Improve your sales productivity by 5% in 2013

February 19, 2013

By John Boyens, Owner of The Boyens Group

If a salesperson or business owner wants to get off to a quick start in 2013, they can’t confuse sales activity with sales productivity. As a matter of fact, the most successful salespeople and business owners I know establish processes that are repeatable and scalable. That way they know what they did when things are going well and they know what to address when things didn’t go well. One process I suggest they consider is to take my 5% Challenge:

• Improve customer retention by 5%
  • Track customer retention numbers on a monthly, quarterly and annual basis.
  • Thank your customers for their business they’ve given you in the past. Tell them you want to continue to earn their business today and ask what you can do to delight them in the future.
• Upsell or cross-sell 5% of your customers
  • Offer additional products/services to your customers.
  • Establish upsell or cross-sell goals on a daily, weekly and monthly basis.
• Get referrals from 5% of your customers
  • Make a list of five customers from which you’d like to ask referrals.
  • Create a script (or email template) for them to use when introducing you.
• Win back 5% of your former customers
  • Make a list of five customers that haven’t purchased from you in the past 12 months.
  • Create a list of what’s new (i.e., new products and/or services, new locations, new people) since the last time they bought from you.
  • Reach out to them (e.g., phone, email, letter) and let them know you’d love to earn their business again.
• Improve your close rate on new business by 5%
  • Profile your best customers and sell to more potential customers that look like them.
  • Leverage referral selling since referrals close at a significantly higher rate than cold calls.
  • Improve your negotiating and objection handling skills.

So what can a 5% increase in these areas mean to you? It’s not a linear projection, meaning it’s not just a 25% increase.

• A 5% increase in customer retention could mean a 20%, 30% or 40% lift in performance.
• Winning back5% of former customers (and getting them to buy at previous levels) could double your business.
• Improving your close rate by 5% could mean thousands of additional commission dollars in your pocket.

I’m positive you will successfully complete my 5% Challenge. 2013 could become your bestselling year ever! Also, be sure to join me in Nashville for the NAID conference March 22-24!