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Our sales, service and franchise
management service helps sales managers design, analyze,
align, realign and manage geographic field territories.
If territories aren't aligned properly, you're wasting
resources and losing revenue. Territory mapping
solutions can help you optimize the layout and content
of your territories based on any number of criteria such
as:
 | Sales |
| Driving distance |
| Customers served |
| Lead distribution |
| Work load
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| Attend a Web Seminar to
discover how market-leading companies use sales
territory software and services for territory
alignment and sales territory mapping.
Register here or
call 888.627.7767. |
OVERVIEW
Our sophisticated sales territory management service
combines specialized features used in designing and
planning territories together with a database, mapping
technology, reports, drive time information, territory
analysis and optimization.
Our management service includes an
optimization engine, which incorporates powerful
algorithms that have been designed to rapidly create
balanced and travel efficient territories. It is the
ideal tool for managers with direct field sales
personnel, as well as for those overseeing distributors,
resellers, service personnel or franchisees. Its
flexible design lends itself to a variety of situations,
making it the perfect tool for both simple and complex
sales deployment applications.
Sales Territory Map
Empower's intelligent
optimization engine allows you to choose the number of
territories or a variable (such as sales volume or
driving distance) that you want to optimize territories
on.
Powerful,
Sophisticated, Easy-to-Use
| Use multiple data sources to map
sales people, customers, sales volume, prospects,
competitors, demographics and more. |
| Assign a weight to variables used
for optimizing. |
| Set an optimization goal based on
number of territories or a target data value (such
as sales potential). |
| Optimize within existing
hierarchies (e.g. districts, regions, etc.) or other
defined areas. |
| Create overview territory map and
maps for every individual territory. |
Sales Territory
Mapping
Our
sales territory mapping service provides a visual
display to easily pinpoint territories that can benefit
from a more balanced alignment. Sales territory planning
will save your company time and money.
Above:
Territories out of balance result in an uneven
distribution of workload, leading to wasted resources
and lost revenue. Below: Properly aligned
territories let you reach the most customers while
optimally using your resources.
A
Powerful Productivity Tool
Sales territory alignment is a very underutilized, yet powerful sales force productivity tool. Most organizations overlook a significant opportunity to increase sales and profits by not aligning and balancing sales territories appropriately. In today’s competitive marketplace, companies cannot afford to have inefficiently designed territories.
Efficient territory design is the key
to increased performance for two reasons:
| Our experience tells us that in
most companies, over 40% of all field sales reps
have either too much work or too little work. This
means that the sales resource is being wasted, since
a field rep with too much work will not make all
required calls and a field rep with too little work
is being underutilized. In each case, the result is
reduced productivity and sales revenue. |
| The average field sales rep
spends approximately 20% of their time traveling.
More efficient territory design results in less
travel time which translates into more selling time.
Even a small decrease in travel can result in large
revenue increases. |
Sales Territory Alignment: Grow Sales Without Adding Resources
By David Klein
For many companies, the sales force is one of their most expensive human resource investments, with sales calls costing upwards of several hundred dollars.
Companies have turned to Sales Force Automation (SFA) systems, Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems, enhanced sales training and account management programs to gain more productivity from their sales force. While each of these initiatives has merit, many companies have found that a sales territory alignment initiative can increase productivity and sales at a relatively low cost.
Sales territories, by nature, are geographic in nature. When they are out of balance, some areas with high potential customers may be underserved while other areas are saturated. Too much effort may be expended against low potential customers. Sales and service people spend too much “windshield time” driving from sales call to sales call and don’t spend enough time seeing and listening to customers.
The result of these inefficiencies is that companies not only often leave millions of dollars on the table, they suffer from low morale and high turnover among sales people.
The Benefits of Sales Territory Alignment
Aligning sales territories is an important initiative and can lead to many benefits for a business. Good territory alignment will increase sales and customer coverage, reduce travel time and associated costs, provide a competitive advantage, and foster equity and morale among sales people.
Increased sales and customer coverage — When territories are properly aligned, issues of under- and over-capacity are reduced or eliminated. Each territory is created allowing the sales person to reach and spend time with the greatest number of high potential customers, thus increasing sales.
Reduced travel time and associated expenses — Due to the geographic nature of sales territories, better alignment means less travel time to reach customers. Less time spent in the car means more time spent with customers, thus more time for selling. Other associated expenses such as fuel and automobile costs are reduced as well.
Competitive advantage — This benefit of sales territory alignment is often overlooked. However, if you have better coverage in your territories, you can reach new opportunities faster than your competitors, again leading to increased sales.
Equity and morale — Nothing can be more discouraging to a sales person than to see an associate milking a highly profitable territory while they’re stuck servicing an area with low potential. Properly aligned territories provide a more equitable distribution of accounts, level the playing field in terms of achieving rewards, and boost morale among sales people. In addition, sales people stay longer, thus lowering the costs associated with new hiring.
When to Align Sales Territories
Many companies conduct a yearly review of sales territories. The year’s performance may or may not lead to a change in the shape or makeup of the sales territories. However, a number of situations should compel you to embark on a sales territory alignment initiative, including:
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If your sales territories are based on historical data rather than potential for sales. |
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If you have a new or changed sales team due to acquisition, merger, partnering or restructuring. |
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If your company is launching a major strategic initiative and sales staffing is not matched to it. |
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If your sales team has experienced significant changes over a short period of time. |
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Each of these situations is ripe with the potential for decreased productivity, missed customer opportunity, and confusion and competition among sales people. Sales territory alignment can help rectify all these situations. |
How to Align Sales Territories
There are many software packages available to help you align territories. Some are simple and may lack the functionality required to align multi-tiered territories and account for complex relationships. Others can be sophisticated, expensive and non-intuitive. You may want to engage a firm with expertise in sales territory alignment that can advise on the territory alignment process and provide software and analysis services.
Most successful sales territory alignment initiatives follow a proven process similar to this:
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Analyze current territories, sales force composition, compensation plans, target markets, customer locations and market penetration. |
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Assess existing territories to find underserved or saturated areas based on the number of customers and prospects in each territory, and analyze how easily they can be reached by your sales force. |
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Determine the number of territories needed based on your criteria for realignment. Criteria can include equitable distribution of leads or workload, account assignment, number of sales people, travel time, location of distributors, and other variables relevant to your business. |
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Rank and align territories, optimizing them at multiple levels. For example, territories that roll up into districts, districts into regions, and so on. |
In addition, once
territories are aligned, you will want to roll out the
new territories to your sales force by providing
detailed territory maps, either printed or online
through your intranet. The maps can include the
boundaries of territories, customer and prospect
locations, market penetration levels and areas of high
potential. Now you’ve given your sales force a much
higher probability of success.
Discover how better sales territory
management can increase your revenues and save you
money. Our sales territory mapping service is used by
national and regional companies throughout the United
States for sales territory planning and mapping. Call
888.627.7767 to speak with one of our sales territory
experts. |
News Article
Read an article on the benefits and important of Sales Territory
Optimization.
Brochure
Download the Empower Geographics Sales Territory optimization
brochure.
Related Data
Discover how you can use demographic and business data in your
sales territory optimization efforts.
Use our territory mapping
services for:
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Sales Territories
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Service Territories
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Distributor Territories
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Franchise Areas
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Reseller Areas
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Marketing Areas
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Advertising Zones
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Merchandise Areas
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Shipping Zones
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Distribution Centers
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Planting Zones
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Climate Zones
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And Many Others!
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