In 2021, sales organizations have more data on their hands than they know what to do with. Your company data is the most valuable resource you have as a sales leader (besides your team of course). But there are so many data points you can focus on that analyzing them often becomes overwhelming and confusing. The result is that many companies end up abandoning data analysis altogether, despite the extraordinary resources they have at their disposal. That’s why it is critical to identify the most important data points to focus on, the ones that will have a direct impact on your company’s revenue.
If you want more ways to make good use of your data and save time as a sales leader, Attention can help! We use the latest artificial intelligence technology to help train your reps and track their progress over time.
1. Growth
One of the fundamental metrics you absolutely need to keep an eye on is your company’s sales growth rate. Your sales process should be geared towards growing your revenue and sales. It is important to identify the processes and activities that most contribute to furthering your growth and zero in on these.
2. Lead Conversions
How effectively does your team transform leads into confirmed customers? For obvious reasons, you should keep track of this metric at all times and do anything in your power to improve it. Remember, the purpose of these metrics is to determine through trial and error followed by analysis, what the best practices for your company are. Once you have determined these activities, you should set process-based goals for your team to strive towards and systematize.
3. Number of Calls
It is essential for you to know how many calls your reps are putting in on a weekly, monthly, and yearly basis. This can help you identify underperforming reps who are not putting in enough effort or completing the fundamentals. As you know, you miss 100% of the shots you don’t take! The more calls a salesperson puts in the greater their chances of success. This key analytic can also help you determine ideal call numbers, where the salesperson is putting in enough call volume, but the quality of those calls and his success rate do not diminish. This sweet spot will be different for every rep, and ideally it would be as high as possible.
4. Quote to Close Ratio
Your quote to close ratio, also known as your close rate is the proportion of quotes sent out to deals closed. This is an important metric to get down to the specifics of what is garnering sales and what isn’t. This rate will be different depending on the industry in question, which must be taken into account. A low quote to close ratio could indicate failings on the part of your sales team or it could suggest your lead generation process is flawed and focused on quantity rather than quality.
5. Length of Calls
You want to keep track of how long your reps are spending on their calls. If most of their calls are less than a few minutes long, this indicates a problem somewhere in the sales problems. You should track the percentage of calls that are only a few seconds long and end in a hang-up. Too many of these could indicate that the leads are not sufficiently qualified.
6. Sales Cycle Length
It is critical to track the sales cycle and how long your reps are spending in all the different stages. Lack of time is one of the chief obstacles to success in sales, so reducing the sales cycle should be one of your first priorities. This can help you find out if there are any blockages that need to be taken care of in your sales funnel. It can also help you avoid prospects that stall too much, and train your reps to overcome stalling and objections. The longer the sales cycle lasts, the higher the chance that the deal will fall through.
7. Percentage of Speaking Time
It is important to keep track of how much your reps are speaking on their calls or virtual meetings, as well as how much they are listening, asking questions, or taking notes. Salespeople tend to be extraverted and talkative by nature, so one of the biggest mistakes they make is talking too much on calls or during meetings. One of the keys to closing sales is giving the prospect the space to speak, voice their problems, and communicate their needs. Salespeople often try to oversell and get their pitch in before the prospect can make any objections, but objections often provide valuable information and can move the conversation forward. Asking effective questions is often far more productive than talking at length about the product.
Attention makes it easier than ever to keep track of this vital analytic in your junior reps’ conversations. Our software tracks and sends feedback based on key metrics like engagement, body language cues, time spent speaking or listening, and countless others.
8. Emails Sent and Open Rate
How many emails are your reps sending out on a regular basis and how often are they actually opened and read? You want to track both of these metrics together to establish the ratio. Again, you want to establish a sweet spot here. If too few emails are sent out, your reps may have to put in more work, but if the open rate is too low, your lead generation may be off, or your reps may have to focus on personalizing their emails rather than sending them en masse.
In order to be successful in sales, you need a clear understanding of what your goals are and how to make those happen. Sales analytics can help you track progress towards these goals by showing the growth of your company. Great data points to investigate lead conversions, the number of calls taken per week or month, the quote to close ratio for each customer service representative that is on quota, length of call time spent with a customer before receiving a sale or offer from them, meeting attendance rates, percentage of speaking time during meetings compared to listening/taking notes/silence, emails sent and open rate (as well as any other digital marketing channels). By keeping an eye on these metrics, you can gain clarity about how your team could do better to reach their goals and start generating more revenue.
Consider trying Attention to boost your results even more by accelerating sales training for your junior reps!
