Have you considered outsourcing your sales function, in particular your sales management? If you’ve wondered about the benefits of outsourcing sales operations and how outsourced sales management works, read on. You might discover that sales outsourcing can take your business to new levels of success.
The Problems of Internally Managing Sales Operations
Businesses and the environments (internal and external) in which they operate constantly change. So, whether yours is a longstanding or new business, when market share drops or revenue falls short, it can be easy to attribute the downturn to external factors and maintain your course – for a while. However, when sales performance shortcomings become the norm rather than the exception, it’s time to examine your sales strategy, your sales processes, and your team’s ability to fix what’s broken.
Often, when a troubling sales/revenue trend is identified, many business leaders, including owners or executives from other areas, try to “right the ship” themselves. Unfortunately, by taking on sales management responsibility, they neglect other critical business areas. Coupled with the fact that they might not be skilled or experienced in sales leadership, this can drag the ship down even faster.
Hiring a highly-qualified full-time VP of Sales might not be the answer either, because current revenue can’t sustain the expense – at least not until sales and revenue improve. And even if you have the resources to tackle nagging sales problems internally, it can be difficult for insiders to truly see and address problems when bogged down in the day-to-day details of running your business.
For these reasons and more, a growing number of small to mid-sized businesses are turning to outsourced sales management. Here’s why:
Benefits of Outsourcing Sales Operations
The difficulties and challenges of internally managing sales operations can be unique from industry to industry and company to company. From start-ups to legacy businesses, every organization is different, every sales team is different, and every market position is different. Still, for many small to mid-sized businesses, we often see similar benefits from outsourcing sales management. These include:
Strategic Focus
When you hire an Outsourced VP of Sales (OVPS), strategic focus is a result. The OVPS can concentrate on fixing, leading, and managing sales operations while the owner or other company executives can focus on other key aspects of the business.
Lower Cost
By bringing in a sales management consultant, such as a fractional-time Outsourced VP of Sales, costs are typically lower than for a full-time VP of Sales or even a dedicated Sales Manager. This becomes especially clear when you factor in a full-time sales leader’s salary and benefits. Because an OVPS is contracted for fewer hours each week and for a limited time overall, costs are contained while solutions are developed.
Increased Sales and Profit Margin
It is the role of the Outsourced VP of Sales is to identify sales performance problem areas and deliver solutions that increase sales, revenue, and profits. With this singular focus, perspective and accountability, results often exceed expectations.
Sustainable Operations
With deep executive-level sales management experience, an Outsourced VP of Sales has the unique perspective to analyze and build sales strategies, plans, processes, and teams. By quickly putting these key components in place and refining as necessary, sustainable sales performance and success make it possible for the short-term engagement of the OVPS to lead to hiring a full-time sales manager or executive.
How Outsourced Sales Management Works
A customized client engagement typically includes several critical components, such as:
- Developing a sales strategy
- Recruiting, interviewing, hiring, and training your sales force
- Creating and executing a sales plan focused on growth
- Reporting on and analyzing sales performance
- Building compensation plans that deliver results
- Holding the sales team accountable via weekly team meetings, coaching, ride-alongs, training, and corrective-action plans
- Selecting, customizing, and fully leveraging a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system
- Developing best practices for sales
At the conclusion of the engagement, the Outsourced VP of Sales will have delivered both a team and the processes to drive significant revenue growth.
The Bottom Line:
For many small to mid-sized businesses and start-ups, outsourced sales management has benefits that lead to sustainable sales success and revenue growth. At Sales Xceleration, our sales management consultants typically engage as Outsourced VPs of Sales. They learn about your unique needs, develop a custom plan that puts a structure and system in place, and then manage it until you can hire a sales leader. Based on your needs, the amount of involvement and cost varies, but engagements typically last about a year. We offer a no-obligation assessment that allows us to build a proposal to address your organization’s needs. To get started, find an outsourced VP of Sales near you by clicking here, or call us at (844) 874-7253 to learn more.
(Still not sure if your company could benefit from using an Outsourced VP of Sales? Take our free 10-question Sales Agility Assessment now.)