OREANDA-NEWS. December 10, 2015. As a sales leader, it is easy to become consumed in the day-to-day grind and lose sight of how to generate incremental revenue. However, there are powerful strategies that can maximize sales and make a major positive impact on your team, and ultimately, on your customers.

Join me on December 10th at 11am PT for a webcast where I’ll share six strategic and tactical roles leaders need to play if they want their sales teams to be successful. Before the event, here’s a look at some questions all sales leaders need to ask themselves in order to be in a revenue-generating, high-performing state of mind.

What can I be doing now to become a sales leader in a high-performing sales organization?

Great sales leaders help their team see and achieve things they didn't think were possible.  We often spend less than 5% of our time developing people and, to me, that means we are failing to realize our most important job.

For right now, not only is it important to be thinking about your team, but also your customers. 2016 is around the corner, and successful sales leaders are thinking about one big tactic to kick off the new year: customer visits. At the start of the fiscal year, uncover new opportunities by scheduling in-person customer meetings. You’ll develop strategic opportunities with major accounts right from the start of the new year.

As a sales leader, how do you gauge whether you’re making a positive impact on sales?

Ask yourself if you’ve brought new strategic insights to your organization based on the relationships you’ve made with your customers at the senior level.  As a leader, you have the ability to create relationships with other senior level people, the purpose of which is to help gain insights you can leverage.

Second, measure the percentage of closed sales with zero discount.  A leader’s role is to help create confidence amongst the sales team, and support them to close more sales with minimal — or no — discount.  If this ratio is not moving in the right direction, then you are not making a positive impact.

Lastly, test new ideas. Great sales leaders can make a positive impact on sales by constantly testing and developing programs. Test an idea with an account to not only make it a stronger customer, but also to stay engaged. Use your connections and relationships to develop a test, doing so will allow you and your entire organization to have access to the client in ways your competitors can’t.

How do strong leaders communicate with their team?

Communication with your team is key, but it’s even more important for you to collaborate with your team so that you’re both engaging with customers. From the start, the customer relationship must extend beyond the sales manager. Engage your account managers with the customer’s senior management. When meeting with a customer’s top management, always have the account manager ready as the follow-up contact. This develops and establishes a relationship right from the start. Now, not only do you have a better relationship with the account manager because you’re involving them early, but the customer benefits from an early and strategic relationship as well.

Join me December 10th at 11am PT for the Salesforce Live webcast. If you lead a sales team, you won’t want to miss this. Register today.