{"id":352,"date":"2011-08-15T16:57:01","date_gmt":"2011-08-15T23:57:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/?p=352"},"modified":"2015-11-10T09:07:13","modified_gmt":"2015-11-10T17:07:13","slug":"sales-metrics-to-track","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/archives\/352","title":{"rendered":"Choosing Effective Sales Metrics"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"One of the more important seminars at\u00a0a recent\u00a0Sales 2.0 Conference<\/a> in San Francisco involved a panel of Sales Operations experts slated to discuss the best sales metrics to track.\u00a0 The question of which metrics should be used for your organization has to be one of the more strategic decisions a sales leader can make.\u00a0 Unfortunately it is a decision that is usually left to your sales finance person or to\u00a0your CRM administrator based on\u00a0predefined reports.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 So the question you need to ask yourself is, \u201cwhat metrics do I need to effectively drive my business?\u201d<\/p>\n

Competitive Metrics (the internal view)<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Behavior is most easily modified by what you chose to measure and how you choose to\u00a0share that metric.\u00a0 According to Sarah Doody of Personal Metrics<\/a>, \u201cThe idea that measuring behavior can drive behavior is central to game mechanics. By providing players with performance cues, the player alters their behavior to get to the next reward.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0There are now many\u00a0software companies (Bunchball<\/a>, LevelEleven<\/a>, iActionable<\/a>, Hoopla<\/a> to name a few) offering gamification solutions that\u00a0will generate and share individual performance metrics with peers, displaying their metrics in Salesforce.com for all to see.\u00a0 In the right organization this gamification could be a very effective catalyst for intense peer pressure, thus driving performance\u00a0improvement.<\/p>\n

Benchmark Metrics (the external view)<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Fewer sales metrics are better than too many metrics; it\u2019s the difference between focus and noise.\u00a0 Any of the metrics you use should be actionable<\/span> or, at minimum, motivational.\u00a0 When you look at a sales dashboard or read an analysis of your metrics do they readily suggest how you should react or think about the subject being measured?\u00a0 If your job involves managing several direct reports one of the relevant metrics for your<\/span> job is their<\/span> sales performance.\u00a0 If your job requires that you meet a quota (and what sales job doesn’t!)you need to know your current and projected quota attainment.\u00a0 These are typical metrics for a sales leader and unless they have other specific performance goals an argument can be made that these are the only metrics with which you should be concerned!\u00a0 The most effective metrics that help you drive the business are not necessarily the same metrics as your peers, subordinates or individual contributors.\u00a0 The most effective metrics are those directly related to your job.<\/p>\n

Metrics can be lagging or leading.\u00a0 Lagging metrics are like a rear view mirror, telling you where you have been or where you are to date but with no ability to improve the future.\u00a0 A stacked ranking of your team\u2019s quarter to date performance or your bookings to date are examples of this metric type.\u00a0 Others, called leading indicators, can help predict your future performance.\u00a0 Leading indicators are typically related to the pipeline, be it your sales pipeline or the estimated pipeline from your new product launch based solely on market research.\u00a0 Accurate predictive metrics are more difficult to obtain, less certain but\u00a0more highly valued in that they allow you time to react\u00a0and affect change.<\/p>\n

Taking predictive metrics to the next level is the science of predictive analytics.\u00a0 Lattice Engines<\/a> applies the power of predictive analytics, the norm in the B2C world, to increase B2B sales productivity.\u00a0 A\u00a0while back\u00a0in Gerhard\u2019s Selling Power blog<\/a> he wrote, \u201cThe insight is that the explosive growth of data about companies and purchasing decision makers contains hidden but invaluable intelligence for frontline sales teams. Lattice Engines has encapsulated this vision into its sales intelligence software, salesPRISM.\u00a0 [The founder and CEO, Shashi Upadhyay] explained that this is the first solution that combines a company\u2019s internal view of its customers and prospects (e.g., purchase histories, product usage data, customer service records) with external information about these accounts and decision makers (e.g., news sources, company Websites, social media).\u201d<\/p>\n

Are the metrics you’re using aligned with these goals?\u00a0 Do you have other ideas related to metric effectiveness?\u00a0 As always, feel free to respond here!<\/p>\n

Cheers!<\/p>\n

Bob Bacon<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One of the more important seminars at\u00a0a recent\u00a0Sales 2.0 Conference in San Francisco involved a panel of Sales Operations experts slated to discuss the best sales metrics to track.\u00a0 The question of which metrics should be used for your organization … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_s2mail":"yes","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[48,15,62,26,98,45,47,63,31,44,43,42,79,37,35,46],"class_list":["post-352","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sales_ops","tag-sales20","tag-analytics","tag-b2b","tag-bob-bacon","tag-gamification","tag-iactionable","tag-lattice-engines","tag-linkedin","tag-metrics","tag-predictive-analytics","tag-sales-analytics","tag-sales-metrics","tag-sales-metrics-to-track","tag-sales-operations","tag-sales-ops","tag-selling-power"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/352","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=352"}],"version-history":[{"count":19,"href":"http:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/352\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1018,"href":"http:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/352\/revisions\/1018"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=352"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=352"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=352"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}