We know that salespeople who accomplish their goals do these things consistently:
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Their goals are written down and they have a plan to achieve them.
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They have a timeframe that they stick to and their goals are defined and measurable.
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Lastly, they have an accountability partner or a coach to keep them on track.
A sustainable sales goal plan is more than just thinking about and writing down goals. Goals without actions and a strategic plan are just thoughts you have about what might happen. Writing goals with action items is a waste of time if you don’t commit to time frames. And ultimately, you have to inspect what you expect. The joy of accomplishing goals is what will keep you moving forward.
But keep in mind this one very important idea – your sales goal plan has to be tied to YOUR personal goals. It must be a number or objective driven by your needs and not the needs of the company. For example, maybe you want to pay off your credit card debt, a significant portion of the mortgage on that new house you bought, or pay for an upcoming vacation in full. When your work plan is directly tied to one of your personal motivators and objectives, you are much more likely to see the success you want.
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The Manager’s Role in Sales Goal Planning
When asked, most sales managers say that one of their greatest challenges is their ability to motivate their salespeople. If a sales manager can figure out what makes their team “tick,” they can better help them hit their goal numbers. Motivation seems like hard work because salespeople often value different things. There are, however, several steps a sales manager can take to establish a motivating environment.
The first step is to recognize that motivation is an “inside-out job.” When the topic of motivation is discussed, we typically think about incentive compensation, sales contests, and recognition programs. All of these certainly encourage your sales teams to focus on generating new business because these are rewards. However, you will gain true engagement and enthusiasm if you create an everyday environment that encourages each individual to identify and visualize their own internal motivation.
Do you remember Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs pyramid? The bottom two tiers, Physiological and Safety, are the most basic needs of every individual. This same concept holds true for new salespeople. Hopefully, they will make their way up to self-actualization at some point, but they must first have income for food, shelter, safety, etc. Only once they realize they have attained all of these basic necessities and have established a cushion, can they turn attention to the higher tiers of Self-Actualization and the bigger dreams and goals to which they might aspire.
To put it another way, salespeople do not care about corporate shareholder value unless they are shareholders themselves. What they care about is food, shelter, clothing, recognition, paying for a college education or a wedding, buying a vacation home, etc. These are personal desires and make up the vast majority of things that are important to people. So, the solution is to create an environment where this internal motivation can take place. Refer to The Dream Manager by Michael Kelly for more insights.
This means that it is up to you to help your salespeople identify what is important to them. Make the effort to set up time off-site that is dedicated to planning and spend time developing each individual’s dreams and sales goal plan. This is time that you and they will spend ON your business instead of in it. Take a day or two that will help you and your team take a giant step forward to plan for the future.
Create a process where people can establish personal goals because this is where true motivation, passion, and desire are born. Hence, it is from this process that each salesperson’s business plan must evolve.
Create an environment where people get a chance to unplug, sit down, and outline their goals and dreams; a time when both of you can establish timeframes and attach financial values to these items. Once you have attached financial values, you will know what level of prospecting and selling activity is necessary for each salesperson.
Reward yourself and your people when they have a success. As your people go through this process and identify their sales goal plan; as you sit down, and establish your own personal goals, be sure to specify how you will reward yourself and your people as each of you achieve these goals. Make sure that you take time to find and celebrate the joy of this wonderful world of selling and helping customers make sound decisions, as that might just be the most rewarding goal of all.
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