The key to achieving Field Sales effectiveness is to get all the supporting ingredients in place so that the person can be a success – this means targeting them at the right customers, providing them with the key customer and competitor information they need to develop the wining sales approach and put forward the right proposition at the right price - this is where automation can help. However, get the ingredients mix wrong and it can have a detrimental effect on sales to the extent that in extreme circumstances in order to be successful the sales team avoid the supporting technology.

The last five years has seen an incredible uptake of Sales Force Automation solutions - but there is still room to improve. Capgemini’s experience is that it is not unusual to find less than 20% of a sales person’s time to be spent on ‘active selling’ – the rest being made up by less value adding activities. Redesigning sales activities from the perspective of both sales efficiency and sales effectiveness, particularly those involving the rest of the organisation, can realise a 100% improvement in active selling time and higher conversion rates while still providing the feedback and data to keep sales management and marketing happy. While technology properly designed and implement can undoubtedly help, it is only one part of the solution. Establishing the right sales behaviours and competences is equally important. Investment in developing core selling skills and providing active coaching supported by the right incentives and rewards will help to address the all important ‘last yard’ of the sales process – closing the sale.

Capgemini has proven experience of improving the efficiency and effectiveness of sales organisations both with and without technology for clients across multiple business sectors.

This section includes:

• Benefits of Sales Efficiency and Effectiveness
• Capgemini’s approach
• Capgemini capability
• Success stories

The benefits of Sales Effectiveness

• Increased revenues and increased share of wallet through faster sales cycles
• Cost efficiencies through lower cost of sales and better customer coverage
• Increased customer satisfaction levels leading to return business
• Greater innovation as a result of better customer insight through real-time information

Capgemini’s approach

Capgemini’s Sales Effectiveness Framework (picture available) takes into account different challenges faced by organisations in relation to their sales channels. These include the need to:

• Analyse sales strategy
• Analyse market and customer requirements
• Review customer segmentation
• Define to-be account management organisation
• Define team roles and responsibilities as well as required skills
• Design adequate processes for interaction with Key Accounts
• Define supporting systems and tools, e.g. Account KM repository
• Develop adequate pricing model
• Define performance measurement and reporting responsibilities

Capgemini capability

Capgemini has over 150 consultants with experience of working on Sales Effectiveness and Efficiency programmes and over 20 dedicated sales experts some of whom have over 15 years experience of bringing benefit to sales organisations. We have a proven and structured approach to identifying and addressing sales issues which can be tailored to your circumstances. We aim to deliver short benefit focused projects to get our clients started while equipping the client’s own team with the tools and training they need to continue the journey.

We can help you assess the current health of sales organisation and how much potential you could unlock.

Success stories

Logistics company

This client offers “customer-unique” logistic solutions to companies with transport needs for parcels and pallets to, from and within the Nordic region, and targets companies and private individuals in 190 countries across the world.The sell-in and implementation of new large accounts were malfunctioning while there were threats from the firm’s largest customer to call off contract. There were communication and collaboration problems between Sales/Key Account function and supporting functions. Capgemini was appointed to work on both the sales related issues and the capacity problems at the hubs, in two separate projects. We developed a hands-on sell-in and implementation process, created through collaborative workshops where Sales and supporting functions worked together, and established clear escalation procedures to secure contract profitability levels and operational feasibility. Based on new processes, roles and responsibilities were defined, including the creation of cross-functional Bid Teams with responsibility to sell-in new contracts. The end result has been an improved working climate and better co-operation between internal functions through cross-functional bid-team and implementation team and an improved ability to take informed decisions, as a result of better information and knowledge sharing between functions.