How to set sales targets and achieve them!

I have a question for you today: Are you on track to reach your sales targets?

Don’t worry if you just answered “no” to that question, because I am going to give you some ideas and a stack of free resources, to help you hit your sales targets.

I’m also going to give you a simple 5 step guide, to show you how to set your sales targets in a way that’s easy to manage and achieve!

OK, there are 3 possible answers to my opening question:

1. Yes.
2. No.
3. Sales targets?  What sales targets?

Sales targets: If you are on track

If you are currently on track to reach your sales targets, keep on moving forward.  Just make sure you don’t allow complacency to rob you of a great year’s results.  Examine what you have been doing and look for the most effective elements of your marketing, as well as any elements that have underperformed.

Seek to improve your weaker areas and refine your stronger areas.  Nothing happens in business by chance, so be sure to research where your successes have come from, so you can build on them in the 2nd half of the year.

Oh, and WELL DONE!

Sales targets: If you are off track

If you are currently off track, this is a fantastic time to review your marketing strategy and get yourself on track.  Make a list of every marketing activity you are using as part of your overall marketing strategy and examine how well or how poorly they have been performing for you.

If you are currently using certain types of marketing simply because you see others using it or because it feels comfortable, STOP!

You need to identify the correct marketing mix for you and your business, based on your sales targets, your resources and what you want to achieve. Here are 180 marketing and business development ideas to help you.

Here’s a list of 32 questions, to help you get your marketing and business development back on track.  Oh, and if you have not yet discovered the right marketing for you, here is a list of my top marketing tips.

Sales targets: What sales targets?

Most small business owners don’t have a process in place, to set and then track their sales targets.  It’s easy to see why, when you consider that the whole process seems so complicated.  This makes it hard to focus and to he honest, a little daunting too.  The good news is that it’s easy to set realistic, easy to follow sales targets.

The key, is for you to know how many sales you should be making each month or each week, in order to meet your annual turnover and profit goals.  By chunking the annual number down into monthly or weekly targets, it’s far easier and less daunting to keep on top of the figures.

Here’s a simple, easy to follow way to discover what your sales targets should be, in weekly or monthly chunks.

1. List your turnover / revenue targets for the next 12 months.  We need to know what this figure is, in order to know how many sales you should be making each year.
2. Now, list how many “average” sales you would need to make over the next 12 months, in order to achieve the above figures.  Write this number down.
3. To get an approximate idea what your “average” sale value is, list (for example) the value of your last 20 sales, and then divide that number by 20.  This is only an approximate figure, but it will give you something to work with and is usually pretty accurate.
4. Now, divide the number you wrote down in step 2, by 12.  This will give you a monthly sales target.
5. If you want to work on weekly targets, (this suits some business types better than others), simply divide the annual number of sales by 52.

The great news is that no matter how things are right now, you can improve your sales and not only reach your annual targets, but blow the lid off them!

Whatever you do, make sure that if you are off target and not enjoying the success your hard work deserves, that you make the changes required.  Things will not “just get better” by themselves.  For better results, you need to be making better marketing decisions.

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