How To Set Effective Sales Goals (With 5 Examples) 2024

For most companies, a typical sales goal focuses on selling as much as they can.

But those aren’t the best kinds of sales goals.

It’s like saying ‘having fun’ is your summer vacation goal.

But what is fun?

Splashing in a pool all day or going scuba diving?

Similarly, in sales too, you need to define the hows to form well-articulated goals.

In this article, we’ll discuss what sales goals are, their types, five examples, and how to set excellent sales goals. We’ll also tell you how to achieve your sales goals and answer some related FAQs.

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What Are Sales Goals?

Sales goals are quantifiable outcomes for your sales team that are usually documented in your sales plan.

Some realistic goals can be:

Increase revenue by 20% every year
Improve conversion rate by 5% in the second quarter
Boost customer retention by 8% in 2024

Once you establish the goals, your sales team can translate them into measurable and achievable actions that make you money.

And maybe then, you can buy that vacation home with a pool you’ve always dreamt of.

Is a goal different from an objective?

Take a look at our in-depth goals vs. objectives comparison to find out.

5 Types of Sales Goals

Here are five types of sales goals most businesses set:

1. Annual sales goals

If there’s an ultimate sales goal, it’s this one.

An annual goal helps you make a roadmap and decide everything from personal sales goals to professional ones.

It can be goals about:

How much money you want to bring in this year
How many units of your products or services you want to sell

Everyone, including board members and investors, will have their eyes on these goals as these are crucial for a company’s success.

2. Sales team goals

Your sales team shouldn’t just focus on your annual sales goal because those can take time to achieve.

You don’t want to demotivate your team with slow progress, right?

Instead, your team goal should be a weekly, quarterly, or monthly sales goal. For example, you could have a monthly sales goal like sell $20,000 worth of summer hats by the end of August.

3. Individual sales goals

You know how some people get tanned, some don’t, and others turn lobster red after hitting the beach?

Well, sales reps are like that too.

Some thrive when selling to a specific industry, some do well in all fields, and others have an average performance on any given day.

As they’ll all have different success rates, you need to plan and set individual sales goals for every salesperson.

4. Individual activity goals

Every sales person needs to set activity goals to have control of their overarching goals. Activity goals measure what the sales rep needs to do to nail those broader sales goals.

You can usually measure activity goals as the number of:

Emails sent
Sales calls made
Appointments set per week
Sales proposals sent, etc.

5. Stretch goals

Sometimes your sales rep or your team will surpass their sales goals.

But before you plan to celebrate your profits with a summer trip to Bali…

Enter: stretch goals for sales reps.

Stretch goals are targets set above what’s expected to help sales reps go the extra mile.

If your reps meet their stretch goals, you can offer them incentives.

It can be money or a free supply of ice cream for a year to beat the heat. 🍦😋

5 Sales Goals Examples

A sales goals example list can be like a long summer day… it never ends!

Fortunately, you only have to set goals that fit your needs.

To give you an idea, here are some sales goals and objectives examples:

Generate more sales revenue: you want to bring in more money by increasing sales call volume, improving lead generation, etc.
Reduce sales cycle time: your average sales cycle time tells you how long it takes your reps to convert a lead and close the deal. Reducing it helps generate more revenue
Track sales time: calculate how much time your reps log per week doing sales activities. This helps you better manage workloads
Reduce customer churn: customer churn is the number of customers who leave your business during a certain period. Reduce it to create a loyal customer base
Reduce customer acquisition cost (CAC): it’s the expense you make in sales, marketing, salaries, etc., to win new customers. Lower CAC means more customers and better ROI

How To Set Sales Goals

Now that you’re familiar with some examples of sales goals, let’s start setting sales goals right away.

Step 1: decide the sales goal type

An annual revenue goal? An individual quarterly goal? Or a lead-generation monthly goal?

As a sales team leader or manager, you have to set relevant sales goals based on your business goals.

For example, to measure your company’s success, you could set a revenue target.

But if you want to improve efficiency, aiming for a higher win rate (the rate at which your sales team converts prospects into customers) might make more sense.

The bottom line is, you should connect every set sales goal to the business intent.

Step 2: make your sales goals SMART

No, you don’t put them in a suit and tie. 👔

Instead, SMART sales goals are:

Specific: set goals that are clear about what you want to achieve
Measurable: ensure your goals are measurable so you can track progress in a sales report
Achievable: set realistic sales goals that are attainable, but it doesn’t mean they can’t be challenging goals
Relevant: your sales objective should align with every business, team, and individual goals
Time-based: set a definite timeline to achieve your goal

Use these factors as a checklist to make every objective a SMART goal and drive your business towards success.

Step 3: set a stretch goal

Now, you can focus on goals that give your sales team a little extra challenge.

However, ensure it’s not impossible, like counting how many watermelon seeds you ate.

But also not too easy, like sweating in mid-July.

Instead, when you set it, take a look at past sales data and see how likely it’s for your reps to meet the goal. This will help you strike a balance between making it challenging and achievable.

