Ready, Set, Crunch … The Numbers You Need for Year-End Success

September 4, 2016|Mary Jane Copps
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Wow … what a crazy August it’s been for The Phone Lady. I’ve had the honour of attending a conference in Iowa, working with very energetic sales and customer service teams in Toronto and travelling to all  four Atlantic provinces in four days to share phone communication skills with startups.

It’s not unusual for my summer months to be full, but this year has been exceptionally busy. Why? Companies and organizations now want September to be a fast start. Instead of clarifying and setting goals by mid-month, expectations are already in place and the march to a spectacular year end starts on Tuesday September 6.

What about you?  As an entrepreneur, salesperson, account or business development representative … are you ready to meet or exceed your year-end goals? If you’re unsure how to answer this question, there’s some basic math you can do to find out. It isn’t a time consuming task and the results will set you up for your most successful year yet:

Here’s the data you’ll need:

1. How much revenue have you generated (and invoiced) up to August 31?

2. Subtract this number from the revenue you want to generate this year. Whatever the answer, you have 16 weeks left to make it happen. (I’m not including the last week of December.)

3. How many individual clients have you invoiced so far this year?

4. Take this number of clients and divide it into your invoiced revenue as of August 31 (the answer from question #1).  This is your current average worth of one client.

5. Divide this average worth into the amount of revenue you still want to generate this year (the answer from question #2) and this is, roughly, the number of clients you need to close – and invoice –  in the next 16 weeks.

So … how are you going to reach and close these clients? Make sure you have a clear plan in place because the 16 weeks starts on Tuesday!

These numbers are all logical and true. They don’t carry any emotion, only facts – facts you can work with to make a substantial difference in how your business is growing. In fact, it’s incredibly valuable to track even more numbers such as: How many potential clients have you spoken with/met so far this year? How many have accepted a proposal or participated in a demonstration or agreed to a discovery meeting? How many of these have become clients?

These are the statistics/metrics of your sales process. Knowing them allows you, no matter how busy you become with projects for existing clients, to continually generate revenue. For example, in my business, a proposal is usually the final step of my sales process. And my current closing ratio on proposals is 78.5%. So as long as I continually create quality proposals, I can accurately forecast future revenue. As I write this, I have 14 proposals yet to be confirmed and I can be very confident they represent 11 new sales. Is this enough for me to reach my financial goals for 2016? Yes it is! (My year end is October 31 … so I have 8 weeks to make it happen.)

For more information on what numbers you should be tracking and what they mean, check out these posts:

https://cloudkettle.com/cloudkettle-year-1-by-the-numbers/

https://thephonelady.com/you-arent-making-enough-calls-to-hit-your-quota/

https://thephonelady.com/creativity-logic-and-noise/

Enjoy your phone  work everyone!

Closing a sale is the natural outcome of inspiring great conversations and listening intently to our potential customers. This natural approach still involves a process – a plan that moves potential customers through a journey of discovery with you. So ... what's your process? And am I the right sales coach for you? Let's find out.

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What's The Phone Lady doing?

  • One-on-one coaching with 6 amazing entrepreneurs - info about sales coaching here
  • Designing a sales campaign - that includes phone conversations - for a waste management consulting firm
  • Creating client communication module for college students
  • Delivering remote learning on essential business communication skills for job search
  • Remote learning experience on sales and customer service skills for vet equipment company
  • Remote learning experience for financial advisors
  • In-person learning experience with new business owners on creating a sales process
  • Remote learning experience on essential skills to reach and inspire conversations with C-suite executives
  • Team coaching for a firm representing natural products for arthritis in dogs
  • Remote learning experience on sales and customer service skills for a transportation company
  • Remote learning experience on both discovery and sales calls for new startups

Do you or your team want to improve your communication skills? Do you have a communication question or challenge you'd like to discuss? This quick-to-fill-out form is easy to use and you'll hear from Mary Jane very soon.