It’s 10 AM. Do You Know What Your Sales Reps Are Doing?

Sales executives are often in the dark about what is actually occurring on the front lines, and what sales activities and behaviors advance or impede progress toward goals. Using new software to analyze the digital exhaust of calendar and email metadata provides a practical way to build an accurate profile of how frontline sales representatives and managers spend their time, who they interact with externally and internally, and what effect this has on sales performance. Analyzing the data of several B2B companies using Microsoft’s Workplace Analytics showed that internal data can be used to optimize the design of the sales coverage model; align sales resources to the market opportunity; and identify and encourage the adoption of behaviors that improve sales performance. For example, top sales performers were three times as likely to interact with multiple groups inside the company and 50% more likely to have weekly pipeline reviews with their direct managers.