Part 2: Clear Expectations
The most important part of building an outbound culture is bringing your team along for the ride. Setting clear expectations means reps not only know their metrics, but they also know what good looks like thanks to your example.
Set a north star metric
The best way to create accountability is managing to one key metric that everyone knows and understands. Time and time again we heard the metric is less important than keeping it top of mind. That means as your outbound culture evolves you may shift from activities to meetings, then meetings to opportunities, then opportunities to pipeline created, and from pipe created to self sourced revenue. The goal is to have a clear expectation that translates to success. That said, the most common metric was number of meetings per week per rep.
"Your hear a lot of things. Going back to the old days, you've got to do 50 cold calls or the 1440 program with 120 meaningful activities a week, etc. Those are all great, and there's not one specific framework that works. What makes those frameworks work is that we believed and we could coach people around us."
Do the math
Rather than setting an arbitrary target, show reps what it will take to be successful and the math you did to get there. The more concrete you can be, the better.
This is where cross-functional enablement comes in. Your operations team is going to your strongest partner. To understand what needs to happen to be successful, you have to understand what is currently working, or if nothing is measured, have a partner in keeping a pulse on metrics going forward so you can stay aligned on your north star.
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Showing reps the math and the recipe to be successful is one thing, but showing reps how to be successful was another common theme. This meant creating a culture where playbooks, messaging, and success stories are shared (we'll talk more about this in enablement), but it also means leadership put in the work to make their own outbound successful.
""[At Orum], everyone prospected from the rep level all the way to the CEO level, and now that I'm leading a sales team here, I've noticed that kind of behavior inspires reps to outbound and create a culture by showing that it works."
80% of leaders we surveyed joined their teams in outbound efforts, and shared their own wins and successes. As Neal George, GM of Customer Growth at Zuora said - "If you expect your reps to stand and deliver, you stand and deliver."
Consistency is key
You need to incorporate expectations, examples, and enablement on a regular cadence. This is not a one time training at sales kick off or a quarterly review.
The best teams have incorporated outbound into their standard operating cadences (review some examples here). They make time in 1:1, weekly team calls, recurring enablement, even all hands.
To be part of your culture, it has to be the heartbeat of your company.
Sweat the Small STuff Weekly
"You can't expect what you don't inspect. You have to, on a weekly basis, go into the details because you can't expect the results if you're not doing the small things and inspecting them. It's super important to focus on those small details because that's what creates consistency. "
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