Our Personal Sales KPIs

If sales feels random, it’s usually because we’re measuring “effort” instead of measuring the activities that actually create revenue. KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) solve that. They’re the actions that, when carried out consistently and well, lead to revenue results. And they also have a behavioural side: the discipline to do the work even when we’re not getting instant wins.

The catch is that not every company hands us personal KPIs on day one. If we haven’t been given KPIs, we can create them ourselves—and they become markers for what we’re doing and what we should be doing to grow sales in our market, our industry, and our territory.

About the author (short bio)

Dr. Greg Story is President of Dale Carnegie Tokyo Training and an Adjunct Professor at Griffith University, with a Ph.D. in Japanese Decision-Making. He is a two-time winner of the Dale Carnegie “One Carnegie Award” (2018, 2021) and recipient of the Griffith University Business School Outstanding Alumnus Award (2012). As a Dale Carnegie Master Trainer, he delivers programs globally across leadership, communication, sales, and presentations, including Leadership Training for Results.

Q1) What are “personal” sales KPIs, and why do we need them?

KPIs are not “busywork metrics.” They’re the handful of actions that reliably drive results. The reason personal KPIs matter is simple: everyone has a different business area. Our market, our deal size, our sales cycle, and our buyers are not identical to someone else’s—so the construct of our KPIs will vary across industries and sectors.

If our company has already defined KPIs for us, great. But if they haven’t, we can’t just float. We need a scoreboard we own. Personal KPIs give us clarity, focus, and a way to self-correct when the pipeline goes quiet.

Most importantly: we have to recognise we cannot do everything. But we can do the most important things. That means choosing the highest-priority sales activities and tracking them consistently.

Q2) Which KPI activities actually lead to revenue?

Start with the practical activities that move prospects through the sales process. For many roles, the simplest personal KPI list looks like this:

• How many qualified leads do we work with each week?

• How many calls (or outreach attempts) do we make each week?

• How many of those calls lead to appointments?

• How many appointments lead to agreed deals?

• How much do we sell, on average, per appointment gained?

• How many buyers become repeat buyers?

These aren’t abstract. They’re observable. And because they map to stages in the funnel, they give us an early warning system. If our activity is strong but results are weak, we don’t panic—we diagnose the stage that’s failing and fix that.

Q3) How do we convert a big revenue target into weekly KPI numbers?

We work backwards from the revenue goal and turn it into a chain of activities. This is where ratios matter. If we know how many calls typically produce one appointment, and how many appointments typically produce one deal, we can reverse-engineer the activity we need to hit the target.

For example, we might start with a revenue goal and ask: how many deals do we need, and how many meetings create those deals? From there: how many buyer conversations create those meetings? And from there: how many outreach attempts create those conversations?

This is why it’s a good practice to break big revenue targets down into activities. It turns “hope” into a plan—and converts pressure into a schedule.

Q4) What do we track in the ratios between each step?

The magic is in the ratios. We can set targets for the conversion steps between:

Lead → Contact with buyer

Contact → Appointment

Appointment → Deal

And we need to be realistic about how the world actually works. We can have a long list of numbers to call, but people don’t answer. We get message services. Gatekeepers promise to pass on the message…and then “gracefully slide it straight into the bin.” Even when we reach the buyer, talking to them and getting a meeting are planets apart—because we must be persuasive and spark enough interest to earn the next stage.

So we ask better questions: What is our target for success at each stage? What is our closing ratio for deals coming from meetings? Once we track those ratios, we stop guessing—and we start managing.

Q5) What if we keep failing these targets?

Good. That’s normal. These are specific targets, and often we will fail. Sales is not a straight line; it’s a statistics game wrapped inside human psychology and timing.

Over time, however, we build reliable statistics that show how strong we are at each stage. That’s when we can see the real places we’re leaking revenue. Maybe we’re great at getting contacts but weak at converting to meetings. Or we hold meetings but struggle to close. The KPI system is doing its job when it shows us the truth—and gives us a place to improve.

Also, our goals can have a range: a number we can hit comfortably, a higher number that is difficult but realistic, and then stretch targets. Ranges keep us motivated without turning our week into a punishment ritual.

Q6) How do KPIs improve time management (and beat gatekeepers)?

Specific activity targets activate time management. If we know the number of calls we need, we schedule the calls throughout the day to reach enough buyers to hit the KPI. And we don’t call in only one time slot.

It’s no good calling everyone only from 9:00am to 12:00pm. Some people can be reached then, others are better during lunch, others after 6:00pm when gatekeepers have gone home, and others from 8:30am in the morning. The point is to keep calling and keep trying different times of day until we make contact.

Starting the day with targets and starting the day with no targets are completely different approaches. Sales is a diabolical art—mostly we fail—so we need supreme discipline to do what needs to be done. Once we know the ratios, we have a guide for how much we need to be doing. And as we analyse where we’re struggling, we can improve our weaknesses and lift our overall success ratio.

Conclusion: Your personal KPI system is your revenue steering wheel

When we define our personal sales KPIs, we stop relying on mood, motivation, or luck. We measure the activities that create revenue, track conversion ratios between stages, and adjust the approach based on real data. The result is simple: more control, better discipline, and a repeatable path to hitting revenue targets—even in tough markets and gatekeeper-heavy environments.

About the Author (full credentials)

Dr. Greg Story, Ph.D. in Japanese Decision-Making, is President of Dale Carnegie Tokyo Training and Adjunct Professor at Griffith University. He is a two-time winner of the Dale Carnegie “One Carnegie Award” (2018, 2021) and recipient of the Griffith University Business School Outstanding Alumnus Award (2012). As a Dale Carnegie Master Trainer, Greg is certified to deliver globally across all leadership, communication, sales, and presentation programs, including Leadership Training for Results.