Organizations in which senior leadership publicly supports and sponsors the sales team typically have a healthy sales culture, and a healthy sales culture is what drives solid top-line results.
Regardless of whether senior executives have a business development, operational or engineering bent, they need to foster a solid sales culture if they want the best sales results. The following ideas are ways any senior leader can get the sales team more engaged and empowered to be successful.
1. Annual sales meeting keynotes
There’s no better place to motivate, empower and support the sales team than at an annual sales meeting. When a CEO or president gives a keynote to the sales organization and commits to that team that senior leadership understands what sales faces and will provide them with resources to help them succeed, morale among the sales team will improve.
2. Publicly celebrate wins
Celebrating sales success via company-wide newsletters, company-wide emails or some other medium reinforces the value leaders place on the efforts of its salespeople. Further, this practice can create a sense of competitiveness among the sales team around who can get some time in the public spotlight, which is another win.
3. Host forums in which salespeople are asked for input
People want to feel heard, and your salespeople are no exception. By placing value on the marketplace intelligence sales can bring to the organization and actively seeking input from sales relative to new products, trends in the marketplace, competitive intelligence, etc., senior execs are saying “you’re important to us,” which will foster a higher level of engagement.
4. Create a culture of sales coaching
When salespeople see that managers are encouraged by senior leadership to invest in their people to help them get better, they come to believe that the organization genuinely cares about making them successful. Sales organizations in which front-line reps are armed to advance their careers are among the healthiest.
5. Invest in sales enablement in a very real way
Sales training, sales enablement technology and the development of an inbound lead methodology are all great examples of positive ways senior leadership can allocate budget to support sales. By investing in your sales team – and helping them to become more efficient and successful – you’re creating a win-win scenario in which you’ll realize more revenue and build employee loyalty.
While these are all viable ways of generating a healthy sales culture inside of your organization, one of the absolute best ways to improve your revenue generation is through a sales culture shift initiative.
This involves customized sales training, sales management training and the implementation of talent assessments as part of the selection process.
NOTE: Our sales training tools are designed to make your life easier. Use them to your advantage.
How to Align Sales & the Rest of the Organization
We just finished an eye-opening research study which revealed that 47% of salespeople do not have confidence that the sales department is respected by other departments inside of the company. The fundamental truth is this: sales believes that the rest of the company wouldn’t have jobs if not for them… and the rest of the company feels sales wouldn’t have a job without them.
