Territory

The set of accounts one salesperson is responsible for, defined by geography, segment, named accounts or a mix. The unit of coverage, quota and planning.

DefinitionThe set of accounts one salesperson is responsible for, defined by geography, segment, named accounts or a mix. The unit of coverage, quota and planning.

Well-formed

Every account in exactly one territory. Every territory owned by one person, or explicitly vacant. The sum of territory potential equals the company's potential. A territory plan that fails any of these cannot be compared with one that does not.

Measures

Accounts per territory, potential per territory, current revenue per territory, and the spread of each across the team. Fairness is a tight spread of potential.

Changes

A territory change is a dated event. Accounts moved mid-year belong to the old owner before the date and the new one after. Without the date, the roll-up counts the account twice or not at all.

How it is used

The set of accounts one salesperson is responsible for. Whatever the rule, geography, segment, named accounts or a mix, every account must belong to exactly one territory, and territory totals must sum to the company.

Example

A hybrid model has twelve geographic territories and two named-account reps. A precedence rule puts each named account under its named rep only, so revenue is not counted in the geography as well.

Where it goes wrong

An account in two territories. Both reps are credited, the territories sum to more than the ledger, and nobody owns the customer.

Articles that use this term

Board and management reporting

A board narrative with a citation on every number: how to draft the commercial pack from reconciled figures

A method for writing the quarterly commercial narrative so every figure carries a citation to the calculation that produced it: the reconciled roll-up as the source, the narrative structure, the citation format that survives export, and why the model writes sentences but never numbers.

16 Sept 20263 min read Coverage and territory · Sales teams

A new rep's first ninety days, from the data: the list that replaces shadowing

What a newly hired rep should be given on day one from the book they inherit: the accounts ranked by revenue with days since last touch, the returning lines that were bought and dropped, the dormant accounts with their cadence and run rate, the open deals with slip counts, and the tier cadence that says who to call first. A ninety-day plan in three lists, the measures that say whether the ramp is on track, and why it beats a week of shadowing.

16 Sept 20263 min read Coverage and territory

Account penetration rate: formula, denominators and a worked example

Account penetration rate defined, accounts buying over accounts in a stated universe, the four denominators it is computed against and what each answers, the target list, the estate, the segment universe and the installed base, a worked example per rep against a target list, the roll-up, the identity to the universe file, and why a penetration rate with no stated universe is a percentage of nothing.

16 Sept 20262 min read Territory, capacity and quota planning

Capacity is arithmetic: how to build a sales capacity plan that reconciles to the budget

The capacity model behind a defensible sales headcount plan: reps times calls times weeks less ramp on one side, accounts times required frequency on the other, the gap in reps per territory, and the scenario table that lands on a cost finance can put in the plan.

16 Sept 20263 min read Wallet share and penetration · Industrial distributors

Category penetration and dormant accounts by branch for industrial distributors

How an industrial, MRO or building products distributor measures category penetration per account and finds dormant accounts per branch from the ERP's invoiced sales: the norm from your own accounts, the valued gap, the dormancy window, and the roll-up that reconciles to invoiced sales.

16 Sept 20264 min read Coverage and territory · Sales teams

Coverage is the number under every other number: measuring it for any B2B sales team

Why pipeline, forecast and win rate all rest on whether anyone contacted the account, and how any B2B sales team measures coverage from CRM activity: untouched accounts, rep load, territory trend against plan, and the reconciliation to invoiced revenue.

16 Sept 20263 min read