Tech4T - Sales territory planning, resource optimisation, route planning and call scheduling

   

 

Contact
Tech4T
Call us on:
+44 (0)1733 890790
 

"We have used Tech4T twice now to support us with realigning our sales force territory boundaries. Each time they have listened to our requirements and worked with us quickly and efficiently to help us create an optimum structure that meets both the needs of our business and those of our customers"   

Shilpa Patel
Sales Development Manager
Bausch & Lomb

 

 

 

Sales territory mapping and planning

Sales and field force territory planning - improve sales performance by optimising and realigning your territories, call planning, route scheduling and lead capacity planning

Effective field force deployment ensures the maximum coverage of high value prospects and customers by the sales force, but it is a complex problem. Companies must design sensible territories, assign the most appropriate sales personnel to specific geographies or accounts, and accurately target profitable customers.

Times are hard and you think you have done everything to increase sales and improve operational effectiveness and efficiency.

However, have you overlooked realigning your territories - sales, service, advisor or other areas where field staff operate? Doing this properly can result in more sales and revenues for your organisation whilst reducing operational costs for support teams and field staff. Most importantly, with petrol prices at an all-time high, it makes sense to ensure only the right people are being visited.

Sales Optimisation & Territory ManagementThere are lots of benefits to territory alignment and optimised call scheduling, but what services and tools are available to help you?  

Tech4T work with you to assess existing territory structures, performance and quotas, analyse customer value and define the optimum contact channel and call frequency. We then plan and map out an optimised territory infrastructure - including realignment of territory boundaries as needed taking account of targets, available field force and sales potential. Once changes are implemented we can improve operational efficiency by providing targeting insights of who to visit, when and why, and deliver the information through call scheduling, route optimisation and sales planning tools.

We provide this service to field sales teams, health and safety advisors, assessors, merchandisers, service/support providers and engineering teams. If you have no field staff but are planning to put a team in place, we can design an optimised territory structure from scratch and provide ideal locations as to where to recruit staff.

And if you are drowning in a sea of data, we have developed simple ways to extract and transform data from virtually any accounts (including SAGE), operational or CRM system, before merging, computing and applying the insights that improve your sales and marketing and help cut costs.

Should you wish to undertake the tasks in house, we can also provide software, training and support, together with supporting geocoding and data services. 


123 Send Logo“We knew that to ensure the success of our new field based sales force, we needed a company that we could partner with and trust.  Tech4T delivered everything that they promised (and more), they had the quality of approach and focus that made the whole process run smoothly and delivered everything on time and to budget. Graham and the team come highly recommended.”  

James Coe, Head of Sales, 123 Send Ltd.


Benefits of optimised sales territory and service area planning

*More motivated, successful sales teams  *Optimised territories and improved routing of customer visits *Increased capacity to handle leads *Less time spent on administration with field sales automation *Reduced travel, mileage, cost and carbon footprint  *Territory maps showing sales potential hot-spots  *Increased visits to the right people = more orders and profits...

Get in touch!

Click here to receive our field sales territory planning and optimisation presentation, request a call back or arrange a meeting.  Or call Tech4T on +44 (0)1733 890790

See also sales territory planning / mapping and franchise territory design, optimised call plans and route schedules plus sales targeting insights and territory mapping software. For an example of territory optimisation in distribution, click here

Did you know that by reducing travel for a sales person by 10% based on 2,000 miles (3,200km) per month at an average of 30mpg (7.8 Litres/100km), saves the equivalent of 1 ton (30,480kg) of CO2 - or 5 trees to offset this, per annum!


 

Mapping existing sales territoriesField sales territory planning, alignment and optimisation

Despite the field sales force being a major revenue driver, most companies still operate with unbalanced sales territories. Over 40% of field sales staff have either too little, too much or the wrong kind of work, and on average, spend 20% or more of their time travelling. 

Poorly aligned sales territories, visiting the wrong customers, and/or having a sales team with skills that don't always suit the product or service offered, can cost anything from 2.5% to 10% in missed sales each year, let alone the cost of lost efficiency. That can be a huge loss of revenue however you look at it!    

Several major issues point to misaligned sales territories: Your sales team complain their territories are unfair as they have to manage different workloads with varying levels of opportunity.

Sales territory designOr you have combined sales teams following a company merger resulting in overlap or team members 'passing on the road'. Maybe your territories haven't been examined in the last 2-3 years or are based solely on sales history and don't take account of future potential. Or perhaps a new product line requires changing the deployment of your sales resource?

You therefore need to create the right workload and sales potential for each sales person, correctly allocate territories based on the right postal geography, and identify the ideal locations to position new staff to exploit market opportunity and fill gaps in coverage.

Sales territory planning solution

Sales territory planning, performance optimisation and capacity planning is far from simple. It is far more than mapping and requires resource skills of the right kind together with the time, data and analytical tools, and commitment to continually measure and realign territories to maximise field sales performance. Tech4T can help.

Realigning existing sales territoriesSetting the scene

The benefits of matching the right sales people to the right customers at the right time, and in the most efficient, effective and timely way, is obvious. As is the benefit of delivering sufficient new leads to the sales team with the knowledge that every lead will be worked in full - no cherry picking or leads left unfulfilled.

We work with you to understand your sales process and specific challenges, then identify your customers and see how their locations compare to high potential market hot spots and to sales person base locations.

We can undertake customer recency, frequency, value and visit analysis, including looking at buying trends by product group, and review sales achievement by individual sales person together with their supporting internal team. We also take account of market penetration and potential, and the volume of new enquiries.

This is typically followed by a re-alignment of territories to allow sufficient sales time to be allocated with each type of customer and prospect. We take account of each individual sales person's capability and performance, customer-to-sales person relationships, and identify the best locations for recruitment. Target business heat mapTerritories are analytically balanced using relevant sales and demographic data, and optimised to take account of underlying drive times so sales staff can spend more time with the right customers.

We can optimise call sequencing, schedules and journey planning that take account of required call frequency, seasonal trends, preferred call times and days... whatever you need. This helps minimise travel, save on fuel costs and maximise selling time. We can also help with the automation of data collection - recording the outcome of visits and feeding them back into the system to refine who to see and when.

The last stage is the continued sales performance analysis. In fact the process rarely finishes and is hence termed 'closed-loop' - where the resulting sales intelligence then drives a refinement of the varying selling, marketing and HR recruitment stages on an on-going basis.

We can offer a tailored solution that encompasses any or all of the above points, but this page focuses on one of the most overlooked element, that, by itself, will deliver a significant increase in sales performance whilst reducing cost... Territory Design

 

Sales territory design - next page