How to Set Up a Winning GTM Sales Program - Part 3

"Nothing Happens Until Someone Sells Something"

(Henry Ford)

To begin with, let's all acknowledge that it is pretty presumptuous to claim that there is one way to set up a sales team. After all, every business is unique and presents its own set of challenges and opportunities. The one commonality is that everyone must generate significant sales to survive. However, how you accomplish that will depend on your industry, competition, pricing decisions, and 100 other considerations.

This is the third installment of our go-to-market strategy series. The previous two articles were:

How to Create a GTM Plan—Part 1: In this section, we discussed the benefits of a GTM plan and began to discuss the steps needed to implement an effective program.

How to Create a Winning Go-To-Market Plan - Part 2: This article discussed pricing strategies, unique value propositions, and GTM strategies.

For this article, we will delve into the sales side of your GTM strategy in more detail. We will assume your product or service is not an e-commerce product or service that requires little or no sales support. We will discuss those requiring a more protracted sales cycle because of the price point or competition, where nothing happens without a highly qualified and motivated sales team.

Pro Tip: Hire the most experienced candidates to head up your marketing and sales initiatives. If you do not have the revenue that justifies their hire, find ways to enhance your offer with equity and a revenue share. Many startup companies, particularly those with tech founders, make one major mistake. They believe they have such a unique and novel solution that the world will beat a path to their door to buy it. This belief system, coupled with the fact that financial resources are scarce, results in them hiring a very inexperienced marketing and sales team. The results are usually a disaster where they never achieve the traction needed to continue operations.

Establishing A Sales Program

We start by determining what type of sales program is appropriate for the startup company. This is not difficult, as the answers to these questions will quickly allow you to flesh out the right sales initiatives. The questions are:

1. Product Complexity: While some products are designed to be self-served e-commerce purchases that can be purchased without much consideration by the buyer, others, due to the competitive marketplace or the complexity of the product, take time and consideration. Does your product/service require the buyer to compare, contrast, or negotiate before they buy it?

2) Target market characteristics: In many cases, due to the amount of the product or service, the decision to purchase must be made by senior management if not the C-Suite itself. The consultative sales process

• Sales cycle length

• Resource availability

• Customer preferences

Define Your Sales Strategy

1. Define your target audience: You must identify your target market and what are the characteristics of your ideal customer profile. Prevail Marketing has the industry's gold standard when it comes to identifying the ideal customer and the personas that comprise it. This process can be reviewed on the following pages and articles:

• Our Approach

• How To Create Buyer Personas

• Buyer Personas - The Foundation of Strategic Marketing

2. Determine your sales model: Whatever sales model you implement, it must be a multi-faceted approach that engages with the prospect in the manner that their buyer profile indicates. In most cases, the client will use a combination of approaches. However, every single one of the approaches is presented using the consultative sales approach. The consultative sales approach focuses on helping the prospect understand how the benefits of your brand can help address or solve a problem they are facing. Every prospect is primarily concerned about how your product or service will be the solution to help them grow their business. Consultative sales focuses on building relationships and trust.

While there is no one-size-fits-all, here are some of the sales models that many B2B clients incorporated into their programs.

Inbound Sales Method: This sales methodology is closely tied to the inbound marketing philosophy. The idea is to engage the prospect with content and promotions that align with what their persona needs to see at each stage of the buyer's journey. When the prospect does a bottom-of-the-funnel activity (e.g., ask about pricing, ask to see a case study, or speak to a rep), or they accumulate enough nurturing points through lead scoring that we know they are ready to engage with sales.

Outbound Sales Method: Here is a dirty little secret that the originator of the inbound marketing concept does not want you to know. HubSpot, which built its claim to fame using inbound marketing and sales, built much of its business using the ultimate outbound sales methodology: cold calling. HubSpot literally had "boiler rooms" where its sales team was judged not only on results but also on the number of dials they made.

While cold calling can be extremely difficult and only has a conversion rate of about 2% (LinkedIn) If enough calls are made and they are done properly, it can jump-start a sales program long before inbound sales will deliver on its promise.

There is a proven methodology that Hubspot perfected over a number of years that can increase that conversion rate. Using the right approach, a study found that 69% of those being cold-call allowed the sales rep to pitch them. (Crunchbase) Another study found that 82% accepted meetings with sales professionals who contacted them proactively, including by cold calling. (The Rain Group)

The key is to hire highly qualified Business Development Reps (BDRs), train them, provide them support, and set clear expectations.

Account-Based Sales: Account-based sales is the ying to the yang of account-based marketing (ABM). Account-based marketing is a highly focused strategic approach implemented by the marketing and sales teams to target high-value accounts using very personalized content. It flips the traditional marketing funnel upside down by focusing on specific target accounts and then engaging individuals within those accounts. ABM includes the same elements of the comprehensive marketing plan: inbound marketing, content marketing, earned media, and outbound marketing. The differentiation between ABM and Comprehensive Marketing is the size of the net you cast and the degree of personalization.

Why should companies consider an ABM sales approach? Let's look at the numbers:

• Account-Based Marketing/Sales will increase the sales process by 28% (The CMO Club).

• 97% of companies said ABM had a higher ROI than other marketing activities. (Alterra Group)

• Companies using ABM saw a 171% increase in contract value. (ABM Benchmark Study, 2017)

Leverage Sales Methodologies: One of the most cost-efficient sales methodologies that a startup or early-stage company can implement is one that takes advantage of the time, energy, talent, reach, and relationships that third parties have already built with your targeted buyer personas. Several sales programs can create massive results in a short period. These include Affiliate Marketing and Reseller Programs.

