class_fact

Country Sales Management

Handling Large Territory with No Support

I'm a new BDR at a small, older tech company in Europe with a great but niche product. We have a small sales team, so all of us have huge territories (worldwide). Since the team is so small, each sales person takes multiple roles in the sales process. For example, I generate my own leads, run presentations and software walk-throughs, close deals, and conduct customer service after the sale.

I feel like I lose track of my processes easily and have difficulties following up with contacts. My company is very hands-off (unless something goes horribly wrong) and provides no training or support for reps. This is fine for small deals, but if I work on anything larger, it can be difficult.

Any tips for handling large territory? Thanks

👑 Sales Strategy

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antiASKHOLE

Tycoon

Bravado's Resident Asshole

one question... why are you still classified as a BDR?
Another question.... are you getting compensated on the work that you are doing essentially doing a full cycle AE role?
If the money was good, I would stay, but if not....

class_fact

Opinionated

Country Sales Management

I'm not exactly sure why my job is BDR. My company is in a non-English speaking country, so maybe they became confused.

My salary and commission is good for this country, and the product is interesting. But for the amount of work I do, I would make much more in salary and commission at other companies doing the full cycle as an AE.

Kosta_Konfucius

Politicker

Sales Rep

As long as the salary and commish works!

braintank

Politicker

Enterprise Account Executive

You read my mind!

Calling this person a BDR seems like an easy way to underpay them.

CuriousFox

WR Officer

🦊

Nice gif 🔥

antiASKHOLE

Tycoon

Bravado's Resident Asshole

great band/song too

Pachacuti

Politicker

They call me Daddy, Sales Daddy

Exactly - this isn't a low level BDR/SDR type position.

detectivegibbles

Politicker

Sales Director

Props to you for taking on so much. I promise you, doing all of this will help your career and be appealing to future employers.

I'd look at getting some systems in place.

"I lose track of my processes easily and have difficulty following up"

What can you automate? Have you looked at the DIY tech stack article in the academy? It's nifty and may help.

Piggybacking off Tennis...when you have a huge territory, I think you need to find that carbon copy client that looks, feels, talks, walks like your best current client.

Then go find 100 more of those in one specific area.

class_fact

Opinionated

Country Sales Management

I am working on getting some automation in place with my Head of Sales. But she also sells and manages at the same time, so progress is slow.

I will check out the tech stack article as well. Thank you!

detectivegibbles

Politicker

Sales Director

You've got this. Best part of a big territory is opportunity.

Find the most repeatable and friction-less process you can.
Keep us posted!

TennisandSales

Politicker

Head Of Sales

wow you have a lot going on.
The first things that come to mind are calendar blocking, and focus.
so with all the things you have going on, i strongly suggest that you block times on your calendar to do the different activities: Prospecting, customer services activities ect.
This has helped me be productive when all these activities take over your time.
For the territory situation, I would go look at the most successful customers you have, figure out what they look like, what vertical they are in, how big are they, what problems they are solving.

then go find more prospects that look like them.

its not a bad idea to say "im going to focus on the US for the next 6 months for prospecting" and then find those ideal prospects in the US.
then the next 6 months you can focus on EMEA if needed. but dont try to do EVERYTHING all at once. you will fail.

class_fact

Opinionated

Country Sales Management

Thank you for the tips. I definitely need to block off times and focus on specific regions. I find myself all over the place in different countries throughout the day and I ultimately don't get much done.

TennisandSales

Politicker

Head Of Sales

yep! just need to figure out where the best place is to focus your time. best way to do that is to see what your best customers look like.
good luck!

Sunbunny31

Politicker

Sr Sales Executive 🐰

I'm also wondering if you have a CRM. If you can organize yourself to set tasks there and go through the ones that are due daily, that's one way to help stay organized. It's a small thing, but beats notes in a book!

braintank

Politicker

Enterprise Account Executive

I hope you're pulling in 6 figures.

If they're paying you as BDR to effectively be a 1-person sales org you're getting screwed.

class_fact

Opinionated

Country Sales Management

Yes, 6 figures in my country's currency.

sketchysales

Politicker

Sales Manager

Your role and company size and approach sounds very similar to mine. What i would do and what i do right now is narrow down my approach. Look at an area within your territory that has a high concentration of ideal clients and put your energy into that area before moving onto the next.
You will find as you start to build a bit of traction in one market it can build momentum and you sign a company that the next company you are going to call knows about helps with that. The issue with big territories, while in one sense is nice it also can be a distraction.

Pachacuti

Politicker

They call me Daddy, Sales Daddy

I think you mean BDR in a high level position rather than just an SDR/low level position.
Your company has basically given you the opportunity to run your territory like your own business. Lots of people aspire to have a sales opportunity like this.
Most people have to generate their own leads and run the process from cradle to grave. Its actually rare to have someone handing you well qualified leads for you to simply "close".
And they hired you because they feel, or were at least led to believe, you are capable of handling that responsibility.
So you need to ask yourself - do you feel lucky? Well, do ya bub? Or least can "can I handle this level of responsibility?"

class_fact

Opinionated

Country Sales Management

Yes, no one checks what I do, or how I do it, as long as I keep the money coming in, which I have been. I was given access to a CRM of great leads and contacts, so I do not have to do too much prospecting to meet my number.

Everyday I go between being completely confident and completely overwhelmed. But so far so good though.

HVACexpert

Politicker

sales engineer

Will be good experience for you to have to learn additional sales operations parts of the business, but having little to no support always sucks. It will be a little trial by fire for you unfortunately, just try to stay organized; keep lists, prioritize more important things and customers. You got this!

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class_fact

Handling Large Territory with No Support

20 comments

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