The customer forms his opinion of an organization based on the people that he works with and sees. For a company, this is the salesperson. The salesperson shapes and structures the customer’s view of the company. Thus, the advancement and collapse of a corporation rests almost solely on the performance of the salesperson. In turn, the responsibility of the qualifications of the salespeople rest on those who train them. This essay is devoted to help set objectives and find a good strategy for the sales manager.

The personal touch and customer service is back in style. More "face time" with the customer and focus on service is showing up as a trend in sales. The management of the sales force is changing as a result with more metrics in place for measurement of outcomes. Globalization presents sales management with the challenge of understanding how cultural influences affect certain business behavior.

Face time

Face time with the customer may be a key to long-term success of a sales force. Making your sales force more productive and minimizing their time in the office will increase revenue…theoretically. Assuming that the sales professional we're talking about is not an idiot who couldn't sell anything to anyone.

One way to get the sales force out of the office and encourage more productivity is to provide more freedom. Some sales professionals may want to hire an assistant, on their own dime, to increase their face time with customers. This can be a risky, but a worth while step for the sales professional. Even though they will be personally responsible for the assistants' salary, the sales professional can free themselves from the daily routine and time consumption of paperwork. This will allow the sales professional to return client calls much quicker, increase face time and ultimately sell much more.

Metrics & CRM

With new customer relationship management (CRM) software available via the web, the sales person can be more productive in the field without tying them down to a desk. CRM automates the recording of customer contacts and improves the development of products and services by analyzing existing buying patterns and streamlining access to customer data.

What does this mean for the sales force and sales management? Measurement opportunity! Organizations are realizing that in order to achieve their business objectives, increasing efficiency alone is not enough. Every company that sells products or services needs to maintain good customer relationships. In order to measure the "good" in "good customer relationships", organizations must review their sales force productivity.