Managing A Remote Salesforce
We talk about this topic at length because it is more than a trend. ManageSmarter.com’s Long-Distance Teambuilding addresses this topic in a real-world manner:
“Sellers by nature like to be in a team environment—they want a high-five and a talk around the water cooler,” says Cowitt, vice president of national advertising sales for Freedom Interactive, the Internet division of Freedom Communications, a media company in Irvine, Calif. So Cowitt implemented a daily phone call, which lasts about 15 minutes, to allow salespeople to exchange ideas, successes and challenges.
That is the right approach. We initiated a weekly conference call earlier this year with one of our customers with whom we are placing salespeople around the Western US. We had multiple salespeople onramping around the same time so we had to develop a sense of team amongst a group who had never met each other.
The military often discusses and incorporates force multipliers and that approach is going to be a required tool for any sales manager in today’s market. Technological tools are affordable and instant. Managing remote salespeople is a daunting task that requires a different skill set in comparison to managing in an office environment.
At first, to generate conversation, he asked salespeople to come prepared with discussion points, such as a summary of a particular category. But eventually the talks became more organic.
Perfect. “Organic” talks are the sign of community and something we experienced first hand in our national conference calls. The first calls were quiet, measured and strictly on topic. However, after a month the discussions became livelier, cross talk developed and the ultimate sign occurred - the salespeople started razzing each other.
Along the way, the salespeople started discussing national accounts that crossed over territories and they shared marketing messages, sales techniques and voicemail approaches. As a sales manager, what more could you ask for?
Well, sales I suppose. And they did. In fact, they closed business at a faster rate than any previous salespeople in the company.
If you're new here and like what you see, you may want to subscribe to our RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!
Posted By Derrick Moe | Communication, Sales Management, Trends | |
This is a very under served work population. I haven’t found much written about the “Remote Manager”. The majority of medical device and disposable product companies (not Pharma)have sales reps that only see each other face-to-face 2 or 3 times a year. Managing reps in 6 different states and across mulitiple time zones creates unique hurdles. We have used weekly conference calls for 3 years but several factors have reduced their efectiveness over time:
1. Different time zones. a 12:00pm CST call time equates to 10:00am in California and 1:00pm in New York.
2. To be on the call means not being in an account or with a customer.
3. Twenty three people on the call was cumbersome. Time was wasted on roll call for starters. Then questions were asked that had limited relevancy so gradually more reps hit “star 6″ to mute during the call so they could drive or eat without anyone knowing.
4. Hospitals don’t allow cell phones inside so spur of the moment communication isn’t feasible.