Boosting Your Sales Growth: 32 Takeaways from McKinsey

Here are below my takeaways of the book “Sales Growth: Five Proven Strategies from the World's Sales Leaders” from McKinsey & Company (authors: Thomas Baumgartner, Homayoun Hatami, Maria Valdivieso de Uster).

Based on discussions with more than 200 of today's most successful global sales leaders from a wide array of organizations and industries, “Sales Growth” puts the experiences of these professionals in perspective and offers real-life examples of how they've overcome the challenges encountered in the quest for growth.

This book is full of good basics and actionable tricks & tips, which my team and I have already implemented successfully for some of them, and that any sales leader may get inspired from for his/her own sales org.

Happy reading!

Chapter 1 – Look ten quarters ahead

1. Constantly scan the horizon for the next opportunity. p6

2. Spend time to analyse why you are winning and loosing. Use tools & CRM. p6

3. Understand where the best opportunities are. p17

 

Chapter 2 – Mine growth beneath the surface

4. Micro-market approach - to identify opportunities: Break large markets into smaller units. Set targets at micro-market level based on market potential rather than being spread equally across all markets. p25

 

Chapter 3 – Find big growth in big data

5. Get personal in selling - Use micro-segmentation and personalisation analytics to create tailored selling proposition that meet buyer’s needs. p36

6. Use algorithms to predict customer trends based on factors such as shopping frequency. p39

7. Use big data to target customers, tailor promotions, customize offers. p41

8. Ideal sales leader: IT & analytics knowledge + Management + Leadership. p44

9. Not giving a sales pitch but a business conversation: asking the right questions based on data. p46

 

Chapter 4 – Master multichannel sales

10. McKinsey research: Consumers who shop accross a number of channels - physical stores, online, catalogs - spend about four times more annually than those who shop in just one. p56

 

Chapter 5 – Power growth through digital sales

11. Optimize often to maximize sales ROI accross digital platforms. Test & adjust in an nonstop effort to build loyalty and turn clicks into sales. p76

 

Chapter 9 – Tune sales operations for growth

12. Create a library of proven pitch documents by product and by industry segment. p148

13. The best sales leaders run weekly, monthly, quaterly pipeline, forecast and business reviews, lead account and territory planning clinics, and drive the customer segmentation, capacity-planning, rostering, and quota-setting processes for their entire geography or global segment. They harness the power of advanced analytics to provide deeper business insight that leads to better management decision-making or front-line sales rep targeting and customer engagement. p149

14. Map the end-to-end process for a sales rep set of deals and identify pain points. p153

15. Segment your clients and identify those generating the most of revenue. Identify segments asking for different focus: global giants, fast growers, niche leaders. Then assign the high-performing sales reps to those high value segments. p156

 

Chapter 10 – Pay more attention to pre-sales

16. Rely on big data and advanced analytics to identify opportunities early on and then prioritize the most desirable at the micro-market level, by geography and segment. p164

17. Important to have: knowledge-sharing system where sales reps can easily access best practices, insights based on win-loss reviews, competitive-positioning analysis. p165

 

Chapter 11 – Get the most out of marketing

18. Deep understanding of segment preferences is the starting point for marketing and sales to chart a joint course of action. p178

 

Chapter 12 – Build a technological advantage in sales

19. Arm sales with insights. p197

20. Generate closing pitches for the sales team, generating the right value proposition for each type of customer. p198

21. Sales force automation system tells reps which products to offer, based on sales histories that included the relative penetration of different categories and products. The report also suggests best pitches tied to the-next-products-to-sell list for each customer. The system flags at-risk account and tells reps to arrange immediate face-to-face visits. p199

 

Chapter 13 – Manage performance for growth

22. Bottom sales performers should spend a day on the road with top performing rep so that they can really see what makes these stars stand apart. p217

23. Best sales performance report includes leading & lagging indidators, metrics that increase the visibility of the performance at the individual rep level and that cascade through all relevant levels in the org, immediate insight into what’s working and what’s not. p219

 

Chapter 14 – Build sales DNA

24. Raise productivity by standardizing on best practices used by highest-performing reps. p228

25. Prospecting approaches + selling approaches + the way they articulate company value prop = most important determinants of success among top reps -> Teach these skills and enforce their use with specific goals. p228

26. Role playing (improving softer skills) and deal rehearsals: used by high-performing sales orgs. p230

27. Use ranking for reps, have targets being updated quaterly, if rep delivers 150% then offer a super bonus, include customer satisfaction in target. p238

 

Chapter 16 – Make it happen

28. To change the sales game, start with a conversation: How can i get the top players on board? How can we identify the gaps between what we do and the best practices? How can we focus on the most promising opportunities? p256

29. Sales orgs are results oriented. If they are expected to match the market, that’s exactly what they will do. Leading sales executives have a surprinsingly simple approach: they demand that their teams beat the market. p258

30. Week-long workshop example: 1) micro-market segmentation to identify attractive pockets of growth & develop plans for capturing them; 2) sales routines using standardized tools; 3) a system to track & manage performance. p269

31. Show the teams the revenue potential linked to the change. p271

32. If you do not do what customers are asking, somebody else will. p272