How to Use a Simple Metric to Amplify Your Sales Efforts

Published: Thu, 12/18/25

Updated: Thu, 12/18/25

How to Use a Simple Metric to Amplify Your Sales Efforts

Too many people focus on the wrong things.

That’s an observation I have made over 30 years of sales consulting – working with over 500 sales organizations. In my world of B2B salespeople, sales managers, and sale executives, the pressure to produce short term numbers often eclipses a more thoughtful, long-term strategy.

One way to ensure that you are focusing on the right things is to thoughtfully establish the metrics that you will track. Put the right metrics in place, and you have the raw material to transform your sales efforts and dramatically increase the top line.

I’ve found one simple metric that is almost universally ignored yet is key to sharply focusing a sales team’s efforts. The metric is this: The number of customers the company or sales territory currently serves.

Measuring the quantity of customers

We have all heard about valuing our customers, so the concept is not new. What is lacking, though, is building that idea into the structure of our company’s sales efforts. With a little work, the idea of the value of customers can provide direction to the company and transform the company’s sales efforts.

Yet in my 30 years of sales consulting, I commonly ask this question of a new client: “How many customers do you have?” I can’t remember any sales executive answering that question with a definitive number. In other words, almost no one tracks this absolutely essential metric.

They are so focused on selling things that they neglect to remember that they sell those things to people. The people are more important than the transaction.

They are so focused on selling things that they neglect to remember that they sell those things to people. The people are more important than the transaction.

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Sales is ultimately about influencing and serving people. Companies who don’t track the number of customers often rely on metrics that ignore the people and instead track transactions. While transactions are important, keeping track of people is more important.

The value of a company is more determined by the number of customers it has than the amount of money in its coffers.

Here’s how to implement that concept.

1. Create a definition of a customer.

Most sales organizations have no objective measurement for what constitutes a customer. No wonder they don’t know how many they have.

Your definition should be objective and data driven. In other words, the computer should be able to spit it out.

It should reflect a relationship that extends beyond just a transaction. For example, if someone walks into your showroom and buys $100 worth of stuff and leaves, is that person a customer? Most companies would say no. In this case, one transaction doesn’t make a customer.

But what does?

One of my clients defines a customer this way: A qualified account that spends $1,500 each month for at least three out of four consecutive months.

That’s a great example, because it captures the repetitive nature of the transaction, and adds an objective dollar amount. With this definition, the computer can spit out how many accounts meet this criterion every month.

Quality of Customers

Your definition can vary by market segment. So, for example, if you sell high-end building materials to contractors... READ THE FULL ARTICLE HERE

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