Adapt your sales playbook to your company's needs

[jrineakter]

Because every company is different, sales teams need documents that are tailored to their technology, customer base, product offering, and unique value proposition . We share the steps to create a tailored sales playbook that fits your company’s needs.

A sales playbook replaces guesswork with reliable, detailed guidance , helping your sales reps make decisions that win more customers. Logic says that if every salesperson is equipped with the right sales playbook, sales performance will greatly improve.

While every sales playbook contains information on sales plays, sequences, and sales enablement technology , every company is different. The ideal sales processes for one company may not work for another. The challenge, then, is to write a sales playbook tailored to your unique circumstances . But that’s easier oman telegram data said than done. After all, companies are experts at what they do. Writing sales playbooks is typically not one of them.

So how do you tailor your playbook to give your sales teams the exact tools they need to get results? The important thing is to work as strategically and meticulously as possible before, during, and after writing your sales playbook. Let’s explore each step, starting at the beginning of the playbook writing process.

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Before you draft: Involve stakeholders and map everything out
As is common in most organizations, teams operate from a set of processes they’ve built up over time, and they’re often unwritten. This can be dangerous. For example, if your sales director moves to another company, they might take their knowledge with them. Your sales reps also work with customer service, marketing, and other departments. So vital information could be in the hands of people outside the sales team. That’s

why it’s crucial to bring the right stakeholders on board before you start writing your sales playbook. Once you’ve brought the right people to the table, you need to map out each of your sales processes . This is complex work, as business involves different buying stages and multiple sales sequences.

Defining your sales stack—the set of tools that empower your sales team—is equally important. As a resource for onboarding new sales reps, your sales playbook should be a guide to using your key sales technology. Once all your sales enablement processes and tools have been mapped out, it’s time to roll up your sleeves and get writing.

While writing: focus on improving structure and process
Immanuel Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason is one of the most important works of European philosophy of all time. Despite its importance, few philosophy professors have bothered to read it. That’s how difficult it is to read.

Here’s the bottom line: For a sales playbook to be useful, it must be structured and written in a way that is easy to understand and reference . This means adding context to help readers understand the details, such as providing information about the actions needed, and where, how, and when the actions are executed. It also means structuring the playbook so that the information is easy to find. That’s because most reps who review your sales playbook are only interested in the information that is useful at that moment.

At this point, and after you’ve mapped out all of your sales processes and technology, you need to identify gaps, pain points, and areas for improvement. Developing a sense of what’s working and what’s not is critical. This will help you recognize opportunities, create new processes, and tailor your sales playbook to your offering and customer base.