Sales Partnerships, Inc.
Company: Sales Partnerships, Inc., Westminster, CO
Company Description: Sales Partnerships, Inc. is an outsourced sales force company providing dedicated branded representation to companies in a number of industries across North America.
Nomination Category: Sales Awards Team Categories
Nomination Sub Category: Field Sales Team of the Year
Nomination Title: Sales Partnerships Inc (SPI) Northeast Expansion
Tell the story about what this nominated team achieved since the beginning of July 2011 (up to 500 words). Focus on specific accomplishments, and relate these accomplishments to past performance or industry norms. Be sure to mention obstacles overcome, innovations or discoveries made, and outcomes:
Sales Partnerships, Inc (SPI) continued growth as the market leader in business to business sales outsourcing in 2011 and 2012. As an Inc 500 company and past Stevie winner, we have been recognized by our peers as the gold standard in Sales Outsourcing. Specifically, our Northeast teams (B2B small and middle market sales)grew by more than 500% in size and revenue, generating more than $120,000,000 in sales. By comparison, competing teams in the deregulated energy sector (the focus of the team in the nomination) on a per representative basis closed less than 50% of the revenue SPI closed at less than half the margin on sales closed.
Making this accomplishment more impressive was it being done launching as a "new to market" entry into a mature marketplace without a price advantage over the key players in that market.
The keys that led to our success were implementation of our headhunting and metric based recruiting strategies, continuing evolution of our field CRM solutions allowing for real time accountability for our sales work, and better use of business intelligence tools to analyze, correct, and predict future results. These three areas are identified below.
A general review of our current processes is attached in the SPI summary overview document. We are currently the case study used by Research in Motion for how field sales should be done but are in the process of updating that case study with Apple due to our migration onto I-pads to support our field sales platforms.
SPI's advances in recruiting and headhunting follow a 360 degree metric review process. Our interviews are scored, and then compared to training scoring, field observation scoring, and then sales results. Each element of data helps us identify where we need to make improvements and how each skill tracked impacts the others. This allows for each generation of sales program we launch to have better and better qualified candidates, on average.
The tool-set we are using today allows our field representatives to work their target customers using a fluid CRM available through their Ipads that actually helps the representatives locate the nearest qualified prospects near their locations and prioritize working those prospects. The system allows for real time tracking of activity with management oversight to help improve sales performance using the data as key performance indicators for ongoing improvement.
Lastly, our management teams take the data gathered from the field to identify patterns and trends for score-carding representative performance both against each other and against expected norms. This business intelligence review/process allows for us to identify problems before they result in losses in sales and correct them in real time. In markets that change daily competing with multi-billion dollar incumbents, reacting quickly makes the difference between success and failure.
Provide a brief (up to 100 words) biography about the leader(s) of the nominated team:
SPI’s CEO and Chief Sales Officer, Fred Kessler, a 20 year sales veteran, focuses on sales implementation and business development for SPI. His prior posts included senior director and VP of sales roles in Pharmaceuticals and Publishing.
SPI’s VP of Operations, Aaron Kullman, is a 15+ year sales veteran with extensive finance and operations backgrounds. His prior posts included sales systems development in the Fortune 500, business process outsourcing sales, and running a software company.
SPI’s Director of Business Development, Paul Murphy, is a 30 year sales veteran with extensive operations and process management experience. His prior posts included GE and Northwest Airlines serving in both senior sales and operations roles. His work in aviation helped redefine how aviation could be sold.