Attieve® Sales Process Analyzer

Step 1: Training of your sales force in the concepts of process

Selling is a process and not a collection of clever strategies.

The selling process is composed of sequentially executed steps. As the process progresses, each step is dependent upon the correct and complete execution of the steps that occur before it. Each step has a specific attrition, capacity, and duration.

In any process, sequential steps are never equal in capacity. One will always have less capacity than others, and it therefore determines the capacity of the process as a whole. The lowest capacity step – the constraint – must be identified.

Efforts applied toward the improvement of all steps result in wasted resources, and rarely increase the capacity of the whole process. Maximum capacity is only achieved when those executing the process understand that the goal of all steps preceding the constraint, is to assure that the lowest capacity step – the constraint step – is always able to work at full capacity.

We train your sales force on these fundamental principles by using our own methodology based on simple objects that are not easily forgotten and on an interactive game that simulates a sales department. Participants “live” the same reality that they experience in their work, where pressure and many hours of work do not guarantee the achievement of the desired sales quota and where every month is a last minute dash, full of special discounts and terms in order to arrive at the desired number.

Fortunately the participants also experience the opposite where quota is met by moving the right number of opportunities at the right speed and the right value through the process. And they are reducing stress and working normal hours.

Immediate benefits

1. Salespeople will understand their daily work in a more productive way.
2. By understanding that they are executing a process they will change their attitude towards each Opportunity as they now understand that their objective is to move it to the next step.
3. The salespeople will become very sensitive to the consumption of time which is their worst enemy.
4. They will clearly know that their success depends on having the right number and value of Opportunities, moving at the right speed, entering and moving through the process.

Step 2: Modeling of your sales processes

Teaching that selling is a process is a great benefit but it is not enough. Each company is different. The culture, product service/mix, approach, and value creation for the marketplace is unique. Thus, the process must be unique. Each Company has different goals, different steps, and different attritions, capacities and durations at each step.

As Opportunities move along the process they create a FLOW of business that must be tracked. This FLOW is composed of the number of Opportunities at each step, the speed at which they move from step to step and their average Value.

One unique combination of these variables will form the FLOW that will take your process to quota. Your processes must be individually modeled in order to define the required FLOW. You will know:

1. How many Opportunities are needed at each step of the sales process at all times?
2. What is the maximum number of days that each Opportunity should take to move from each step to the next?
3. What is the average value that the Opportunities in the process should have?
4. Which is the capacity determining step? What is its capacity?
5. What is the estimated hourly work load required of the people that will execute the sales process?

Immediate Benefits

1. Learning the true closing capacities of your different sales processes.
2. Discovering the values of attrition, duration and capacity that each step of your processes must have in order to achieve the desired goal.
3. Learning if the number of salespeople is enough and if their daily work load is appropriate.

Step 3: Setup and training on the system that will capture the daily sales information

Modeling the processes is a great benefit but it is not enough. A model is just the blueprint of something desired but it is not the reality of what is desired. The model is a simulation of a desired reality.

In order to build this reality it is necessary to have a system that will guide your sales department in the construction of the real sales process. This is a system that works over the internet and is used daily by each person that executes the sales process in order to report certain basic information about the process.

The setup and training on this system is based on the desired model built in step 2.

Immediate Benefits

1. Defining the families and hierarchy of your Processes
2. Defining the flow of information amongst the Processes

Step 4: Using the system

Setting up the system is not enough. It must be used on a daily basis by the people executing the sales process so the results can be compared to the model built in Step 2 and 3. We are committed to supporting you and making sure that everyone stays on track so you can get the full benefit of the system.

Immediate Benefits

1. Capture the real FLOW and values of your sales processes.
2. Solidify in your salespeople the concepts learned in step 1.
3. Gather data to begin validating the process model built in Step 2 and 3.

Step 5: Continuous analysis and improvement using the collected information

(This step happens concurrently with step 4)

Capturing the real data is not enough. The actual results must be continuously compared against the modeled results in order to know if the sales process being analyzed is on track to meet the expected quota.

If results are not being achieved in the day to day work of the sales force then immediate action must be taken in order to improve it. Over time, reality will mirror the model. In this way the real sales process will achieve the sales goals defined in the model.

Immediate Benefits

1. Confirm that the model designed in step 2 is correct, and that the values are achievable.
2. Targeted, corrective action only in the most constrained process.
3. Complete visibility into each salesperson that allows individualized sales management coaching.
4. The individuals and the Company continuously improve and move at the same time toward achieving the quota.

Step 6: Presentation of results and recommendations

We will meet with you regularly (at least monthly) to discus what we have discovered during the engagement. We will give you our analysis of what we are seeing in the Company. We will discuss the effectiveness of the sales process, the progress of the individuals, and the ability of achieving the modeled quota.

At the end of the engagement we will present final conclusions and recommendations.

Immediate Benefit

1. Progress measurement to gauge the overall effectiveness of the plan.
2. Know exactly what has happened and what must be done in order to continuously and reliably achieve the sales goals you desire.