deathsalesman

Account Executive

Help me survive my next pipeline review

Hey Sales Savages,

I and a fairly sizable section of our organization's sales team has been underperforming (according to the sales target that's been set too high at least)

In my last pipeline review, I've been told I'm on "thin ice" and my manager said I should come prepared with some suggestions I will implement to improve my performance. I told him if I knew what I'm doing wrong, I'd have fixed it by now, but he didn't really care.

Anyway, can you help me come up some generic suggestions I could come up with to make it look like I respect this manager's advice?

Normally I would just say that I will commit to putting an increased emphasis on quoting my deals higher and working harder. The thing is I've already been saying that for the last couple of weeks. What else can I say to appease this person?

Thanks

🧢 Sales Management

8 comments

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CuriousFox

WR Officer

🦊

I'm not sure what you are asking.

JustGonnaSendIt

Politicker

Burn Towns, Get Money

Some ideas for you:

- MOST IMPORTANT - Have data to show to back up your statements.
- Look at your TAM analysis and whitespace analysis. Identify areas where you can leverage references to open up deals. Identify areas where there is no coverage that you could use some air-cover support.
- Talk to the teams around you (Marketing... ugh, Partner team, Product Management, other AE's that might sell complimentary solutions). See if there is anything you could bolt on to what they're already doing to drive more deals.

Essentially you're trying to create a story that says:
1. This is the current state of things. The good, the bad.
2. Here are some of the things I'm thinking about doing to change the current state
3. Here is what those things look like in terms of a timeline to ramp up, execute, and reap results
4. Here is what I'm doing to measure the success/failure/progress of the above

If you come with those 4 story elements backed by data you stand a much better chance of finding thicker ice.

justatopproducer

Politicker

VP OF SALES -US

Can you be more specific on where you’re not meeting the goal? Or is it just rev? If so, id say fresh closing techniques, how can you create urgency, how to speed up the process so you can capitalize on pipeline now.

deathsalesman

Good Citizen

Account Executive

Honestly, just about everything. I'm a junior AE with the quota of a senior AE. That's a good tip though. Taking the opportunities I do have and being more efficient with closing them.

1nbatopshotfan

Politicker

Sales

Do you have any ideas on filling the top of the funnel? Without knowing what you sell or what contribution inbound etc happens, you should probably focus on growing that portion of the pipeline. The knock on effects of a bigger funnel means more oops etc.

I would speak to efforts on that end. Growing the potential pie there will have the most effect.

deathsalesman

Good Citizen

Account Executive

Right, like new strategies for increasing the number of opportunities. That's something I can bounce off of.

1nbatopshotfan

Politicker

Sales

So where are you guys getting your leads/opps?

mostly referral: talk about leaning on your clients for referrals.
inbound/resulting from outbound: what can you do to increase your role in bringing these leads in. Is it small stuff by prospecting more? Leaning on cold leads? Leaning on cold quotes?

A lot of this will be the basic blocking and tackling of sales, just increasing by 10% or 20% to boost the top end of your funnel.

JuicyKlay

Celebrated Contributor

Put together a nice list of bullet points full of daily action items you will start holding yourself accountable to. You’ll make x calls, emails, client touches, etc…

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deathsalesman

Help me survive my next pipeline review

8 comments

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