As efficiency sales professionals, it’s vital that we know exactly how and why each sale either succeeded or failed. Even if you have a pretty clear idea about what does and does not work from your own experiences, this information should be documented and tracked. A formalized performance review uncovers patterns and trends that you may not otherwise recognize. Additionally, if there are multiple sales professionals in your organization, the sharing of this information will improve the performance of every team member.
In Rick Marcet’s book, Win/Loss Reviews: A New Knowledge Model for Competitive Intelligence, Marcet reveals some great strategies for developing effective win/loss reports. He also provides instructions on how to take these completed reports and make practical use of them. Throughout the book, Marcet stresses the importance of transparency, arguing that all reports should be accessible to the entire team so that each person can learn from the experiences of the other team members.
If you’re interested in how formalized sales reports can benefit your organization, I highly recommend picking up a copy of this book.
Here’s a summary from Amazon Books:
“An effective framework for strengthening competitiveness by learning from past deals and applying insights derived from them.
“Every sales opportunity, whether won or lost, has useful nuggets of information that can be harvested and used to improve performance. When those pieces of information are aggregated, analyzed and made available for all to use, the organization s competitive position is greatly enhanced.
- Reveals how to turn field sales teams, a mostly underutilized resource, into net producers of competitive intelligence.
- Exposes new and unconventional approaches for gathering and democratizing sales insights for a broad stakeholder audience.
- Presents a proven knowledge sharing model that is being adopted by major companies worldwide
“Win/Loss Reviews shows how every company can improve top and bottom line performance by systematically capturing the key insights from deals that have been won, lost or delayed. While the book talks to decision makers and business strategists, the principles and disciplines explored are aimed at bridging the flow of competitive intelligence between sales and marketing, simultaneously providing insights and line-of-site to the dynamics affecting business performance.”
Want our daily content delivered to your inbox? Subscribe to the Selling Energy Blog!
