FIELD SALES ACTIVITY HAS CHANGED. HAS YOUR SALES STRATEGY CHANGED WITH IT?

There was a time when field sales meant being out of the office for most of the week, travelling from customer to customer, shaking hands, having conversations and building relationships face to face. I started my field sales career in 2001, and back then, being physically present with customers was simply part of the job. In fact, in one of my early roles, I was expected to make ten face to face visits every day, which taught me a huge amount about discipline, planning and making every customer interaction count.

Moving forward to recent times, the pandemic changed everything.

For a period, face to face meetings disappeared almost overnight and we discovered that an enormous amount of business could still be done through video calls, email and the telephone. Customers became comfortable with it, salespeople became comfortable with it, and businesses discovered that there were significant efficiencies to be gained from not travelling everywhere.

The world has moved on since then, and I don't think we're ever going back to the way field sales worked before 2020. The question for sales leaders now is whether we've found the right balance between digital and face to face selling, or whether some sales teams have simply become too comfortable behind their screens.

Summary Highlights

• The pandemic permanently changed how customers and sales teams interact.

• Video calls, email and telephone conversations have an important place in modern sales.

• Face to face meetings can still create levels of trust, insight and engagement that are difficult to replicate digitally.

• The right question isn't how many customer visits a salesperson makes, but where those visits will create the greatest value.

• Good field sales requires discipline, planning and purposeful activity, whatever channels are being used.

• Customer visits should create opportunities to meet more people, understand the wider business and uncover new challenges.

• Complex sales must centre around getting people together and seeing the customer's environment first hand.

• Sales leaders need to give their teams clarity about when digital is appropriate and when getting in front of the customer really matters.

  
  

The World Of Field Sales Has Changed

When I look back at my early career, the structure was very different from what we'd expect today. My territory covered a relatively small geographical area and I had a huge number of customer accounts and contacts to manage. The expectation was that I would spend the vast majority of my week in the field, with one day set aside for administration.

There was a real discipline to it. I had to plan my diary, prioritise the customers and contacts that could create the greatest return, and make sure I was continually building my opportunity pipeline. Being busy wasn't enough. I needed to know why I was visiting someone and what I wanted to achieve from the conversation.

That discipline has stayed with me throughout my career, even though the way I work has changed considerably. Today, a salesperson can have a productive customer conversation without leaving their desk, and there are plenty of situations where that's exactly the right thing to do.

The danger comes when convenience starts making the decision for us.

A video call is easy to arrange, doesn't involve travel and can often be fitted into a busy diary at short notice. From an efficiency perspective, that's hard to argue with. However, there are times when being physically present with a customer gives you something that a screen simply can't.

What You Notice When You're There

One of the things I've always valued about face to face selling is everything that happens around the meeting itself.

It might be the conversation you have while walking from reception to the meeting room, something you notice on the factory floor, a comment from someone who joins the meeting unexpectedly, or a conversation with an employee who has been with the business for twenty years. Those moments can give you an insight into the customer that you probably wouldn't get from a thirty minute Teams call.

You also get to see the environment in which your customer operates. You can understand their challenges in a much more tangible way and, sometimes, you'll spot something that nobody thought to mention during the formal meeting.

That matters particularly in technical and complex B2B sales, where the solution you're selling might need to be demonstrated, tested or understood in the context of the customer's operation.

I've experienced this throughout my career. When you're introducing a product or solution that customers need to see and experience, the demonstration itself can completely change the conversation. Suddenly, the customer isn't listening to you describe the benefits. They're seeing how it works and thinking about how it could solve a problem for them.

That's difficult to replicate through a screen.

The Pandemic Proved Digital Works

I'd be the first to acknowledge that the pandemic taught us a huge amount about what can be achieved remotely.

During that period, I secured several significant contracts with customers I'd never met face to face. The work could be done, relationships could be established and commercial decisions could still be made.

There was a difference, though. In those particular situations, the sales cycle was noticeably longer than it would have been had we been able to meet in person.

That experience reinforced something I've believed throughout my career. Digital selling works, and it has an important role to play, but there are certain points in a sales journey where getting together in person can accelerate trust, understanding and progress.

The answer, therefore, isn't to choose between digital and face to face selling. It's to understand when each one makes sense.

The Modern Salesperson Needs Both

I think the strongest salespeople today are comfortable operating across multiple channels. They can have a quick conversation on the phone, run a discovery meeting through Teams, send a useful follow up email and then spend a full day with a customer when the situation warrants it.

The skill is knowing which one to use and when.

If you're having an initial conversation with a prospect and you're still trying to establish whether there is a genuine fit, a thirty minute video call might be perfectly appropriate. It saves everyone time and gives both sides an opportunity to decide whether there is something worth exploring further.

