Sales Enablement Plan Template: How to Showcase Business Impact

Gaining Influence with Sales Enablement

Both Gartner and Forrester have talked about how important it is for enablement efforts to be able to measure their business impact.  However, the enablement role often holds substantial responsibility, but little power. This construct restricts enablement professionals as strategy-takers rather than strategy-makers. It also makes it difficult to get buy-in from key stakeholders. 

So how does sales enablement take back power as strategists? We believe a capability framework is the key to a strategic sales enablement plan. Once you have a plan in mind and have identified the tools you need to deliver it, you need to successfully implement it. When delivering the plan, your sales enablement strategy should address the following three questions:

• How can you best communicate that to the business?

• How do you secure any necessary investment?

• How do you ensure alignment throughout the organisation?

Here are 3 key areas to think about:

Show How Your Plan Will Help to Achieve the Business Goals

To create an enablement plan, you need to identify the key areas in your plan that will best achieve your business goals. It is important to tell this story when communicating your plan or building a case for investment. Nothing should appear as ‘nice to have’ and each part of the plan should show how it moves the business one step closer to achieving its goals.

Use Data to Prove the Value

Your enablement efforts should always lead back to the key performance indicators. Having the right metrics in place can help to prove the value of your proposed activity or the ROI of an investment.

For example, if you have identified a skills gap that impacts the leading and lagging indicators you want to improve, you can quantify the value of an x% uplift in this competency. Remember, it’s not just the value of the uplift that can be useful. The cost of not addressing the skills gap in question can also be a powerful metric.

In the example above, Kunal Pandya talks about how, after benchmarking SDRs against UserZoom’s competency framework, he utilised the sales velocity metrics to calculate the revenue impact of improvements to achieve stakeholder buy-in and secure investment in the process.

Step Into Your Stakeholders’ Shoes - What’s in It for Them?

Achieving the business goal is success for everyone but the way each stakeholder views their path to success will be different. The following scenarios exemplify specific goals different stakeholders identify in an enablement plan.

For the CFO, a focused enablement plan leading to increased efficiency in the sales team is also likely to:

• Uncover cost savings

• Avoid wasted budget

• Create more reliable forecasting

For the HR Director, a competency framework and sustainable coaching programme leads to:

• More engaged employees

• Better career path planning

• A reduction in staff turnover.

In your communication efforts, call these benefits out specifically for each stakeholder, emphasising the far-reaching and additional benefits. Acknowledging these benefits can also help you tailor your reporting going forward. It ensures you are communicating the successes in a way that will resonate with everyone individually.

By addressing these key areas, you can successfully communicate the value of your enablement plan and win over stakeholders. Your efforts will pave the way for an impactful and sustainable sales enablement strategy.