Modernize Your Sales Playbooks

At one stint in sales enablement, I was given a 180-slide sales "playbook" and asked to make sure the team understood it and executed on it. When I scrolled through the deck, I was horrified by the mishmash of process documents, competitive intel, case studies and sales slides. Would you have guessed why the team was underperforming?

Ideas for modern sales playbooks

• Short and sweet. Ideally no more than one double-sided sheet, with clear sections outlining the sales situation, actions to take, and resources that are available.
• Focused. Address one sales play, one sales challenge. Take the rifle, not the shotgun approach.
• Easy on the eyes. I have been in marketing and have committed the sin of writing as much text as possible and cramming it all in 8-point font on a single page. Don't do that. Use short phrases that jog your reps' memory.

Use it

No playbook will have impact if it's not used in the field. Make sure sales leaders pull out the right ones during opportunity reviews, and reps discuss them and even role play the situations. A football team practices the same plays over and over until they become second nature. Why shouldn't your team do the same?

If sales playbooks are on your mind, contact me for a free discussion!