The headline of this article may sound ‘Common Sense’ to you but I needed to write this article to narrate the plight of the thousands of ‘Sales Representatives’ who suffer because of the lack of this ‘Common Sense’ in some of the top leaders of their organizations.
‘Sales Department’ in every organization is given sales targets.
In many organizations, a substantial part of the salary of a sales person is kept as variable, which is paid to him only when he achieves the target.
The sales target set for a sales person is always a challenging one.
In most of the cases, the sales target is just imposed on the sales person.
Even if, the sales person complains about this challenging sales target with his manager, it does not yield anything because the manager himself is sandwiched between the top management and the sales people.
The Sales Manager being a part of the sales department loses a substantial portion of his salary, if his department does not achieve the total sales target.
Before getting self-employed, I was employed as a sales representative and also as a sales manager for a decade. So, I resonate with the sales people and their managers very well when they say that they do not get the support from their organization that is needed by them in order to achieve their sales targets.
I urge you to go through this article as an unbiased judge without having any prejudice either in favour of the sales department or in favour of the top management of the organization.
The plight of the sales people requesting their top management representatives to improve service for their customers to help them achieve their sales target is prevalent in every industry.
Whether it is ‘Fast moving consumer goods’ or ‘Banking’, the sales people keep crying loud for better service for their customers in order to help them achieve their sales target.
In this article, am not talking about the sales people who are very new in the sales profession or the sales people who join an organisation in its sales department for a brief period until they get a non-sales job as per their expectation.
In this article, am talking about the sales people, who are very serious about their job and are proud to be in sales, as they represent their employing company in the market.
Let me take you through some scenarios in different industries and you decide for yourself, whether the demand of the sales people from their top management representatives to improve service for their customers in order to help them achieve their sales target is justified or not.
Fast Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG)
I am associated with a well-known FMCG company in India which offers milk and milk products.
The sales team that I train in this company is responsible for the milk business of the company.
Senior sales team members told me that the company had set a very challenging sales target for them, which they were eager to achieve but at the same time they wanted their top management representatives to help them resolve their customers’ issues within a twenty four hours time frame.
The customers of the sales team are the distributors and the retailers.
Many times, some of the milk packets are damaged and affect the business of the distributors and the retailers.
Even if, there is a demand from the end-customers for the milk packets, the distributors and the retailers are unable to meet this demand because of these damaged milk packets.
Many times, it has also happened that the end-customers received these damaged milk packets by mistake and lost their trust in the seller.
These two types of issues need a very fast resolution.
There are hundreds of sales persons who look after the milk business of this company and each of these sales persons wants his customer’s issues to be resolved at the earliest.
Even if, one sales person does not achieve the sales target, the company does not achieve its total sales target.
Though the expectation of the sales people is that issues like damaged packets need to be resolved within a 24 hours time frame, such issues do not get resolved even for days.
Consequence is that sales people lose their distributors and retailers to the competition.
Hence, it becomes increasingly difficult for the sales people to achieve their sales target.
When the sales managers raise such issues of damaged packets with the top management representatives, they are told that they have to drive their sales team members efficiently to achieve the sales target without being given any assurance for improved customer experience.
The company ensures that its sales people are trained consistently and properly to generate sales and maintain good relationship with the customers.
But what about the fast resolution of customer’s issues and customer experience?!
Even if you get trained by the best sales trainer in the world, you cannot revive a relationship with a customer just like that, who has lost his trust in your product and service.
So, as a layman and as an impartial judge, what are your views about this scenario in the FMCG industry?
We will certainly discuss the steps that the top management of an organization in any industry needs to take that can boost the morale of its sales people and make them more confident to achieve their sales target. But we will discuss these steps towards the end of this article, so until then keep reading this article and come up with your own ideas, which can make the sales people more comfortable in their profession.
Banking
Recently, I had an in-depth discussion with a gentleman, who works as a Branch Manager for one of India’s leading private banks.
He has 20+ years experience in sales profession and he leads a team of 20 sales team members.
