At Ring Ring Marketing, we know that metrics matter. There’s no point to creating a marketing campaign and implementing it if you don’t know exactly what it’s achieving for you:

Which ad is creating the most leads and/or the most conversions? Which method of social media outreach is turning into sales? How effective is the website at converting prospective customers into buyers?

These things are all critical, but what many people lose sight of is that the important metrics are the ones that translate to sales. Other marketing companies will go on about how well they helped you rank for some keyword (that no one’s searching for) or how many views they got you on blog posts or YouTube videos (that never translate into sales).

Everything you do in your marketing and sales approach must be tightly focused on delivering sales. Greater Web traffic is important, but only if it’s turning into customers. Improved brand awareness is great, but only is people are purchasing your services and/or products.

Production is what matters. Production is the bottom line. If you’re spending time focused on your salespeople’s techniques, how many cold calls they’re making per day, how many follow-up calls they’re making, you’re probably looking in the wrong spot.

Here’s a hypothetical: On a given Tuesday, you have one salesperson who made 50 cold calls and 20 follow-up calls but did not make a single sale. Another salesperson made all of nine calls based on careful customer research and made four sales. Who had the better day? There’s no question: It’s the second salesperson.

There’s no point to rewarding activity if it doesn’t produce results. If you have salespeople who have more efficient methods of producing sales, reward them for it. Better yet, look to inspire all your salespeople to emulate that efficient approach to production.

Measure sales, not activity. Measure profit, not activity. That’s why it’s so important to reward sales, not activity.

Your most productive salesperson might not be the one who’s in first and out last every day if that person’s just going through the motions. The best salespeople find creative ways to be efficient with their time and produce big profits for you.