Once there's a genuine opportunity, however, the value of getting together can increase significantly. You might want to meet the wider decision making unit, understand the customer's operation, demonstrate something in context or simply spend enough time together to properly understand the problem they're trying to solve.

This is where sales leadership becomes important. We shouldn't simply tell a field sales team to make more visits, just as we shouldn't allow them to build an entire pipeline from behind a laptop. We need to help them understand what good activity looks like and where their time will create the greatest commercial return.

Make Every Visit Count

One of the lessons from my early field sales career that has stayed with me is the importance of making every customer visit count.

If I'm visiting a customer to meet one person, why wouldn't I ask whether there are other people in the business who might benefit from a conversation?

That could mean meeting someone in engineering, procurement, operations, finance or another department. It might uncover a completely different opportunity, introduce you to someone who influences the buying decision, or simply give you a better understanding of how the customer's business works.

In complex B2B sales, this becomes even more important because there is rarely one person involved in a significant purchasing decision.

The question I still like to ask is simple: who else should be at the meeting?

It sounds straightforward, but it can make a significant difference to the strength of your relationships and the quality of your opportunity pipeline.

Activity Still Matters

One thing hasn't changed, regardless of whether your team is working entirely in the field or using a hybrid approach. You still need sufficient sales activity to create and maintain a healthy opportunity pipeline.

The difference is that activity can no longer be measured simply by counting customer visits.

A salesperson could spend three days travelling around their territory and have very little to show for it. Another salesperson could spend those same three days combining targeted customer visits with video calls, prospecting, follow up conversations and opportunity development, and create considerably more value.

This is where sales leaders need to look beyond activity levels and start asking better questions.

Are the right customers being prioritised? Are salespeople getting access to enough of the people involved in the buying decision? Are customer visits leading to new opportunities? Are they uncovering new problems? Are they building relationships beyond their primary contact? Are they using digital channels to complement their field activity rather than replace it?

These are much more useful questions than simply asking how many visits someone has completed.

Where Should Your Sales Team Be Spending Its Time?

I don't think there's a universal answer to how many days a week a salesperson should spend in the field. It depends on the market, the customers, the complexity of the sale, the geography and the nature of the proposition.

What I do think is important is that sales leaders create an environment where getting in front of customers is encouraged when it will genuinely make a difference.

If a video call is the most effective way to progress something, then use it. If travelling three hours to have a thirty minute conversation that could have been held online doesn't add value, then don't do it.

But if being at the customer's site will help you understand their operation, strengthen the relationship, meet other stakeholders, demonstrate your solution or uncover something that hasn't yet been discussed, then make the effort to get there.

That decision should be driven by effectiveness as well as efficiency.

The Opportunity For Sales Leaders

The biggest change since the pandemic isn't really about technology. It's about customer expectations.

People have become accustomed to having conversations remotely, and that's a positive development. It means we can often move faster, communicate more easily and spend less time travelling.

At the same time, I think there's an opportunity for sales leaders to remind their teams that relationships still matter. Customers are still people, and trust is still built through meaningful interactions.

For me, the answer is a more deliberate approach to field sales. Use digital channels where they make sense, but don't allow convenience to become the default. Understand where face to face interaction will create greater value and encourage your salespeople to get there.

The sales environment has changed considerably since I started my career, and I'm sure it'll continue to change. The tools will evolve, customer expectations will evolve and the way we organise our sales teams will evolve with them.

The fundamentals, however, remain remarkably consistent. Understand your customer, build relationships, create value, ask good questions and be present when it matters.

Frequently Asked Questions

Should every salesperson be spending several days a week in the field?

Not necessarily. The right balance depends on the customer base, sales cycle, geography and complexity of the proposition. What matters is that the team has enough purposeful customer activity to maintain a healthy pipeline and strong relationships.

Is face to face selling still important after the pandemic?

Yes, particularly where trust, complex decision making, demonstrations or a deeper understanding of the customer's environment are important. Digital channels have become an established part of the sales process, but they haven't removed the value of meeting customers in person.

When is a video call more appropriate than a customer visit?

Video is often useful for early conversations, routine updates, follow ups and situations where travel wouldn't add meaningful value. The key is to make the decision based on what will move the customer relationship or opportunity forward.

How can sales leaders encourage better field activity?

Start by focusing on the quality and purpose of activity rather than simply counting visits. Help salespeople understand which customers to prioritise, who else they should be building relationships with and what they want to achieve from each interaction.

How can customer visits improve sales development?

A good visit can uncover problems that weren't previously visible, introduce new stakeholders, identify new opportunities and give the salesperson a much deeper understanding of the customer's business. That insight can then feed directly into business development and pipeline development.

Has the traditional field sales model disappeared?

I don't think so. It has evolved. The modern sales environment is more hybrid, with field sales, video, telephone, email and other digital channels working alongside each other. The opportunity for sales leaders is to make sure each channel is being used deliberately and effectively.

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