So you're a sales rep starting a new job, hey?
Or maybe you've just been given a shiny new territory to work with and want to show your boss that you have what it takes to crush it.
We get it, you're bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, ready to hit the ground running and make those sales.
But you've got to be smart about it.
There's a well-known principle that salespeople are often aware of, called the Pareto principle, that states that 20% of a company's salespeople produce 80% of that company's overall sales.
You obviously want to be part of that 20%, but before you do that, you've got to learn the ropes, which includes discovering which metrics are important to the company and yourself, learning about your customers, and otherwise figuring out how you can sell the most effectively.
Sounds like a great objective, but what's the best way to achieve it?
By following a comprehensive sales plan.
Because as every great salesperson knows, you can't just walk into a new sales position, whether that's with a new company or taking over a sales territory you've never worked with before, without a solid plan on how you're going to tackle sales.
A sales plan is basically a schedule that helps you prioritize tasks and set specific targets and objectives that you'll want to achieve.
But to be effective, you want to create more than just a general outline. You want to get specific by digging out your SMART goals, researching, and much more. That's where the 30 60 90 Sales plan comes in.
Let's start by defining what it is and then go from there.
A 30 60 90 sales plan is a strategic outline that maps out a salesperson's first three months in a new role. It's designed to help individuals gradually integrate into their position, setting clear goals and milestones across three distinct phases: the first 30 days, the next 30, and the final 30 days.
This structured approach allows new hires to onboard effectively, build strong foundations, and start contributing to sales targets within 90 days. Whether you're a seasoned professional or a beginner, a 30-60-90 day sales plan helps clarify expectations and streamline success.
You can customize your sales plan to suit your needs and the needs of the business you work for, but a typical 30 60 90 day sales plan will look something like this:
Days 1-30: Understanding |
Days 31-60: Strategy & Planning |
Days 61-90: Execution & Performance |
Focus on training and gaining product knowledge. You'll dive deep into understanding company culture, researching the market, and familiarizing yourself with the sales processes. Build rapport with key team members and complete initial training. |
In this phase, you'll start developing sales strategies, building relationships with prospects, and setting intermediate goals. Key activities include shadowing senior reps, planning outreach campaigns, and identifying potential clients. |
The final phase emphasizes executing sales strategies. This is where you start actively selling, closing deals, and tracking your performance. The focus is on integrating fully into the sales team, achieving your first sales quota, and building a sustainable pipeline. |
In the first 30-day phase of the 30 60 90 day sales plan, the focus is on learning. This period is all about immersing yourself in the company culture, familiarizing yourself with the products or services, and understanding internal processes. Here, you're laying the groundwork to ensure a smooth transition into the next phases.
Key Activities |
Description |
Training and Onboarding |
Dive deep into the product or service offerings. Understand how they solve customer pain points, and know your unique selling points inside and out. |
Market Research |
Analyze competitors, market trends, and target audience profiles to understand the landscape. |
Sales Process Orientation |
Familiarize yourself with the sales funnel, customer relationship management (CRM) tools, and internal sales workflows. |
Initial goals:
This first phase helps you build a solid foundation before diving into sales execution, ensuring you're well-versed in the company's offerings and market positioning.
After the learning phase, the 60-day phase shifts toward crafting your game plan. Now that you understand the product and market, it's time to begin forming relationships and laying down sales strategies. You should also begin setting intermediate goals that will help ensure you're on track to hit sales targets in the final phase of the 30 60 90 sales plan.
Key Activities |
Description |
Sales Strategy Development |
Use your market insights to craft personalized strategies that resonate with your target audience. |
Relationship Building |
Begin reaching out to prospects, attend networking events, and start nurturing leads. |
Mentorship and Shadowing |
Work alongside senior sales reps to observe their techniques and gain practical experience. |
Intermediate goals:
At this stage, you're actively working on aligning your strategies with company goals, setting the stage for execution in the final phase.
In the final 90-day phase, it's time to execute. By now, you should be fully integrated into the sales team and actively engaging in sales activities. The primary goal here is to start closing deals and meeting your sales quotas. This phase is where you truly begin to demonstrate the value you've been preparing to deliver.
Key Activities |
Description |
Active Selling |
Engage with prospects, present product demos, and begin negotiating deals. |
Performance Tracking |
Start tracking your performance metrics (e.g., conversion rates, lead generation). |
Sales Pipeline Management |
Continue building and refining your sales pipeline to meet future goals. |
Long-term goals:
It's crucial that new salespeople, whether they are new to the company or just new to a particular sales territory, have all the sales tools and information they need to be successful. Part of that includes creating a 30 60 90 sales plan, which provides the following benefits:
Sales are all about first impressions, and there's a lot to go around in a sales environment. Not only does the salesperson want to make a good first impression on their customers, but also on their manager as well, especially if they've just started a new job. On the other hand, a sales manager should want to make a good first impression on a new salesperson, to show them that "this is a good company to work for and you have great earning potential here."
A 30 60 90 sales plan helps foster great first impressions all around:
Any employee, salespeople included, should never be in doubt about what is expected of them in a new role. With a 30 60 90 sales plan, whether the salesperson creates it themselves and receives manager approval, the plan is created by their manager, or the creation of the plan is a joint effort, clear expectations regarding learning, sales, and process optimization can be clearly established from the beginning.
