Sales Plan: How to Create an Effective Sales Plan

A sales plan outlines your organization’s strategies, tactics, target market, obstacles, and the steps needed to reach sales goals. It’s a roadmap to guide your team members in every aspect of their sales activities and allows you to keep track of their progress as you hit milestones.

A sales plan lays out the tactics you need to achieve sales targets. A strategic sales plan should:

1. 1. Clarify the company mission and revenue goals: A sales plan ensures everyone on your team works toward the same purpose and understands their contribution. Explore different revenue models.
2. 2. Define tactics and sales tools your sales reps can use to achieve goals: A comprehensive sales plan will improve your team’s efficiency since they won’t have to spend energy deciding on the best approach.
3. 3. Establish a time frame of achievable benchmarks to reach sales targets: Due dates for goals will help you and your team stay productive and make the most of your time.
4. 4. Identify a target audience for new business: New business leads to company growth, so it helps to be specific about who you want to reach. Learn more about finding your target market.
5. 5. Outline obstacles to reaching your sales goals: A sales plan gives you a clear picture of the challenges you may encounter along the way, giving you time to make a plan to overcome them.
6. 6. Track progress towards success: If you find your team struggles to meet milestones on time, you may want to rethink your strategy.

Keep the following tips in mind as you formulate your sales plan:

1. 1. Be flexible and communicate with your team. You may need to adjust your sales plan as you reach sales milestones. Be sure to communicate these changes to your sales managers.
2. 2. Give your salespeople incentives. Reward and acknowledge your team whenever they reach business goals, such as finding new leads for possible sales, generating referrals, or closing deals with first-time customers. Incentives will energize your sales force to keep pushing toward your sales goals and make them feel like they’re an integral part of the sales process.
3. 3. Set clear, realistic goals. Avoid setting your goals so high that they aren’t achievable. A good sales plan should have both short-term and long-term goals and instill a feeling of possibility and excitement in your sales professionals.
4. 4. Use CRM software to optimize customer relationships. CRM, or customer relationship management, is any technology or practice that improves customer-sales team relationships. CRM databases can help your team keep track of outreach to existing clients and qualifying leads.
5. 5. Use KPIs to track your progress. KPIs, or key performance indicators, can help you keep track of important metrics such as revenue growth, profit margin, rate of client retention, and overall customer satisfaction.

Follow these steps to create an effective sales plan. Consider using a free sales plan template to facilitate the process.

1. 1. Identify your company mission. A mission statement clarifies your company’s goals and values and pinpoints a north star for your sales plan. Learn more about writing a mission statement.
2. 2. Determine your revenue targets and a timeframe to meet them. Know your metrics for success by identifying specific sales goals, broken down into objectives to be reached by specific time frames, such as one year, three years, and five years.
3. 3. Define your target customers. Knowing who you’re selling your product to will help determine messaging and pricing and narrow your sales pipeline to focus energy only on areas of possible growth. Clarify the demographics of your ideal customer profile.
4. 4. Identify assets and weaknesses. Knowing your business’ assets and liabilities will help you understand what you can achieve given your available resources. Depending on whether you have a large or small business, the number of employees may limit or enhance the scope of your sales enablement.
5. 5. Create your sales budget. The tactics you use to reach new markets and sales goals will require time and money. Determine your budget parameters to maximize profitability.
6. 6. Develop a detailed sales strategy, including tactics. Define your company’s most effective sales strategy, including specific tactics your sales team will use to reach sales goals, such as targeted emails to potential customers or ad sales for a new product.
7. 7. Implement sales plan and monitor progress. Once your sales plan is in motion, you can determine its success in reaching your sales goals. Make adjustments as necessary, such as changing sales tactics and increasing your budget as your company grows.

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