• Affiliate marketing(AM): AM is a performance-based program where you leverage the time and talents of an individual (or company) to market your products or services. You only pay when an actual sale is made, making this an extremely cost-effective method for increasing your sales. Affiliates use their marketing prowess to promote your products or services through various channels such as websites, blogs, social media, or email marketing. Affiliates are given a tracking code or a dedicated landing page so all their efforts can be attributed back to them.

• Reseller programs: A reseller program allows you to leverage another business's marketing and sales skills to sell your product or service. It is a business arrangement where a company purchases products or services from a manufacturer or service provider at a wholesale price and then resells them to end customers at a higher retail price. The reseller acts as an intermediary between the manufacturer and the customer, handling tasks such as marketing, sales, and customer support.

  A subset of reseller programs are value-added resellers (VARs). A VAR will take your product or service, create integrations, or add products and features that provide enhancements and sell as an integrated package.

Establish a Pricing Strategy: An extensive amount of research must be undertaken when setting up the prices you will sell your product or service. The various types of pricing models were discussed in some detail in the second installment of this series, How to Create a Winning Go-To-Market Plan - Part 2. Here are some of the research and considerations that must be conducted:

Know your Numbers: Before you can begin pricing your brand, you need to understand your fixed costs of doing business (e.g., rent, salaries, insurance, etc.) and the variable costs of doing business (e.g., cost of goods, shipping, etc.).

Competitive Research: What are your competitors charging for a similar product or service? Do they offer any discounts or incentives?

Pro Tip: Avoid being the low-cost company that tries to capture market share by barely making a profit. First, consumers may view your price point as indicating that your product is cheaply constructed. Dr. Robert Cialidini, in his book Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion, spoke of how people are trained to believe the rule “You get what you pay for,” which is further translated to mean “expensive = good.”

If you base your model on being the lowest-price option, it will not only be seen as inferior, but it usually results in a race to the bottom when a competitor starts lowering their prices to compete.

Set clear revenue goals and objectives: Be specific on what you want to achieve. For example, "We will increase sales revenue by 100% over the next fiscal year". Or if you are an actual startup, "We will have sales of one million USD by the next fiscal year. Whatever you choose, there are two general rules to follow:

1. The revenue goals should make you uncomfortable. Something that, while theoretically possible, scares the hell out of you. You want a goal that will challenge you.

2. The revenue goals should be achievable if your team works hard, implements best practices, and truly is willing to grind it out every single day.

While the two criteria may sound inconsistent, a well-trained Chief Growth/Revenue officer will know how to find the balance and craft a program to achieve it.

Recruiting the Right Sales Talent: For any company to be successful, it needs the right combination of a great product, a process defined by best practices, and a team of professionals who can execute and deliver on its promises. One of the most critical hires will be your sales team. They will define your success or create your failure.

Not ALL sales positions require the same skill sets. For example, the person cold calling is usually not the person who will do the demos or close the sale. Different skills are required, so before you begin advertising for a position, create the ideal candidate profile.

• What are the skill sets they need?

• What is their personality type (e.g., D.I.S.C profile)?

• What success have they had in prior companies?

• Are they trainable?

• Will they be a good cultural fit?

Implement a Product and Sales Training Program: Onboarding a new sales professional should not simply introduce them to the company's policies and procedures but must have a comprehensive training program that covers both product information and how to sell.

Product Knowledge: It is not enough that your sales team needs to know product information. They must understand the nuances of using and optimizing it when a prospect has a unique use case. They need to have a clear understanding of how each persona will utilize the product. In short, they have to be experts in all aspects of the product, including specs and product implementation, and be able to present the product in a clear, logical format.

Sales Training: Of course, you will hire a highly trained sales team with a track record of success. While you don't want to micro-manage how they sell, you will need them to understand and utilize your process. Do not assume everyone will automatically respond to a prospect or handle a question the same way you might. Provide a course that will make it clear what processes and procedures they need to follow.

ProTip: We recommend that ALL new sales team members shadow your best sales professional, who will teach by doing all their normal activities for two weeks. The new hire is not to speak or engage the prospect in any manner during the calls but must listen and learn. When the third week arrives, the roles are reversed. The new hire makes all the calls and performs normal activities. The teacher only interjects to save a sale or avoid a problem from occurring.

Monitor Performance and Make Adjustments: Every sales team member has their own personal KPIs and metrics to achieve. The metrics will be different since sales professionals' roles have different responsibilities. The results expected by a particular team member will be based on their skills and experience. The more senior sales members should have higher standards in their metrics.

Here is a list of key performance indicators (KPIs) and metrics that are commonly applied to sales professionals to evaluate their performance and contribute to the growth of the business:

Business Development Representatives (BDRs)

• Number of Calls Made

• Number of Calls Connected

• Number of Appointments Set

DEMO or Closers

• Monthly Sales Growth

• Average Profit Margin

• Customer Retention

• ROI Indicators

• Sales Pipeline Health

• Sales Targets/Goals Achievement

• Net Promoter Score (NPS)

• Average Sale Value (ASV)

• Sales Growth by Product/Service

Conclusion

If your sales team is not some of your company's most highly compensated employees, you clearly don't understand their value. If a sale is not made, everyone in the company quickly becomes unemployed. Hire the best, train them well, and hope they have such high income from their commissions that the company is straining to keep up.

Too many companies hire some of the most green and inexperienced sales professionals. They claim it is because they want to teach them their unique method. However, that is not the real reason they hire inexperienced sales team members. Any great sales professional will gladly adopt a better practice if it means more sales. Mostly, they hire these young, inexperienced people because they work for less. The results are fewer sales for lower amounts.

Be Smart - Hire The Best - Train Them - Pay Them Well