As the sales manager of your company, you set some goals and targets for your sales team. But every month, you see the numbers aren’t up to the mark, the sales team performance is going down. You’re lagging behind, you’re losing clients, and you see your company has stopped growing. In this situation, you ask yourself, what to do when your sales team is not performing?

In this case, you should learn how to handle a sales team first. Then, you need to figure out how to motivate sales team. There is a structured way to improve sales team performance: diagnose, motivate, use data, and use a salesman tracking software like Kothay. 

You need to dig deep and start your action from the root level. Our system, Kothay, can help you track the performance and consistency of each sales rep separately. You can combine your action plan for poor sales performance with our sales performance management software and efficiently contribute to your organization’s growth. 

Let’s explain how to improve sales team performance.

Understanding the Real Causes of Poor Sales Team Performance

Understand why your sales team isn’t performing. Then get into action to boost your sales team performance

The most possible reason for bad sales performance might be a lack of KPIs or targets for the sales field force. Without any clear goal set, your salesmen won’t be able to work accordingly. 

Another reason might be the lack of supervision. Poor tracking and lack of visibility are two loose ends that allow your team mates to slack off and make you lose money. Managers can’t see daily activity or pipeline stage progress without any monitoring tools. 

On the other side of the coin, managers might even fail to lead the ship to the shore. Effective coaching and bad leadership style often demotivates the employees and lead to poor performance. 

Outdated tracking systems or tools along with tons of manual reporting work will waste time and strength of your team. 

Sometimes, it’s nobody’s fault. It’s just that a few sales reps aren’t made for being a good sales rep. If you don’t have anything to track KPIs properly, you won’t know who needs to step down from the role of salesman. 

Surprisingly, goals and strategies are to be blamed occasionally. If you create a strategy that won’t align with the latest sales trends or market demands, your sales team will fall sooner or later. 

Apart from all these, bad communication, unclear roles, and weak tech usage often appears to be the main cause of why your sales team isn’t performing. 

Step 1 — Analyze Your Sales Process

You can start fixing performance by dissecting your sales process end to end.

Inspect the funnel: leads → demos → closes → repeat sales. See where deals stall. Measure key performance indicators like conversion rate (lead to demo, demo to close), deal velocity (time in pipeline), follow-up rate (touches per lead), and win rate. Use dashboards or visual funnel tools to track flow.

You must identify bottlenecks. Perhaps leads die after initial contact. Or demos exist but follow-up is weak. Or many deals linger too long without closure.

By analyzing your process, you see exactly where performance breaks. That clarity helps in taking corrective steps.

Step 2 — Set Clear, Measurable Goals

Now that you understand the gaps, you need clear goals.

Use SMART goals: Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time-bound. Set targets for each funnel stage (calls, meetings, close rate). Tie them to revenue objectives. Make these goals visible to all reps.

I suggest linking these goals with what Kothay offers: goal dashboards and activity reports. When each rep sees their target in real time, direction becomes clear.

Every goal must be explicit: how many client visits per day, weekly revenue target, monthly conversion target, etc.

Step 3 — Improve Visibility & Accountability with Real-Time Tracking

When your team is underperforming, accountability and insight are your allies.

Real-time tracking allows you to monitor field or remote reps: location, visit logs, attendance, customer interactions. You catch gaps early, not after the month ends.

With Kothay, you gain GPS-based tracking of salespeople, daily activity monitoring, scheduled visits and check-ins, and instant reporting. That visibility pushes accountability.

More transparency means fewer excuses. You act quickly when a rep falls behind or a route seems inefficient.

Step 4 — Coach & Motivate Through Data

Managers often default to micromanaging. Instead, shift to data-driven coaching.

Use activity reports to see who needs help. Personalize feedback: perhaps a rep’s call frequency is too low, or interaction time with clients is too brief. Recognize top performers publicly to encourage competition. Use leaderboards, small rewards, or gamification.

Kothay supports automated reporting, performance leaderboards, and data that powers one-on-one coaching.

When coaching, be specific. Don’t say “be better.” Say, “I notice your conversion from demo to close is 10% while team average is 25%. Let’s role-play closing responses and strengthen that part.”

Step 5 — Streamline Communication & Collaboration

Sometimes performance lags because teams operate in silos.

Lack of coordination delays deals. Notes don’t get shared. Follow-ups slip. Reminders are forgotten.

Centralize team communication. Use shared dashboards, real-time updates, notes, reminders, and follow-up tools.

Kothay offers activity summaries, reminders, and instant sync so everyone stays on the same page. This ensures no lead or detail gets lost between reps.