The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the bank wants it to be numero Uno in the banking industry in terms of the total turnover and encourages the Sales Heads to set challenging sales targets for their teams.
Like the FMCG company that we discussed in the previous scenario, the bank ensures that its sales people are properly trained and are up-to-date.
The top management representatives like the CEO have a notion that once their sales team is properly trained, it can achieve its sales target and help the bank to become numero uno in its industry in terms of total turnover.
Interestingly, the Branch manager who was talking to me about the plight of his and his sales team told me that he and his team were not afraid to take up any challenging sales target that the company set for them, but what they needed was the support from their company to ensure excellent customer experience.
The Branch Manager and his team are responsible for the business of a wide range of the banking products, that is, current accounts to loans and expect their bank to support them for the timely order processing for their customers.
The stiff competition in the banking industry entails fast order processing like opening a current account in few minutes in order to enable the customer to start transacting through the account instantly.
The plight of the Branch Manager and his team is that they have to depend on their back-office team for the order processing and many times, there are delays in order processing which are beyond customer’s tolerance and eventually, the sales team loses the customer.
When the Branch Manger raises such issues with the company’s top management, the simple question that he is asked is, “What is the percentage of such orders out the total sales orders which are lost due to delays in order processing?”
Isn’t it an inexcusable way to evade the responsibility for ensuring rich customer experience?
Even if it is one order out of hundred orders that is lost due to the delay in order processing, it matters a lot. Because that brings out the drawback of the system, which needs to be rectified urgently.
Neither the Branch Manager nor his team members are able to have a sound sleep at night not because of the challenging sales target but because of the customer experience which depends on the bank’s back-office team.
So, tell me what are your views about this scenario?
Why is it so difficult for the CEO as a top management representative of the bank to tell his Sales Heads that he will ensure that the bank provides a rich and numero uno customer experience in the banking industry, which will pave the way for the Sales Heads and their teams to achieve their sales targets to help the bank to become numero uno in terms of total turnover in the banking industry?
Garment
I was asked by a well-known company which runs a chain of premium Indian wear stores to interact with its stores’ sales people to analyse that what needed to be done to increase sales.
The company sells premium Indian wears like Sarees (Indian wear for women) which cost five thousand Indian rupees per piece.
One of the sales managers told me that the company offered a refund or an exchange policy for the customers who brought back the defective saree within a month from the date of purchase. Whereas their customers’ expectation was that the refund or exchange policy time frame should be increased from one month to three months.
When the store manager raised this issue with the company’s top management, they were told that they had to convince the customers that the refund and exchange policy time frame could not be increased.
The result was that the customers went for other similar premium Indian wear stores, as they offered a longer time frame for the refund and exchange policy from the date of purchase.
Point to note in this case was that why the company’s top management was reluctant to find a way to increase the time frame for refund and exchange policy as per their customers’ expectation.
To my surprise, it came out that the supplier of the company which manufactured its products was reluctant to accept a longer time frame for the refund and exchange policy and even the company was not willing to change its terms with the supplier because of very friendly and long relationship.
Instead the company wanted its sales people to cast their magical spell on its customers to increase sales.
Was it not advisable for the company’s management to support its sales people with a longer time frame for the refund and exchange policy to match the offering of its competitors?
Industrial Equipment
I happened to discuss with the Business Head of a well known multi-national company that offers electronic weighing machines for industrial use.
The Business Head said that whenever there was a problem with the load cell (the sensor which measures the weight of the object placed on the weighing machine) of a weighing machine and needed to be replaced, it took atleast a month’s time to replace it, as it needed to be imported from another country which manufactured it.
This led the customer to lose trust in the product and the service of the company, though it is one of the top companies in its field.
The response that this Business Head got from the CEO of the company for this issue was that, “As a CEO, he cannot let the spare parts pile up and let the cost of inventory go up”.
The CEO tells the Business Head to train his sales people to handle customers properly in this kind of cases.
Is it not the responsibility of every CEO of every organization in every industry to ensure that his company provides a very rich customer experience?
