The SET activity report provides a detailed look at the activities that a sales team has completed over a certain time period of time which includes things like phone calls, emails and meetings. This gives all sales managers valuable insight into individual and sales team performance.
Using a CRM for activity reporting is a proven technique for sales managers to check on the performance of their teams. It is also used in businesses that motivate their sales professionals through competition by reviewing how each professional is doing against one another.
In the activity report, you will be able to view…
SET user and customer Heidi Lavery, Client Engagement Manger at RFS, Swindon found that the activity reporting has helped to drive collaboration as well as competition.
“We use SET as a centralised sales tool to ensure transparency in our sales function.” Heidi explains, “We have a team of sales professionals that have overlapping clients in different regions, we often have many lunches and meetings along with making lots of calls which we capture in detail.”
The activity report is one of Heidi’s most used features in SET. The report tell’s her exactly how everyone in the sales team are progressing towards sales targets which can also be measured against key performance indicators. Heidi can even see how each sales professional is interacting with an individual customer or prospect.
Sometimes sales professionals can be wary of a CRM, seeing it as a tool for their managers to spy on them however the SET activity report can actually help sellers become more effective as it gives managers the data necessary to provide support and coaching while keeping sales meetings shorter and more productive so the team can spend more of their day doing what they do best, selling.
Quality or quantity?
Businesses with sales professionals on the road aren’t overly concerned about how much time they spend at their desks, what does matter is the quality of meetings they make over the course of the week, month or quarter. Sales managers aren’t concerned about the time of day their team have meetings and make calls but if there are any issues with time management it’s useful to know what day of the week they are, or aren’t attending meetings or making calls. If someone is a superstar on Wednesdays but slacking off on Fridays, that might be a concern, or it might not. There may actually be a legitimate reason which should always be recorded in the notes of the call or meeting. Many sales managers rely heavily on the notes feature of activity reporting, if a sales professional just drops in to say hello, that’s not a meeting that’s a doughnut drop off.
Note taking is very important. If a company needs to know key information about their prospects for example; how many employees are in a certain department? who is in charge of that department?is there a preferred supplier list? then this information should be captured in the notes. This will only help you to know everything you need to know about the company at the most important time, when it comes to closing that deal.
Many businesses come in contact with a huge number of prospects and customers all over the world, some can be large, multi-department, multi-site companies. When there is a meeting booked with a company like this the sales professional attending may be in a position to gather useful intelligence on that companies decision maker at another site in someone else’s territory. The activity report then becomes much more than a sales management resource, it serves as a knowledge function allowing that person to open doors for his or her peers.
Sales teams typically maintain a good balance between this type of collaboration and performance driving competition between them. The system then allows sales managers to set goals for each person and for the team. Those goals can then be used to help improve individuals performance and to introduce incentives.
To learn more about how your team can take advantage of the SET activity report, register for a free trial today.
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