Should you focus on sales call quality?
And how to get started as individual or manager.
We ran a study to measure the impact of call coaching on performance.
The outcomes should convince you to give and receive feedback.
To do so, we created a "Call Scorecard": a structured template of aspects to assess during the calls (introduction, closing, discovery, objections handling, preparation, follow-up, etc.).
1 Scorecard = 1 Call which led to feedback and coaching between Sales and Manager.
Managers would rank each element of the Scorecard, automatically generating a total score ranging from 0 (not good) to 100 (perfect) for each call.
After some initial tests, Managers would expect their teams to score 80. Any score below would not meet the company's expectations.
We worked with 14 Managers and 106 Sales (BDR's, AE's & AM's).
Group A: 53 Sales received call coaching.
- Sub-group A1: 26 Sales received at least 2 Scorecards.
- Sub-group A2: 27 Sales received 1 Scorecard only.
Group B: 53 Sales didn't.
Fair split between the two groups in terms of average tenure in the company, total years of experience, country, etc. 
Outcome 1/4: Call quality can be increased quickly.
When conducting the 1st Scorecard, you noticed that the quality was below expectations (at 66 on average).
After 3 Scorecards only, it jumped to 82, meeting expectations.
You notice the “Learning Curve” effect where there is a drop (higher expectations) from Call #4 to Call #6.
After 8 calls, the score obtained by sales lands at 90, that’s a +36% between the first session and the last one.
Bottom line: Sales being coached increased their call quality while gaining in comfort and confidence.
Outcome 2/4: Higher quality leads to higher performance.
Group A (who received coaching) outperforms the Group B (no coaching) 4 months out of 5.
At their peak, they achieve 123% of their quota when Group B only 104%.
In total, they generated +7pts quote achievement on the period.
Outcome 3/4: Consistent Coaching is the determining factor.
Interestingly, Group A1 (Sales who received at least 2 Scorecards) massively outperformed the others, including Group A2 which received only 1 Scorecard.
“Being coached” only once can be even worst and counter-productive.
Going deeper, we observed that Group A2 was getting “Do as I say” coaching (focusing on outputs) while Group A1 was benefiting from “open and on-going conversations” over time (inputs first).
In other words, genuine and repeated coaching brings the best out of the Sales.
Outcome 4/4: Things take time. Start coaching from day 1.
Finally, while mapping when Group A1 received their first Scorecard: we noticed that early birds (starting in Month 1), outperformed their friends by 26 pts.
Demonstrating that frequent and consistent coaching brings more value.
But that it can take 3 to 6 months to reach its full potential. Effective coaching takes time.
How to get started?
Watch this online course (free registration):