This is a behavior to plan behavior. Many people take this to mean planning to plan. It sounds redundant but it’s not. In fact, it’s a commonly overlooked part of selling. Planning to plan is another way of saying procrastination. Behavior to plan behavior is doing an action to set a plan of action. Why is this important? The reason is that it provides a set course which can then be held to, and ultimately evaluated. The salespeople that reject planning behavior are the ones that proudly claim to have many years in sales. In reality they have one year repeated “x” number of times. Making a plan and committing to it will make sure a salesperson meets behaviors they can control and ultimately provides a blueprint for them to modify and improve on.

So what kinds of behavior can a salesperson plan? Saying, “I want to increase my revenue generation by 20%” isn’t it. Most salespeople don’t need to worry about those types of plans because the company will provide them, it’s called a quota. The plan that salespeople should focus on are the actions they can do to reach the set goal. Breaking the goal down into smaller pieces is an effective way to generate the actions a sales person can do to meet their objective. As an example, if an average sale is $50,000 and the goal is half a million dollars, the sales person knows they have to make ten sales. If their close ratio on a sales process is 25% then they have to have 40 good prospects. If they know 1 in 5 prospects will be qualified then they have to meet 200 potential prospects. That can then be broken down into activities. How many people will come from marketing leads? How many from networking? How many from referrals? Etc. This is the plan - breaking goals into actionable items. Of course the newer a salesperson is, the more guesswork there will be. Always be conservative on the numbers, overachievement makes everyone happy. Undershooting the plan and achieving it still looks poor.

The reason this gets overlooked is because it can take some time and can be frustrating. Rather than take a reasonable guess, salespeople say its impossible to know and quit. Don’t over think this too much. Within a couple of hours you could have a reasonably mapped out behavior plan. Year-end is a great time to do this for the following year. Make the plan and commit to doing it. On average, only 3% of salespeople in a given industry have written goals with an action plan. When polled, that 3% makes five times what people with specific goals in their head made and ten times what the people who had no specific goals made. The clearer and more detailed your plans, the more quickly you will be able to achieve your goals. Plan your behavior and commit to it. Chances are you’ll not only meet your goals but also exceed them.

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