The Importance of a Sales Strategy

Having an effective sales strategy is vital to the success of any business. It should focus around four key actions:

• Defining what your business needs to achieve through sales activities – taking into account your business objectives
• Understanding and breaking down who your current and potential customers are
• Defining the value potential customers will derive from your products or services
• Planning your approach – identifying any training needs and resources

It’s a good idea to benchmark your strategy by analysing the previous year’s activity. At the same time, look for any customers, sectors or markets you could exploit more effectively – whether new or existing.

Your sales strategy should be challenging but also realistic otherwise it could have a negative impact on motivation.

You should always consider external factors that could affect your business such as seasonality, the economy or government policy changes – and of course what your competitors are doing!

A sales strategy can be reviewed and amended from time to time, but try to avoid too many revisions as this can distract you from other critical tasks and create confusion.