Step 6 — Track Progress & Continuously Optimize

You can’t fix it once and forget it. Improvement must be ongoing.

Use regular performance reviews — daily or weekly dashboards. Examine trends: are conversion rates improving? Is deal velocity decreasing? Spot reps who stall.

Train early where needed. Use insights to forecast, plan, and iterate.

Kothay helps with trend analytics, performance reports, and historical data comparison. You see progress over weeks or months, not only snapshots.

Step 7 — Align Incentives with Results

Motivation is key. If incentives don’t match your goals, performance will drift.

Connect rewards to actual data: number of client visits, conversions, targets met. Use leaderboards or gamified scoring. Make reward systems transparent so everyone trusts them.

Kothay can automatically calculate top performers from tracked data. That removes bias and simplifies recognition.

When reps see a fair system, they feel motivated to push harder.

Common Mistakes Managers Make When Sales Teams Underperform

Many managers lean into blame instead of solutions. Below are pitfalls you must avoid:

• Punishing people without coaching them.
  
• Keeping expectations vague or not shared with the team.
  
• Ignoring data and going by gut feelings.
  
• Delaying feedback until problems become entrenched.
  
• Overlooking modern tracking tools and relying on manual reporting.
  
• Assuming training is a one-time event, not ongoing.
  
• Focusing incentives on volume, not quality or conversion.
  
• Letting underperformers linger without a performance improvement plan.
  

Recognizing these mistakes lets you steer clear of the traps.

Why Tracking Is the Key to Turning Around an Underperforming Team

Tracking becomes your foundation when performance is weak.

When you have visibility, you enforce accountability. When you have data, coaching becomes precise. When you detect issues early, you prevent revenue loss.

Kothay becomes your central hub for tracking, managing, and optimizing each salesperson’s daily activity. It gives you real metrics rather than opinions.

Correct tracking is not optional — it’s essential for performance recovery.

How Kothay Helps You Boost Sales Team Performance

Let me introduce you properly to Kothay and why it fits this recovery journey.

Kothay is an all-in-one salesman tracking and performance management platform built for field and remote sales teams. Its features map directly to the issues you face.

Key features:

• GPS-based field tracking that shows where reps are in real time
  
• Real-time location monitoring so routes and visits stay efficient
  
• Daily visit scheduling, check-in logs, and customer interactions
  
• Goals and target dashboards visible to leaders and reps
  
• Attendance tracking, route history, and performance insights
  
• Leaderboards, trend analytics, and historical comparison
  

With Kothay, you gain accountability, visibility, and actionable insight — all in one dashboard. That means faster recovery from underperformance.

Start tracking smarter with Kothay today

Checklist — Quick Actions to Take When Your Sales Team Isn’t Performing

Here is a simple action list to get you moving:

1. Review KPIs and identify gaps in the funnel.
   
2. Introduce daily tracking reports and dashboards.
   
3. Hold one-on-one coaching sessions with reps using data.
   
4. Set SMART goals clearly and share them with every rep.
   
5. Recognize high performers and publicly reward them.
   
6. Implement Kothay for real-time visibility and tracking.
   
7. Centralize team communication and sync notes/updates.
   
8. Monitor trends weekly and adjust processes.
   
9. Align incentives to target behaviors and results.
   
10. Use a performance improvement plan for persistently low reps.
    

Follow that checklist steadily, not all at once.

FAQ

How do I improve my sales team’s performance quickly?

Start by identifying weak funnel stages and coach reps based on data. Apply real-time tracking and focus incentives on the behaviors you want to see.

What is the best way to track a sales team?

Use real-time sales tracking software for visits, calls, location, and log entries. That gives you transparency and early detection of issues.

What tools help manage remote sales teams?

You need tools for GPS tracking, activity logging, dashboards, reminders, and performance analytics. Kothay covers all these.

How does Kothay improve sales productivity?

It removes guesswork by tracking rep activity, measuring goals, showing trends, and automating reports. You spend less time chasing reports and more time coaching.

What is a good action plan for poor sales performance?

Diagnose root cause, set measurable goals, apply tracking, coach with data, improve communication, adjust incentives, and monitor progress continuously.

Conclusion

Underperformance is not a permanent label. You can fix it through clarity, tracking, coaching, and motivation. Visibility and accountability become the tools you use to restore momentum.

With Kothay, you get those tools in one place: tracking, analytics, dashboards, and insights. You signal that performance matters and that data, not guesswork, will guide decisions.Take control. Empower your sales team with data. Try Kothay today and turn low performance into high performance.