How Process Can Be Used to Streamline and Optimize Sales

It’s a misnomer that sales can’t be standardized. Salespeople aren’t usually expected to follow a structure in their day-to-day jobs. Who cares about routines when what matters is the result (closing deals and bringing in revenues), right?

Most salespeople don’t want to be standardized until they realize its power in generating sales. Based on a study done by the Harvard Business Review, organizations that have defined a sales process had 18% more revenue growth than those that didn’t have a defined process.

The problem with not having a standard process is that everyone makes up their own steps and follows a slightly different process. This makes it hard to grow and scale. Some salespeople don’t convert as many deals, some take longer to close deals than others and onboarding and training a new hire becomes a painful and tedious process.

We rarely think of sales when we think of business processes that can be standardized and streamlined. Most of the time when we think of streamlining a process in organizations, we think of manufacturing and service. Toyota, for example, is known for its reputation around quality, efficiency and productivity, but most of that comes from the manufacturing side of the business. It wasn’t until the early 2000s that Toyota saw an opportunity.