How Can Sales Territory Re-Alignment Increase Market Penetration?

sales territory map sample 87 Tom had a limited budget and a large task at hand. The business in question was struggling, and a market analyst had been brought in to study its penetration within the 23 counties surrounding the metroplex it served. “Despite the large number of companies that fit the target market,” Tom explains, “The Company’s actual accounts in any given county were lower than hoped for.” Tom was brought in to rejuvenate the companies sales, which he hoped to do in part by executing a sales territory alignment program.

The Company’s target market included any business which had a fleet of vehicles and drivers. Tom determined the best way to identify where these businesses where in the DFW area was to find the SIC codes for all specific industries requiring fleets, and then purchase a physical address list of all entities with those SIC codes.

“Using this information, I hoped to be able to create six unique sales territories.” As Tom explains, “Each territory would contain approximately the same number of businesses with relevant SIC Codes and give each territory both rural and metropolitan flavor.” The idea was for each sales person to cover a given territory for six months at a time and then he/she would rotate to a new territory. Sales people would however maintain responsibility for accounts they cultivated, irrespective of which territory they were in.

Ensuring the number of potential customers in each territory was the same was a very important element, both in order to measure individual reps success and to help them feel that they were operating on a fair playing field.

“With all of this in mind, I searched on the internet for a mapping partner that was sophisticated enough to understand my needs, but not so upscale as to cost more than we could afford.” Tom did not have the time to learn how to integrate list data into some sort of do-it-yourself mapping software and figure out how to create the six balanced territories he desired.

Customer Service Proves Invaluable

“I originally contacted two mapping providers.” The first did not seem to understand what he was looking, and once they did, they wanted to charge significantly more than he was prepared to spend. “I picked Maponics because Faith, my sales rep, was genuinely interested in what I needed and I got the sense that what I had in mind was what Maponics did everyday.”

Faith was able to help Tom figure out exactly what would serve him best, while staying within his budgetary constraints. Maponics was able to create the six equal territories Tom wanted. In addition Maponics mapped them on a giant wall map, and shaded each ZIP Code by the number of business prospects in it. As Tom explains “The shading was important because it could be used by the sales person to determine which areas of their territory held the most and least potential business, thereby maximizing their ability to manage time and driving expense in the field.” Other features of the actual map included highways and county boundaries and labels.

“Implementation of the sales territory alignment will begin January 1, but the sales force is already using the map Maponics created.”