Actionable Intelligence - The Real AI for Sales

I’m just over four months into my consultancy business, and I'm starting to shape my thinking around the key themes my clients face when it comes to developing their sales strategy, teams, and processes. The challenges vary, but there’s one common thread that connects them all - while they know there’s a problem, they’re not quite sure where to start.

And let’s be honest, that makes sense, doesn’t it? If you’re a busy managing director running a fast-paced business with a hundred things crossing your desk every day, it’s tough to step back and take a proper look at your sales team. It might take a few days to really step outside the day-to-day and start seeing where things need to change. But how many managing directors do you know that can afford to spend a few days shadowing the sales team, looking at processes with fresh eyes, and identifying areas that need improvement to boost performance?

The truth is, it rarely happens. And so, that nagging feeling continues - you know things need to improve, but you’re not quite sure where to start.

That’s why I’ve developed a Sales Health Check to help uncover the key levers that can improve sales performance. Whether you’ve got a small team or a more complex setup, this sales health check (or audit, if you prefer) can range from a single day to a full week, depending on what you need. I get hands-on with your team, digging into the details of their roles to uncover those areas needing improvement. At the end of it, I deliver a detailed, action-oriented report highlighting where improvements will make the biggest impact and what benefits you can expect to see.

Think of it as actionable intelligence - AI for your business, but in a completely different context. This is information you can use to steer your sales team in the right direction and drive growth.

The Sales Health Check covers four key areas:

Business Development: We look at how your sales plan aligns with your marketing strategy, your core value propositions and how they’re communicated, how leads are managed from when they first come in right through to progressing in your opportunity pipeline. We also review your pricing processes and how you approach proposals.

Sales Management: Here, we dive into what your team is doing on a day-to-day basis. We’ll explore the key activities and routines, the sales methods used, the main KPIs, and how regions, territories, and accounts are managed.

Sales Development: This is all about personal improvement. We’ll start with the induction and training programme new starters experience, the opportunities for mentoring and coaching, how they’re trained to use systems and reports, and how they interpret data to succeed in their roles.

Customer Success: My favourite part! We explore how you ensure your customers get the results they expect. We’ll look at how new customers are onboarded, how you capture and use customer feedback to build advocacy, how you manage customer relationships day-to-day, and what your renewals process looks like if they’re on a contract cycle.

This level of in-depth process review and optimisation simply isn’t possible during the chaos of a managing director’s day. But as a Consulting Sales Director, I can dedicate the time to help you cut through the noise and identify those areas that will provide real, actionable insights.

The output can then be used to improve your sales strategy, team structures, coaching, development, or even training - the possibilities are endless!