Companies continuously look for ways to leverage revenue growth by getting scalability out of the sales organization and keeping field selling costs down. Many of them now measure sales performance in terms of both revenue and margin impact.

In this environment, hitting your quota is a real challenge, one that requires discipline and sales effectiveness.

Splitting the performance metric ensures that a sales rep doesn’t give away the shop in order to get the sale. It also means your sales team has to hit the quota while protecting profitability, often despite limited resources.

Here are three tips for successfully rising to that challenge:

1) Get organized: The first step is to get organized, developing a precise action plan for how your team is going to hit quota. Once you have that plan, follow it. There’s an axiom in the SCUBA diving world that says, “Plan your dive. Dive your plan.” Trying to just wing it during a dive puts your life at risk.

2) Focus on existing customers: To hit your quota you should start hunting for new customers, right? Not necessarily. First, look at your existing customers and identify new upsell opportunities. In addition to your products and services, seek other ways to add value around your product and your relationship, so the customer sees you as a critical partner.

3) Look at those customers that don’t get much attention: Every account manager has a list of customers, which tends to break down along the 80/20 rule: 80 percent of their quota retirement comes from 20 percent of their customers. Those 20 percent receive most of the sales person’s attention, leaving reps with little opportunity to interact with and cultivate the smaller accounts.

These smaller, overlooked accounts have massive potential. Call on those smaller customers and look for new opportunities. Just the fact that you show up may be exciting for them, and it’s an opportunity to learn about the customer’s other projects, which may open new sales opportunities.

If it’s just not possible to get to these accounts, consider introducing them to one of your partners who can give them the necessary attention.

Many sales organizations approach meeting quota as a mad scramble: Cross your fingers and go, go, go. But just winging it isn’t a viable sales process.

Today’s sales organizations must balance performance across profitability and topline growth. In this environment, hitting your quota profitably and efficiently starts with a plan.

Ready to learn three more valuable tips for improving your team’s sales effectiveness? Download our complimentary tip sheet, “6 Tips For Hitting Quota While Doing More With Less.”