Elements of a Business Development Team Built to Scale

by | Nov 25, 2015 | Sales Strategy, Sales Tips

A successful business is often described as a “well-oiled machine” – and with good reason. Both require multiple parts working together in the most efficient manner. Like a machine without the right parts, a business operating without the right development efforts may get the job done, but not to its best ability. Even worse, adding on new parts to either is difficult and ineffective in increasing productivity.

Although we can’t speak for the faulty machine, the answer to a fledging business is a development team built to allow for growth. The elements of a business development team built to scale are varied, yet each plays a role in making an effective team. A scalable business development team has diverse skills, streamlined processes, established systems, and an effective team culture.

Diverse skills: an effective team spreads the multitude of sales and marketing needs for a business across the team, ensuring no one person holds all the information. A team built to grow includes individuals from each of the following areas of specialization to provide focus and dedication to that area.

  • Sales talents: coaches, mentors, hunters, closers, and/or farmers
  • Marketing team: strategists, writers, graphic designers, CRM & marketing automation  specialists, website designers, and more
  • Customer support: account management, service personnel

Streamlined processes: refined sales, service, and marketing processes are key to allow for quick on-boarding of new employees. An effective business development team should have a playbook of drilled down best practices for each process.

  • Sales pipeline management
  • Territory identification and management plan
  • Integrated sales and marketing process
  • Hiring and training models
  • Reporting and analysis
  • Ongoing coaching and mentoring

Established systems: a good development team needs reliable, automated systems to integrate with its efficient processes. These systems improve the overall communication and productivity of the team for increased ROI.

  • CRM
  • Marketing automation
  • Database augmentation
  • Integrated website
  • Project management

Effective team culture: the dynamic of a business development team is crucial to success. It is important to have a strong, established team culture before on-boarding new members.

  • Established, powerful value statement
  • Versatile and effective relationship building skills
  • Defined roles and high accountability
  • Ongoing training and career development opportunities

Whether you choose to use an internal or outsourced business development team (or a combination of the two) there comes a time when you’ll need to invest to grow. The beauty of the outsourced model is that the systems and processes are already built, and someone else does the hiring, training and onboarding for you. Not only that, when you choose to outsource business development you gain a level of dedicated service, accountability and a constructive eye that is hard to find internally.

Each business is unique – requiring different services at varying times. To learn more about the business development services offered at NuGrowth, contact our team at 800-966-3051.

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Author: Sarah Deak

Sarah is a copywriter for NuGrowth Digital clients. She likes to look for the unexpected angle, and uses her background in nonprofit development and marketing to create interesting and informative pieces that drive prospect engagement.

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