Sales: SOPs
Six procedures from profile definition through scoring, outreach, proposal review, loss analysis and the quarterly calibration check.
Markdown. No sign-up, no email.
SOP 1: Define the profile#
Run: quarterly, and whenever the offering changes.
Everything downstream inherits this. Written, specific, and including the anti-profile.
| Field | Example of a useful answer |
|---|---|
| Sector and size | Not "enterprise". A range, and why that range |
| The problem we solve | In their words, not ours |
| Observable signals | What is visible from outside that suggests they have it now |
| Who decides | The role, and who else has a veto |
| Anti-profile | Who we will not sell to, and why. The row that saves the most time |
An agent given a vague profile returns volume. Volume feels like progress and takes a quarter to disprove.
SOP 2: Generate and enrich#
Run: continuously.
- Candidates matched against the profile.
- Enriched with size, stack, likely problems and decision makers.
- Every inference labelled as an inference. Unlabelled, it becomes a fact within days and gets repeated to the prospect.
- Anything that cannot be verified stays labelled unverified all the way to the first meeting.
SOP 3: Score and route#
Run: on every candidate.
The score orders the queue. The breakdown decides the approach: a high score with low reachability means find a warm route before calling, and a high score with a weak budget signal means qualify the budget in the first conversation rather than the fourth.
Below the working threshold, candidates are held rather than contacted. Working a weak lead because there is capacity is how a pipeline fills with deals that never close.
SOP 4: Outreach#
Run: per contact.
- A person sends the first message. Always. Automated first contact at volume is how a brand becomes spam, and the reputational cost outlives the pipeline it produced.
- The research is prepared; the message is written or approved by the sender.
- Unsubscribe honoured immediately and permanently across every list.
- Volume capped per week. If the cap is the constraint, the profile is too broad.
SOP 5: Proposal review#
Run: before any proposal leaves.
Three checks, by a person who can say no:
| Check | Question |
|---|---|
| Deliverable | Can we actually do this, with the people we have? |
| Costed | Has someone priced it, or is the number a plausible-looking guess? |
| Committed | Does it promise a date, a capability or an outcome nobody has agreed to? |
A generated proposal is fluent, and fluency is the risk. It will promise a capability we do not have in a timeline nobody costed, because those sentences are common in the proposals it learned from.
SOP 6: Loss analysis#
Run: on every loss, monthly in aggregate.
Ask the prospect. The internal guess about why a deal was lost is usually wrong and always flattering.
| Reason | What it means upstream |
|---|---|
| Price | Either the wrong prospect or the wrong framing of value |
| Scope mismatch | The proposal promised something delivery cannot do. Fix proposals, not sales |
| Timing | Not a loss. Diarise it |
| Lost to nobody | The most common outcome, and it means the case for change was never made |
| Trust | Reference or capability claim that did not survive checking. Treat as urgent |
Escalation#
| Situation | Goes to |
|---|---|
| A proposal needs a capability we do not have | CTO before it is sent, never after |
| Discount beyond the standard band | CFO |
| A reference claim that cannot be verified | Remove it. No exceptions |
| Unsubscribe or complaint rate rising | Stop outreach and fix targeting before resuming |