How to Grow a Pie

Where does business success begin?  With a killer app? With a great culture? With a better mousetrap? You do everything else right, but your business will still struggle if you’re not bringing in enough money. Is revenue declining or stagnant? Do salespeople perform the way they should? Does the sales team produce consistent results? Even if you’re not struggling in any of these basic areas, do you have the right talent leading your sales team or are you ready to ramp up to the next level but don’t know how to go about it? If the answers to any of these questions concern you, I’d like to introduce you to my friend Dennis Clouse of Mile High Sales Solutions, a Sales Xceleration consultant. Sales Xceleration is the country’s largest fractional sales leadership company.

As many readers of these whitepapers know, there are entire industries built around different kinds of fractional engagement services. You may even be delivering services with this model – an expert works part time to provide right-sized consultation for a client with limited needs or resources. Dennis offers, among other things, fractional sales leadership and helps clients achieve breakthrough, scalable sales growth and a more balanced, enjoyable life.

Dennis’s clients consult with him to help with challenges like:

• Sales are growing but need to achieve new levels of success.
• Sales are stagnant, declining, or simply not growing the way the client wants.
• Hiring and retaining the right talent and helping them perform consistently.
• Sales leadership is ineffective or inexperienced.
• The sales function lacks processes, tools, metrics, or compensation plans to drive the desired behavior and results.

Dennis begins the process of helping his clients by meeting them where they are. Some clients, he says, don’t have a sales team or may only have one salesperson. If that single salesperson happens to be the owner, deciding whether the owner should continue selling and hand off some other tasks or should bring in a new person to tackle sales is likely to be the next growth strategy. With his sales leadership perspective, Dennis can help create or develop a high-performing sales team, improve sales infrastructure, and much more.

Dennis calls himself “industry agnostic,” explaining that since sales skills are transferable he gets to enjoy working with lots of different businesses, ranging from surgical device suppliers and manufacturers to estate and probate lawyers. When I asked Dennis what he likes most about his consulting, he cited the wide range of businesses, industries, and clients with whom he works. He clearly loves applying his sales and sales leadership skills to help all these different clients and circumstances with their unique challenges and opportunities.

One such client, a design engineering firm, more than tripled revenue within two years after engaging Dennis, and it’s on track to enjoy a five-fold increase within the year. Dennis shared that one of his tasks in this engagement it to help the owner, who is currently the company’s top salesperson, step out of his sales role so he can provide sales leadership, improve operations and human resources, and develop his own CEO role.

Another of Dennis’ clients, also experiencing rapid growth, more than doubled revenue within a few short years and, with Dennis’ help, is tracking to quadruple revenue within a few more short years and exponentially grow revenue within ten years. To do this, Dennis helped the client clarify that the time had come to replace the company’s director of sales, who had been awarded the leadership position after a history of being the company’s best sales person. Dennis explained that, while Michael Jordon may have been the best basketball player, success on the court doesn’t automatically lead to success on the sidelines. To help this client with the transition, Dennis will provide sales leadership on a fractional basis, restructure the sales team, and recruit his own replacement.

While each business and situation are different, Dennis and his team rely on a tried and tested process to help their clients. The first phase typically takes thirty to sixty days and is designed to allow Dennis and his team to learn the client and its business, including the client’s strategy, team, culture, plans, and goals. While learning the client and the business, Dennis also assesses and analyzes these areas to get ready for the next phase. The second phase takes three to four months and its focus is on sales infrastructure, processes, tools, metrics, information systems, compensation plans, and incentives. A final, optional phase is designed to evaluate and improve sales leadership. The final phase may involve a fractional sales leader role, identifying and developing a leader, or even recruiting a leader.

To add to his arsenal of tools, Dennis has developed and maintains strong relationships with other professionals who also act as trusted advisors, sometimes helping with business and marketing strategy. “You owe it to the sales team to have a good business and marketing strategy,” Dennis advised. “If the client has a clear and sound business strategy – the ‘Ready’ – and marketing strategy – the ‘Aim’ – they are in position to execute sales effectively – the ‘Fire.’ Then we just get out of the way, let the sales team do their thing and support them.”

To help him become familiar with the client, Dennis starts by asking for historical sales numbers. “Chances are, the owner has been too busy or hasn’t taken time to analyze sales or break them down by year and customer or even rank customers by revenue,” he shared. Dennis and his team help the client analyze who are their biggest customers, who are repeat customers, and who bought from them and then stopped and why. Next, Dennis and his team identify these as action items – clients to reach out to. Dennis coaches clients to focus on current clients first and then, when sales to current clients are happening as they should, start to work on attracting new clients.

“Business owners are great people,” Dennis says. “There’s a reason they’re running a company. They are drivers and doers. They like being in charge. They’re focused on their teams and on creating a good culture. I can come in and make a difference quickly.” Dennis helps clients gain freedom to do what they love – running their company. By helping the client gain focus and clarity on their goals, creating an action plan, and providing coaching to help reach the goals, Dennis helps his clients work fewer hours and spend more time with family or doing other things they enjoy. The delighted spouse of one Sales Xceleration client even thanked the consultant for “giving me my husband back.”

If you may be thinking of engaging with a sales consultant, Dennis suggests looking for someone who fits and complements your company’s culture and is of good character – someone you can count on. He points out that, “in a small business, sales affect everybody.”  He also recommends reading good books about business and leadership. He shares, “The best business people always continue learning and keep an open mind about learning.” Dennis also encourages his clients to participate in professional groups or to engage a personal coach or consultant. “Invest in yourself through books, coaching, or peer groups.”

If you might want to explore how Dennis can improve sales and sales leadership, please reach out to me. I’d be honored to connect you.