Lean is operations strategy that helps companies become more efficient. It is all about efficiency and learning. Many companies have created break-through results by applying Lean also in Sales and Marketing.
Flow optimisation
I think it is safe to say that most sales organisations can benefit from flow optimisation. Who wouldn’t like to see their sales funnel flow faster? Lean Sales method describes how companies can optimise the marketing and sales funnels into one efficient process and lower the costs at the same time. Lean principles will help companies to (re-)allocate resources appropriately. In B2B industries this typically means investing more into marketing and being more critical about investments into direct sales. Why?
Sellers need to review their marketing and sales investments
According to latest studies customers have already made up their mind about the suppliers before they even meet the sales people. This happen with up to 60 % of sales opportunities! This means that customers have started to do research by themselves. On the Internet, online, through peer reviews and so on. Sales people cannot deliver as much value in the process as they used to. This substantial change in buying behaviour calls for changes in marketing and sales organisations well. Companies need to adopt to this reality, some companies even choose to lead this change!
Flow and resource optimisation create inflexibilities
Lean helps companies become more efficient. Lean puts the customer and customer needs in to the center. Processes are tailored to provide frequent customer contacts and this happens through flow optimisation. But there is one caveat. Flow efficiency (and resource efficiency) leads into inflexibility. This is a serious issue, especially in sales, as companies need both efficiency and flexibility to adopt to changes in the market, customer behaviour, customer needs and so on. How can one tackle the need for both efficiency and flexibility?
Improve flexibility with loops
This happens through loops. Loop is a process that helps create learning. This is core concept in Lean. As you set up an efficient new process, weather it is new customer acquisition or something else, you also need to build in a feedback loop. The purpose of feedback loop is to create organisational learning. Loop provides information on how the process execution is working, where are improvement opportunities, what is the nature of improvement opportunities as so on. A very interesting question about loops is that what kind of loops you need, when should you go into the loop, what kind of information the loop should provide you with and so on. The loops are very different in Sales, R&D and manufacturing. This is an area where deployment of Lean becomes interesting. Different functions require different feedback cycles and different industries require different feedback loops in Sales. I cannot explain here what kind of loop your industry needs, but I can provide a structured approach to get there.
Flow, loop and learning
To summarise. Companies need to balance efficiency and flexibility. This happens through creation of flow, loops and learning. Always prioritise learning.
Check out my latest book Lean Sales on Amazon.com for 20 case studies and introduction of Lean Sales method. Lean Sales method is proven to deliver results in sales performance and sales effectiveness.
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