Sales Management for Start-ups and SMEs

Building an effective scalable sales organisation

Anderson Hirst

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2024
• ISBN:
  9781040123904
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Sales
• Index: Business

Managers and entrepreneurs know they have a great product or service - but they may not know how best to sell it.

Useful for nearly any sector or industry, this book is a thoroughly practical guide on how to build an excellent sales organisation, brick by brick. Creating an effective sales organisation is a challenge for many businesses, and it's easy to waste resources on ineffective approaches. Many MBA and executive education programmes do not cover sales management in any depth. Filling this knowledge gap, this guide will help readers to create their own unique high-performing sales organisation that fits their product and market environment. Evidence-based and field-tested, it will gives answers to critical questions, including:

• Which sales process should we use?
• How do we recruit, retain and inspire our sales team?
• What should we measure, and how should we manage it?
• What do great sales managers do?

Rich with case studies from the author's 25 years of sales consulting experience, this book will appeal to a wide variety of managers and entrepreneurs who wrestle with the question "How do I grow my business?" from sales directors to start-up founders to MBA students.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Endorsement Page
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• 1 The scalable sales organisation: What are the key elements we can define to make our sales organisation scalable?
• 2 Your sales strategy and growth model: How exactly are you going to grow your revenues?
• 3 Defining your sales process and customer journey: How can you best develop potential customers into loyal advocates?
• 4 B2B personal selling under the microscope: What are the essential elements of typical B2B selling?
• 5 Your unique sales methodology: What are the specific routines, attitudes and processes that define good selling in your context?
• 6 Lead generation: What methods could you use to generate new opportunities?
• 7 Your unique value proposition and pricing: Why should customers buy from you and how much should they pay you?
• 8 Sales organisation structures: What structure is most appropriate for your sales approach and stage of growth?
• 9 The work of sales managers in start-ups and SMEs: How do effective sales managers spend their time?
• 10 Targets, forecasts, budgets and KPIs: What are the essential measures to manage sales organisations and how can we derive them?
• 11 Pipeline and opportunity management: How can we best manage this most essential of sales tasks?
• 12 Sales technology: Why is successful selection and deployment of sales technology so important for growth?
• 13 The vital importance of sales training: What does good development look like for sales teams?
• 14 Account management: What can we do to make sure our hard-won customers stay with us?
• 15 Compensation, incentives and prizes: How do we ensure we have competitive, motivating incentive schemes in place that align to our sales strategy?
• 16 Recruitment and onboarding: How do we find the best salespeople and set them up for success?
• 17 Working with partners and resellers: When should we sell through other organisations and how can we best manage these relationships?
• 18 Evolving your sales organisation: How can you ensure your sales organisation adapts to a changing environment?
• Index