Divide and Conquer Why Zoning your Territory will Increase Sales

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Who manages your sales reps? account lists? Your prospects and customers or your sales reps? The most common complaint I hear from sales managers across the country is, "How can I get my sales reps to see more people?" Not only do they need to see more people, but they also need to make more quality calls. Try these components of territory management.

1) Zone your city. Laminate a map of your city for each of your sales reps. Divide it into at least three to four different zones. You should make sure that one zone is not top-heavy, with more commerce than other zones. You will have a zone that is larger in actual square miles than others, but the business potential should be as close to equal as you can get it.

2) Prospect by zone. Most of the time we hit and miss on our prospecting. We waste more time driving around the city from one end to the other without considering the travel distance. When your sales reps set up their appointments, they should have their laminated map in front of them. To ensure that each territory is not called on the same day every week, your reps will be rotating their territory. For example, if they have three zones in which to sell, they will start in zone one on Monday and won't return to that zone until Thursday that same week. The following week they would be in zone one on Tuesday. This will ensure they don't get complacent. And knowing where their appointments will be on certain days of the week will give them added confidence when setting them up. After every appointment that is set up in a particular zone for a particular day, your sales reps can prospect within that same zone instead of wasting time crisscrossing about town to call on someone in another zone who might not be there.

3) Zoning to help your teammates. In many cases, your sales reps are required to pick up tapes and/or promotional items or to attend to myriad other emergencies that pop up in the day. With zoning, at the front desk, the receptionist should have a list of what zone each rep is going to be in that day. Then, if tape pick-ups are called in, or other things arise, they can call the rep in that zone to make the pick-up instead of having someone else make a special trip. This system also comes in handy when delivering collateral material for promotions.

If your sales reps make on average $50,000 per year, each hour of their time - based on an eight-hour day with 244 working days - is worth $25.61. If they make $75,000 per year, it's worth $38.42 per hour, and if they earn $100,000 per year, that hour is worth $51.23. It only makes sense that making more productive calls will increase your sales reps' per-hour worth. Get into the habit of zoning your city or territory. If you can effectively zone, your staff will be capable of making twice as many calls per day in the field.