Start-up companies like Swiggy (Food Delivery Company) and OLA (Cab Booking company) have set example for every business owner and every CEO around the world that how the rich customer experience can drive business and keep growing it.
There are many pizza sellers in the market but what made Domino’s stand out?
Its service and rich customer experience! Either you get a Domino’s pizza in thirty minutes or your pizza is free.
Sales profession is a very enriching profession, as it needs the sales people to develop their relationship building skills.
A seasoned sales person is excellent at relationship building.
In this digital age, with so much of information going around, customers can get any information with a simple click. They can know about your product in detail and can also make themselves well aware of your competition.
So, relationship building is not enough to retain customers.
With great relationship building skills, a sales person can get a customer for the first time for his employing company but then the sales person needs to be supported by the company to provide excellent customer service and rich customer experience in order to retain the customer.
In fact, in the absence of good service, customers lose trust in the sales person and consider him to be manipulative.
Is it not the moral obligation of the employing company that it provides good products, good service and support its sales person not only to get the customer for the first time but also to retain the customer forever?
It is now time for you to come up with some ideas which can be an answer to the plight of the sales people who lose their night’s sleep because of being pushed beyond limits without getting the support from their employing companies for a good customer service and a good customer experience.
If you are an entrepreneur or the head of an organization, you need to keep on mind that the customer service means the ‘External Customer Service’, that is, the service that you provide your buyers and it also means the ‘Internal Customer Service’, that is, the service that you provide your employees and other stakeholders like your suppliers, vendors and shareholders.
So, keeping the above point on mind, let us now come up with some ideas that can be an answer to the plight of the sales people working in different industries.
i. The employing company needs to provide good product and good service to make it comfortable for its sales people to get customers and retain them.
Gone are those days, when sales people could manipulate customers and help their employing companies reap profits.
This is Digital or Information age.
Customers have all the information, right from a company’s products to its competitors.
Rich customer experience is the key to the success of every organization in this age.
ii. The employing company needs to hire the right people for it sales department. Everyone cannot be a good salesperson.
The candidate needs to have good communication skills, so that he is either clearly understood or can be groomed to be clearly understood.
The candidate needs to have a good attitude towards others, without this he cannot be even groomed to build good relationships with customers.
These two attributes of the candidate, that is, good communication skills and good attitude towards others can be observed and rated by conducting a mock selling session.
iii. Once a candidate is selected for the sales job, he needs to be developed for not only for his selling skills but also for being accountable and responsible.
A good sales person, who holds himself accountable and responsible for the transactions that happen through him, can become a key player in resolving customers’ issues and can become a solid bridge between the customers and his employing company.
iv. The employing company needs to respect its sales people.
There are plenty of selling jobs, as every organization needs good sales people. So, it is important for an organisation to retain its sales people to grow its business steadily.
Sales people who have a stable employment with their employing companies contribute significantly.
A new sales person needs time to understand the products, processes and the culture of the organization, and this time lapse can result in revenue loss for the organization.
So, companies need to encourage their sales people to be stable and need to retain them for a consistent business growth.
Instead of threatening sales people of making them lose their jobs, focus on developing their skills and guide them that how they can perform better.
v. The sales department works hand-in-hand with the other departments like manufacturing, finance & accounts, commercial, logistics and other stakeholders.
The sales people should also be well trained to coordinate with other departments and stakeholders whenever the need arises and should not be restricted to only selling and billing.
A sales person needs to be groomed for the entrepreneurial skills.
vi. The sales people are the point of contact with the customers.
So, the employing company needs to take up the feedback from its seasoned sales people seriously and needs to come up with an action plan for the same in order to enhance customer experience.
vii. And now the final and very important point.
If you are a seasoned sales person and want to change your employing company, then do not change your employing company for the sake of a better remuneration.
Check what your potential employing company can offer that can add value to your own image because customers buy from you and not from the CEO of your employing company. This will ensure that when you decide to start something of your own, your image before your customers should help you for your endeavour.
Hope this article conveys the importance of rich customer experience through excellent service and brings respite to the plight of the sales people who are unable to convey this message to their top management.
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