Facing challenges in ramping a sales team
Structuring a Sales team with well-defined processes is still one of the most challenging goals that agencies need to achieve to thrive in a market as crowded as marketing.
It is no wonder that, according to the Digital Agencies Panorama 2019 (survey developed by Resultados Digitais and Rock Content), 46.2% of respondents said that there is no consolidated sales model in the agency in which they work.
If your business is experiencing this same reality, then you need to roll up your sleeves, find out what are the key challenges that lead to this problem and define strategies that are aligned with your customer’s buying journey.
Want to know how to structure a sales team that is more optimized for your agency and thereby generate more sales? So keep reading and check out our three tips!
1. Find out what your agency’s main challenges are
The first step in making an agency’s Sales team effective is mapping out the main challenges it faces in its structure that directly impact its performance.
This starting point helps you understand how processes should be implemented and what improvements should be made for marketing and sales teams to make the sales funnel effectively for business results.
One of the most frequent problems, for example, is precisely the lack of alignment between marketing and sales professionals.
Inaccurate communication between these two teams generates incomplete definitions of what results they have to deliver, omitting critical information for the first approach and lack of constructive feedback.
As a result, the likelihood that efforts will be directed toward disqualified leads becomes much higher and makes it challenging to approach potential customers that fit the agency profile.
Calculate your agency’s CAC
An excellent way to evaluate the performance of your sales cycle and the health of your business is by calculating Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC).
This metric, which helps you understand how much your business is investing in marketing and sales (salaries, commissions, ad-buying, etc.) to attract new customers. It’s calculated through the following formula:
CAC = investments made to acquire unique customers/number of new customers
If the result is higher than the client’s Lifetime Value (LTV), then it means the agency is experiencing financial problems that may be significant to its survival in the marketplace.
See how a simple challenge can lead to other problems that are much bigger and harder to solve?
Therefore, the sooner you take the time to evaluate your agency’s performance and identify adversity, the easier the process of optimizing your business will be.
2. Structure processes for Sales team optimization
Structuring the Sales team only happens when an agency knows what needs improvement and implements well-defined procedures for all stages of the sales funnel.
These processes need to define marketing and sales deliverables, making these teams more agile and effective in attracting, nurturing, and approaching potential customers.
The first step for this structure to work is to determine what the ideal customer profile for the agency is and how information should be exchanged for teams to cooperate with each other.
What characteristics and data about the lead should reach the sales team, for example, so that the salesperson knows how to approach it and what solutions to offer him?
And what feedback should be given to the marketing team for nutrition and lead qualification to be more productive?
Reflection on these issues is essential to start planning for the optimization of your sales team.
An excellent way to make the sales pipeline even more efficient and to create this link between marketing and sales is to introduce a presales team, as we will talk about below.
3. Introduce a presales team in your sales area
Adding a presales team in your sales team is a crucial step in achieving process optimization that you have structured for the business.
After all, it is the Sales Development Representative (SDR), who is responsible for this activity, who can direct the prospect to the agency’s customer profile and select the leads that are actually ready to make the purchase.
Effective lead management makes efforts focused only on real business opportunities, so the entire process becomes more strategic.
Two of the significant consequences of this optimization, for example, are reduced CAC and continued agency growth.
With a well-prepared presales team, it is also possible to promote alignment between the marketing and sales teams, and set goals that bring them closer to the company’s objectives.
This is, indeed, an essential starting point for analyzing each professional’s performance and plan actions aimed at achieving the best results at each stage of the sales funnel.
In addition, more strategic process structuring and lead qualification make contact with the prospect faster and more solution-oriented.
This way, the seller can answer your questions more efficiently and offer customized service, starting a relationship of trust with this potential customer.
See how the presales team can make all the difference in your agency’s sales performance?
