Convincing Your Sales Force to Use SFA

Here are several excerpts from an article by Rick Cook, Convincing Your Sales Force to Use SFA.

About the only thing I’d add is that I believe that it’s critical that representatives from the sales organization, (both management and staff) be integrally involved in the SFA technology selection process. Also, once you’ve narrowed down the SFA technology alternatives to two or three finalists, the sales organization should have the opportunity to compare and contrast the usability of each. They will be expected to use the solution every day. So, you want them to be happy with (and excited about using) the solution you choose.

An SFA (Sales Force Automation) effort is only as good as its implementation— and its implementation is only as good as the degree to which the sales staff, CSRs (customer service representatives) and others use it.

The old apothegm “Technology is easy, people are hard” is never more true than in SFA. If your people don’t buy into your SFA effort, it will at best be only a partial success.

The proof is easy to find. Another old CRM truism holds that the majority of SFA efforts fall short of success — more than two-thirds of them, by some studies. According to those same studies, the most common reason for poor performance is the problem of getting employees to adopt SFA.

The reason for resistance is simple. SFA is not a technology. It uses technology, but at its core SFA is about business processes. SFA changes the way salespeople operate in a business, or at least it tries to. If the people who execute the process refuse to change or only change halfheartedly, then you have a problem.

Another fundamental problem for SFA adoption is temperament. Salespeople are independent by nature. Indeed, one of the things that attracts people to a career in outside sales is the freedom from oversight. With SFA, sales reps can feel like they’ve got someone looking over their shoulders or riding along in their pockets.

While there’s a strong psychological component in making the transition to SFA, most of what supervisors need to do is direct and practical. They have to manage the transition and the ongoing SFA effort to their and their salespeople’s benefit. What’s equally important, managers have to convince their sales staff that SFA will benefit them, and that they can in fact use it.

The key is to show the sales force how SFA benefits them without unduly burdening them. This is one part management, one part good planning and one part execution.

Sell SFA

Assuming you’re using a viable product for your SFA effort, you’ve got to sell that product to your sales staff and others in your organization. This is just like selling to your customers, except here you’re selling to people inside the organization.

Involve the Sales Force

You need to involve the sales staff in planning and implementing SFA for two reasons. The first is that their knowledge is a vital part of making SFA successful.

The second reason is that if the sales staff is consulted and involved they’re going to feel a sense of ownership toward the SFA effort.

Produce Champions

The salespeople who are directly involved in planning and implementing your SFA project not only provide invaluable feedback, but they also become champions for SFA to their fellow sales representatives.

Respect the Culture While Changing It

SFA, like CRM in general, is about changing your company’s culture to make sales more profitable and customer-focused. However, that doesn’t mean that you want to do away with your company’s culture. While some operations and practices are going to change, others shouldn’t. After all, you’re undoubtedly doing a lot of things right, even if you can benefit big-time from SFA.

It’s All About the Benjamins

Fundamentally, SFA comes down to money— money in your sales staff’s pockets. A well-designed SFA program makes it easier for your sales staff to do their job — which is to make money for themselves and for you.

SFA is Not an Option

It’s also important to make sure the sales force understands that SFA is an ongoing effort. It’s not a one-time set of changes, but a series of processes that is going to remain in force in following years.

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Tagged as: CRM Software, Sales Force Automation, SFA