Surprises are good for parties, but not so much for your sales job. A 30 60 90 day plan for a new sales territory or job is the perfect way to keep track of performance. As data from outreach, leads, and sales comes in, everyone can clearly understand how things are going and make adjustments as needed. This means that if there's an issue, let's say with the effectiveness of outreach or the number of overall closed sales, it can be identified quickly, and action can be taken to rectify it.
When a clear map of goals and timelines to reach them is available, it's much easier for salespeople to stay on track with their deliverables and ensure there's enough time available to reach important milestones.
For example, suppose a milestone is set at the 30-day deadline for a meeting between a sales manager and salesperson to determine where they're at with understanding their territory, customers, and/or the company's products or services via a report. In that case, the salesperson knows that they must set aside time to gather their notes and potentially create a presentation in preparation for that meeting.
Not every approach to sales will result in smashing success, and that's ok. By using data from a 30 60 90 sales plan, data-driven decisions can be made regarding adjustments to your sales strategy, giving the salesperson the best opportunity to fine-tune their approach to sales over time.
You won't get very far in sales if you don't do your homework first. Customers respond well to salespeople that demonstrate competence by taking the time to do their research on the customer, their pain points, and the company they work for beforehand.
With Ringy, for instance, a salesperson can see conversation history via a specific customer dashboard. This is especially useful if said salesperson just took over new territory and needed to get the lowdown on the company's current relationship with that territory's customers. This information is extremely valuable for showing a customer that you've taken the time to do your homework and learn about their previous history with your company, rather than relying on them to tell you everything during your first conversation.
In addition to researching your customers, you should also understand your company's products, services, and competitors well. With this information, you can make effective recommendations to your customers that make sense and be prepared to face potential objections.
You'll want to make sure that your own professional priorities are clear in your 30 60 90 day sales plan. It's true that during your first 30 days, your main goal is likely to learn about your company, the products that your company sells, and its competitors, which should be listed in your plan. However, it's also likely that you'll want to get more specific with what exactly your priorities should be throughout your 30 60 90 day plan, like completing onboarding and training within the first week, becoming familiar with the company's values and mission, etc.
You don't want to sell yourself short, but you don't want to be too ambitious too quickly either. When you're developing your 30 60 90 day sales plan, you have to be able to balance which goals you can realistically accomplish without selling yourself short. You might need some input from experienced sales reps or your manager here to set achievable goals, especially if you're new to the company.
Do you know and understand your company's goals? Sure, your company wants you to sell, but chances are the actual company goals are more robust than that, like increasing overall revenue year over year by at least 20%. So let's say you're part of a team of 10 salespeople, and your territory historically earns 2.5% of overall company sales. That's a big territory and a lot of sales you're responsible for, so if you set your own sales goal at let's say 1.5% for the year, that likely isn't needed to cut it, or it'll put more pressure on the rest of your team to make up the difference.
Speaking of sales teams, it's important to ensure that your goals also align with the rest of your team. Going back to our previous example, let's say that you set a sales goal that was a bit lower than your territory typically produces within a given year — but you've done so because a few of your big accounts in the area have downsized their operations or moved on to a competitor.
Sales territories don't stay static forever, there are always changes with accounts with either client moving on or new entrants into the area. That's why it's important to discuss these changes with the rest of your team (and chances are they're experiencing the same fluctuations) to ensure that everyone's on the same page with regard to expectations and goal setting.
Day 1-30:
Day 31-60:
Day 61-90:
Day 31-60:
Day 61-90:
Day 1-30:
Day 31-60:
Day 61:90:
HubSpot's 30 60 90 sales plan template keeps information simple and straightforward with an easy-to-follow format:
What You Want to Accomplish Within 100 Days
A new hire should accomplish the following expectations within the first 100 days of their employment as a sales rep (list as many expectations as necessary):
Month 1: Date - Date
Building off of the list of expectations you created above, the first month should focus on the salesperson getting oriented with the company and getting situated in their position. Sales goals shouldn't be the focus here, as the main goal within the first 30-days should be the salesperson learning about the company, the products and/or services they'll be selling, and their customers.
Goals, deliverables, measurements for success, and resources provided should all be listed:
Download HubSpot's Sales Template
The 30 60 90 day plan for new sales territory template from Xtensio helps you create a visually appealing plan that can be easily shared with stakeholders and includes:
First 30 days:
31-60 Days:
60-90 Days:
Download Xtensio's Sales Template
The 30 60 90 day plan for account executives from Leadfeeder is designed to help new account executives onboard smoothly, building a strong foundation for future success by focusing on customer relationships, sales skills, and goal-setting.
First 30 Days:
31-60 Days:
60-90 Days:
Preparing for a new sales job or taking over a new sales territory in your company can be daunting, but with a well thought out 30 60 90 day sales plan, you can ease stress by setting out expectations in advance.
When it comes to managing your customers, leads, and other sales and marketing initiatives, you'll need a sales CRM that works with you and your sales process. That's where Ringy comes in.
Request a Demo with Ringy today, and we'll walk you through our software.