To sustain sales excellence you must cultivate a Pipeline Generation (PG) Culture.
Having worked with and studied many of the industries top-performing sales orgs/teams—here are a few PG best practices that separate the best from the rest. . .
PG PLAN
◆ AEs should develop a specific PG Plan for top accounts. (i.e. What are you (AE) going to do? How can you leverage partners / channels / the ecosystem? How can you leverage Field Mktg/BDRs/etc.? How you can you leverage the broader org / exec relationships?)
◆ AEs should be setting specific outcome-based, weekly PG Goals. FLMs should be partnering with reps, but also holding them accountable for delivering results.
PG TEAMING
◆ For top-tier accounts AEs should engage with their cross-functional colleagues (i.e. SEs, CSMs, BDRs/SDRs) and operate as ONE TEAM. Collectively, they should be focused on developing the optimal strategy to penetrate each target persona within each target account. Collaborate. Divide and conquer.
BLOCK TIME
◆ One day each week should dedicated to PG block time. No client meetings, no internal meetings, no management fire drills, no distractions. Just a maniacal focus on PGing.
◆ At the end of the day, make sure you celebrate the PG victories and share best practices. Remember: What gets reinforced, gets done. Don’t just celebrate the touchdowns; celebrate the first downs.
UNIFIED PG GTM MISSION
◆ The entire organization—cross-functionally—should be focused on driving PG. Marketing should be focused on driving PG by speaking to the specific business issues and decision criteria of EBs and Champions. CPOs should be focused on building products/features that drive PG. etc.
CONTINUOUSLY COACH PG EXCELLENCE
◆ FLMs should not just be sitting on the sidelines telling their reps what to do. They should be showing their reps what good looks like and coaching them step-by-step through the process.
