How can you use data to identify areas for improvement in sales coaching?

I have found throughout my career that you have to establish the key metrics that contribute to success first. The old adage of "garbage in, garbage out" is quite relevant when talking about data sources and usage. Establishing the key data that speaks to performance may require you to do some in-depth observation of top performers. After all, success leaves clues and you will want to pick up on those data clues and be able to build a framework from which you can coach your team. Keep in mind it is usually the small actions repeated consistently over time that make the biggest impact on performance. Having established your framework, you must communicate it to the entire team and hold them accountable to the standard by consistent coaching.

What I found very useful is to analyse sales meetings to coach your reps. If you record, transcribe and analyse the meetings of your sales reps, you get a lot of insights and areas of improvements. You also see what sales reps do a fantastic job in certain areas (e.g. qualification, discovery, presentation, closing, objection handling etc.). So the team can learn from each other and get better as a team. Furthermore, while analysing sales conversations, you can focus on important metrics like speak-to-listen ratio, # of questions asked, # of objections gotten etc. Overall, for sales coaching I truly recommend to analyse sales conversations and coach on gaps your sales reps have. As a software I can strongly recommend Kickscale.com.

Data brings objectivity to the practice of coaching a team. In football and basketball games, the film does not lie. While data sometimes can be misleading, it does tend to tell the truth of the matter. Data is important because you need something you can measure so you can effectively manage performance. Data also helps you determine where your time investment will produce the best return. One team member may need greater support than another in a given month or quarter to help get them back to the standards you have set for the team. Lastly, don't overlook the opportunity to optimize the data you utilize. Change occurs rapidly these days and we need to be open to changing the data points we monitor to make sure we align with the market.

Many times, we get caught up in data or analytics too much. Sometimes, it is best to stop and see the person first. Look for the data behind the data so to speak. If you can connect the human side and the data side that is powerful! The organizations that perform consistently at a high level have been able to make this connection. Beyond the data itself, it is important to be consistent with coaching. That builds trust with the entire team and helps create an authentic process by which the data is more than just checking a box. It is about establishing a winning process. In turn, that helps promote confidence of each individual as they see a framework to follow.

Working under pressure and all jingoism language boggles down team is interested in " KISS "keep it short and simple! Sometimes too much technology and data shoos away keep doses one at a time overdose kills!

CRM tools have long been good at measuring the input/output statistics of sales and dashboards in these systems can be coded for any “moneyball” type formula you can conceive. What it misses is the secret sauce between. That’s where tools like Kaia from Outreach or Gong come into play. As a leader you don’t have the time to listen to every sales call, however these tools will give you the data behind those calls in summary. Things like “talk v listen”, what closing method, what discovery questions, how many and what were the objections. You can determine to listen at those various points. They are great tools for coaching and mentoring sales reps. Additionally, reps tend to like these tools since they’ll take notes for them.