Recent client testimonial:

“Like many family SME’s our business doesn’t operate an HR department or even and full time HR resource, however we still face the same challenges of managing our resources, and in our situation planning for family succession.
Anna was highly recommended to us as a expert who could assist us in developing our strategy. Anna very quickly understood our business, what we were trying to achieve and identified some of the challenges we faced. Through Anna’s knowledge and guidance we have been able to develop a future succession plan while ensuring the business is not distracted from it’s core day to day operations. As GM of the business it has been great to draw on Anna’s significant external expertise to help me develop a clear strategy ensuring the right approach to succession has been developed for our business.
I found Anna very approachable , professional and very easy to deal with . Anna will continue to be part of our succession journey as I will be regularly drawing on her expertise and guidance.
”

— Simon Toneycliffe General Manager Whitehaven Wine Co

“Anna takes a unique approach to the recruitment process. SME Recruit felt like an extension of our business as Anna takes the time to really understand your business, the role and the type of candidates that would genuinely fit the business and the culture. We recently placed a senior role through SME Recruit and were hugely impressed by the level of professionalism and her communication. It was an important role to our future growth so we took our time. Anna was hugely patient and positively challenged our thinking throughout the process and presented a fantastic range of candidates. I would definitely recommend Anna and SME Recruit.”

— Mike Button - Sales & Marketing Manager - RLB Packaging & Strapping

“After a series of amazing recruitment fails of my own – Anna Freeman @ SME recruit was recommended to me.
We had a tight time frame, and a very specialized candidate we were seeking. Anna gave me lots of options around the process and this worked well for our business.
Anna made things happen quickly and we have secured a great employee. I was so happy that I used her service again straight away.
In the future, if we have any other openings we would use Anna as of right. I was particularly pleased with her professionalism and level of communication.

”

— Jeremy Scott CPS and Ashley & Co

“Anna has a carved out a niche service for SMEs looking for a more personalised approach to recruitment. She takes the time to get to understand your business, culture and resourcing needs whilst unafraid to challenge your current thinking and processes. I would strongly recommend her to any small business looking for a fresh and more economical approach to recruitment.”

— Matt Vyle - Director & General Manager - Unison

“As the owner of an SME and ‘not knowing what you don’t know’ I can’t speak highly enough of Anna’s ability to fully understand our business and establish exactly what General Manager would be the right fit for us. I always felt Anna had our best interests at the heart of the recruitment process and I would highly recommend SME Recruit to anyone who is really serious about making the BEST recruit for their business – A+++!”

— Richard Crum - Owner Founder - Chilltech

“The recruitment process with SME Recruit was seamless end to end. Anna really gets the challenges faced by smaller businesses and is able to apply her years of experience in the industry to get the right result every time. Her pragmatic approach to problem solving was refreshing and the expert advice made the recruitment process easy and enjoyable.”

— Gray Borrell - General Manager at Novii

“I worked with Anna and SME Recruit for the hiring of an Australasian Sales Manager. Anna’s campaign with us was an absolute success, and we are extremely happy with the team member we have coming on board.
The position is one that will be hugely influential to our business growth over the next 5 years, and being a young SME with a young team, it’s never easy to attract top people from the industry. Anna not only took the time to ensure that she fully understood the type of candidate we were looking for, but also ensured we were portraying our business in an honest, but appealing way to the candidates.
I enjoyed the process every step of the way.
I will definitely be using Anna and SME Recruit again, and recommend anyone else to do so.”

— Ryan Kamins - Director and CEO - CleanPaleo

Setting successful sales KPIs

Tips on setting successful sales KPIs

The challenge of small business is that you are often so busy that the first indicator of success (or failure!) is the sales results for the month/quarters. The ideal situation would be to know where you are tracking before the pleasant (or unexpected!) surprise. Having a simple set of KPI’s for your sales person will positively impact this requirement.

Some stuff you need to know about sales KPIs …

When we talk about KPI’s, it’s important to note that there are lagging indicators and there are leading indicators.

Lagging indicators

Lagging indicators tell sales managers how they have been doing by looking at output and results “after the fact.”

Lagging metrics can include:

• Sales – 80/20 rule

• Gross margin

• Gross margin %

• Number of customers

• Churn rate

Lagging indicators focus on past performance. They usually get the most attention in SMEs because these are the types of numbers that get reported to the Directors and/or Shareholders. These indicators need to feed into the overall financial objectives of the business.

Leading indicators

Leading indicators focus on the likelihood of achieving goals and what might occur in the future. They’re a bit like a signposts along the road. Leading indicators are activities and actions that can be tracked or measured during the sales process as your sales person’s opportunities are being developed and the pipeline is being built.

Leading indicators include activities like:

           • How many calls should a sales person make?

• How many prospects does a sales person visit?

• What types of prospect is the sales person calling?

• How many of these calls turn into opportunities?

• How many of these opportunities turn into wins?

If you really want to make a change to your sales the leading indicators are the best indicators to focus on.

Start to observe the relationship between the activities and the actual sales and you can then adjust the activities that are most important. You might then adjust your sales person’s targets accordingly.

(Please give me a call to ask for a copy of a KPI sales grid. I can tailor this to your business.)

Three fundamental principles:

Tracking KPI’s via leading indicators will give you clarity about the road ahead, allowing you to see potential “bumps” ahead of time.

1. Don’t focus on too many KPI’s at a time. Prioritise certain KPIs to focus your sales person on the desired outcome.

2. Make the KPI’s visible and review them regularly in team, 1:1 meetings and Director Meetings

3. Allow your new sales person at least a 2-3 months to settle in before you go through the process of setting up their KPIs. They need to take ownership of their indicators. Time in the business will help them to understand the detail of what makes their role “tick”.

Further food for thought…

·        The best performing sales teams are ones that are able to break their sales process into individual, measurable activities. You will find that most sales happen as a result of predictable activities, and a decline in sales is usually down to neglect of these activities.

Below are some KPI’s that are interesting to follow. They will also assist your sales manager with understand how their sales person is performance across the stages of the sales cycle:

1.      Average number of days in each opportunity (what opportunity is about to close therefore what can I forecast?)

2.      Stage to stage conversation ratios (great for highlighting coaching priorities)

3.      Opportunity to close ratio (who’s good at opening doors, who’s good at closing?)

·        Boosting sales productivity in a B2B environment

                      1.      Enable your sales person with the right content at the right time

2.      Support the rep with just in time coachin

3.      Identity opportunities for improvement in the pipeline

4.      Establish a feedback loop between sales and marketin

·        Consider setting lagging indicators that surpass those written in the sales person job description. Incentivise the sales person based on stretch revenue targets.

·        Set KPIs that are SMART: Specific, Measureable, Attainable, Realistic, and Timely.

·        Sales team KPIs should feed-off the over Business Objectives. Make sure that they are streamlined.

·        Include your sales person in the process of setting and signing off their KPIs

·        Set consistent KPI measurements and targets across the people in your sales tea