Territory

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Algorithmic Territory Assignment

  1. Account Scoring: (see here)
  2. Assign Holdback Accounts
    Allow each rep to unconditionally keep a certain number of accounts – usually between 4 and 10. While this can be limited to each rep’s existing accounts, one can broaden the aperture and allow reps to lay claim to any account. In this instance, if multiple reps wish to own the same account, then you’ll need a reconciliation process. For instance, the current owner has first dibs but if only non-current-owners ask for the account, then assign by coin toss.
  3. Lock account owner where specified
    This is the “house” equivalent of holdback accounts – just a way to assign accounts before applying any other rules. For instance, RevOps may wish to do some shuffling of current customers to new owners.
  4. Keep account owner locked for current customers
    Generally, accounts should remain with existing owners.
  5. Retain account owner if open opp
    Reps should keep accounts with active open opps. To prevent gaming, RevOps should define criteria for what constitutes ‘active.’ For example, opps must be at a certain stage (or higher) and the rep must have had a meeting with the prospect within the last x days.
  6. Rest recently DQd accounts
    If accounts have recent disqualified opportunities, one may wish to ‘rest’ these by assigning to the ‘house’ rather than to reps. This typically more applicable for SMB accounts that likely have a single buying center as opposed to mid-market or enterprise accounts.
  7. Allow account owner to retain account if sufficient activity
    We want to reward reps who are doing their job. You’ll need to come up with an objective criteria but simply sending periodic batch emails should be insufficent.
  8. Remove accounts in “excluded” industries
    We don’t want to assign reps clearly bad accounts. During the account scoring step. one should have created a tier for bad fit accounts which could be based on many factors besides industry. Assign all of these accounts to the ‘house.’
  9. Rest recently churned accounts
    You may want to rest recently churned accounts by assigning to the ‘house’ in situations where the winback rate is very low. This is more applicable in SMB as opposed to MM or ENT.
  10. Assign accounts to people in focus metros
    Even if you have a purely inside sales organization, if a rep lives in a major metro area, then you may want to preferentially assign them some number of accounts in their geography. I recommend setting a threshold for the number of such accounts; otherwise, you risk concentrating all the best accounts with a small set of individuals.
  11. Fairly assign the best available remaining accounts
    There is often a debate on whether to randomly assign accounts or to assign the best accounts to the best reps. You likely already have some tiering of reps – ex. SMB, MM, ENT, & strategic. Within a given tier, I would assign accounts equitably

    Where you have a large number of reps, here is how I would do this, assuming each account has a numerical score. First, sort all accounts by score. In the first pass, select reps at random without replacement and assign accounts from the top of the stack. In all subsequent rounds, first sort the reps from lowest to highest total (or average) account score and assign. This way, you’ll have the most equitable territories.
  12. Assign parent ownership to subsidiaries
    In the prior steps, I assumed the accounts being assigned were ultimate parent accounts (however one defines that). Here, simply assign subsidiaries to newly assigned owner of the parent account.
  13. Release unassigned accounts
    In many instances, you’ll have a cap on the number of accounts you want each rep to own. By definition, you’ll already have assigned the best available accounts. Assign any remaining accounts to the ‘house’; these can be distributed later in the event of inbound demand.
  14. Reassign to-be-hired accounts to existing reps
    When assigning accounts in the prior steps, you’ll not only have existing reps but also placeholders for reps TBH in the window before the next assignment cycle (typically every 6 mos for SMB and every 12 mos for MM/ENT). If you don’t assign accounts to the TBH reps now, they will inherit the dregs when the come onboard and will be highly likely to fail.

    However, one does not want these accounts to lie fallow since they are great accounts. Consequently, keep track of the eventual owner (TBH1, TBH2, etc.) but temporarily assign the accounts to existing reps. Make sure the reps know these accounts are “on-loan” and that they will be unconditionally transferred to new hires at a later date.
  15. Fairly redistribute out-of-segment current customers
    Back at step 4, we kept current customers with their current owner. However, an owner might not be eligible to own a certain account — for example, a rep who moves from SMB to MM will likely lose their SMB accounts in exchange for MM accounts.

Territory Planning & Management Vendors

(*) = recommended

Random Notes

  • A lot can be learned from accounts AEs are engaging that either unassigned or outside of top tier(s)

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