Step 4: identify incentives

Incentives in the sales world are as common as floral prints and flip-flops on beaches.

But how do you design your incentive system?

Start by getting input from your sales staff or team on the incentive program’s rules, rewards, and other aspects. This way, you can create a system that works for everyone.

And remember, a salesperson who hits a stretch goal should get a better incentive than someone who meets an individual goal.

Step 5: clarify the goals with your team

Know what’s not motivating?

Not knowing why you’re tackling the goal in the first place!

Discuss and clarify your sales goals with your team so they know what’s expected.

For example, let’s say you want your reps to increase lead generation.

But you must give them a reason to do it, like how it’ll help increase revenue, expand the company, or get incentives.

It’ll motivate them to hit their sales target!

Step 6: set up a tracking system

You should be able to track the progress of every sales professional in the company. Use goal-setting templates to track your team’s progress.

A tracking system tells you where you stand and updates you on whether you’re on the right path or not.

Otherwise, setting goals can be as pointless as using sunscreen when you’re inside the house watching Netflix.

How To Achieve Sales Goals

Once you have a sales strategy in place, here’s how you can achieve your sales goals:

1. Prioritize goals regularly

Determine which goals generate the highest value or make a huge impact.

Such tasks usually help a sales rep with their professional goals and add to the company’s big picture. Priorities also depend on when you want to achieve that specific goal.

Encourage your reps to focus their energy on those goals. This will help them utilize their time in the best possible way.

2. Gather live data on sales activity

With live data on every sales activity, your team can visualize their efforts and success journey.

Not only will this help keep everyone on the same page, but it can also motivate your reps when they see how their efforts translate into revenue. And motivated sales reps can consistently crush quotas and generate more revenue.

Live sales data also helps teams recognize their peers’ achievements.

After all, a little public recognition can go a long way.

Bonus: Quote templates for sales!

3. Plan for failure

No sales manager sets out to fail.

But in business, obstacles are sometimes inevitable. Like walking past kids (or adults) playing with water balloons without getting hit. #JustSumerThings

What can you do?

Wear a raincoat or carry an umbrella to dodge them! 😝

Basically, prepare in advance.

Develop a proactive plan to deal with roadblocks so you can be in a better position to overcome them quickly.

Here’s how you can start:

Determine if your team has the right skills and systems in place to meet its targets
Study your market, demand, and competition
Acknowledge potential barriers and set strategies to tackle them

Bonus: Sales enablement tools!

4. Develop support and structure

Apart from goal setting and monitoring, your team needs proper support.

And what’s a better support system than a sales manager or team leader, right?

They can mentor sales reps to focus on their personal and professional, pushing them to do their best. This can happen in weekly huddles that empower the team to smash their targets.

Additionally, ask the team:

Do they feel confident with the set goals?
Do they anticipate any challenges?
Where do they want your support?

You should also invest in the right software, like a CRM or project management tool, to facilitate sales process management. This helps a sales leader and sales rep streamline processes and track performance with ease.

Bonus: Sales plan templates!

5. Reward your team

Let’s say you complete a run even though it’s a million degrees outside and then grab yourself a freshly pressed watermelon juice. 🍉

A well-earned reward!

Bonuses and incentives based on sales performance are no-brainers if you want to bring in the best results from your team. But it doesn’t always have to be watermelon juice or money.

Think of ways to recognize smaller objectives like upsells and retention. This should inspire your team to improve their performance consistently.

The Best Sales Goals Software

Want a solution that actually lets you set, track, and manage your sales goals?

Enter ClickUp.

ClickUp is one of the world’s highest-rated sales project management and CRM tools used by several teams in small and large businesses.

Here’s how ClickUp makes sales goal management as pleasant as a summer breeze:

1. Set sales Goals

With ClickUp’s Goals, you can set your sales goals with ease.

You can set goals with clear timelines, OKRs (Objectives and Key Results) and automatically track your progress.

Goals are high-level objectives that you can divide into smaller Targets for easy management.

Targets are measurable objectives that you can associate with:

Task completion
Money
Numerical values
Simple true/false fields

As your sales teams complete these targets, you can visualize the progress towards achieving the goal.

Visualizing progress percentages in Goals in ClickUp — Setting targets and viewing progress with ClickUp’s Goals feature

2. Analyze sales activity and potential bottlenecks with Dashboards

Dashboards are the best way to view everything happening in your Workspace in ClickUp.

You can custom build them with Widgets that help visualize the sales KPIs you want to track.

For instance, you can use Sprint Widgets like Cumulative Flow, Burnup, Burndown, and Velocity Charts to measure how well you scoped out your work.

You also get several other widgets like:

3. Automate your sales processes

With ClickUp’s Automations, you can streamline monotonous sales activities to ensure your team can focus their efforts on tackling sales goals.

For example, ClickUp lets you:

Automatically assign leads to your sales development reps
Change lead Priorities or move them to a new List once their status changes
Create a task for each scheduled call (via Calendly), etc.

All you need to do is set the: