Your sales team diligently tracks CRM metrics, calls, proposals, and emails. But, have you ever zoomed out and observed how your SDR team is doing?
Your SDR productivity directly affects how your organisation will meet its larger business objectives. A productive sales development representative (SDR) team is critical to boosting lead generation efforts, maintaining a robust sales pipeline, and increasing your sales team’s likelihood to hit quota.
Here are seven tips to improve SDR productivity.
#1 SDRs Must Collaborate With Account Executives
Your account executives (AEs) play a vital role in discovering new leads and keeping existing clients satisfied. So, when AEs and SDRs work in perfect harmony, it is easier to keep moving deals forward.
#2 Make Time Management a Priority
Time management skills can be one of the greatest assets for your SDR team. With an organised schedule, your SDR team will remain productive, stay efficient, and avoid undue stress that can further harm productivity.
One way to improve time management is by chalking out an SDR workflow in advance, and prioritising sales activities. Another way is to use technology designed specifically to help your sales and marketing teams, such as CRM software. According to Hubspot, 18% of sales representatives say that the biggest benefits of leveraging CRM software are increased productivity and less time spent on administrative tasks.
#3 Make the Best Use of Your CRM Software
CRM (Customer-relationship Management) software is an essential tool for keeping SDRs organized and staying on track regarding their sales pipeline. But, having CRM software in place is not enough – SDRs need to use it effectively and diligently. Otherwise, there is room for mistakes, missed deals, and inefficient pipeline management.
So, advise your SDR team to make the most of their CRM software and hold them accountable. According to Hubspot, 47% of sales leaders track CRM usage as one of the key productivity metrics for their SDR teams.
#4 Monitor SDR Productivity
Regularly keeping track of SDR productivity can help you guide SDRs to improve their performance and identify what’s the next-best-action to take. This way, they can stay on track and meet company objectives effectively.
To make sure your sales reps are always working with a robust pipeline, host pipeline reviews on a regular basis. They can talk about their goals, their progress, and what they need to do to stay on track.
#5 Track the Prospect-to-Meeting Ratio
Your sales reps may track how many prospects they reach out to, and how many meetings they have. To achieve success in sales, they need to understand how many prospects they are actually meeting, and how many of those calls do not yield any progress. The prospect-to-meeting ratio is a helpful metric that indicates how successful your SDRs are in bagging appointments with prospects. Their aim should be to generate qualified meetings albeit with fewer accounts. This saves time, and generates a predictable pipeline.
#6 Be Selective: Targeting the Right Accounts
In the competitive sales environment, there is no use barking up the wrong tree. Targeting only the most valuable accounts that match the ideal customer profile (ICP) can make it easier for sales reps to fast track important deals and not waste any time struggling with unqualified accounts. The results of precise targeting have an extremely positive impact on SDR productivity, such as:
- More leads that convert
- Higher revenue
- Improved customer retention
- Reduced customer churn
- More time to pursue qualified accounts
- Less stress
- Fewer missed deadlines
#7 Automate Everything You Can
When your sales reps are stuck in mundane administrative tasks, doing manual research, and are overwhelmed with a never-ending to-do list, two things happen.
- One, they waste time on repetitive tasks instead of focussing on sales development activities.
- And two, since they are always swamped with work, there is little room to innovate, discuss new opportunities, and brainstorm solutions. “Who has got the time for this!” is a common complaint often heard from employees who are burdened with manual tasks.
So, why not take advantage of automation tools and boost your SDR productivity? From call logging to managing your marketing campaigns, there are several automation tools designed to help your sales team make the most of their time and effort.
Here are a few sales activities you can automate next:
Source: https://sales.rocks/blog/7-sales-automation-techniques-theory/
The Bottom Line
Remember that your sales development representatives are a great asset to your company. They have more responsibilities than just bringing in new leads and closing deals. In fact, these employees are the ones who are in touch with market trends, buyers’ needs, buyer behaviour, product positioning, and more.
Ensuring high levels of SDR productivity is vital for the growth of your company, be it a startup or an established organisation. After all, only an efficient SDR team that is able to manage their time well can align their efforts with company goals.
