What Method Should You Use to Determine the Ideal Size of Your Sales Team?

08/07/2026
16:04

reading time : 2 min

Lucie Monnot

Content Marketing Manager

For companies, determining the ideal size of their sales team in order to optimize both performance and cost is a delicate exercise. It is not enough simply to generate revenue — each sales representative must be profitable. Let us explore the two most common methods for defining the number of sales representatives to recruit: the division method and the workload method.

The division method: too simplistic

The company starts from a sales forecast established by the marketing department to estimate the overall revenue. It then sets a sales target for each sales representative. The remaining step is to divide the targeted revenue by the amount generated by each member of the sales team to determine the number of people required.

While this method has the advantage of simplicity, it is criticized for being too passive and disconnected from reality.

On one hand, individual productivity is linked to skills and the characteristics of the geographic area covered (size, potential).
On the other hand, sales volume is not a fixed figure — it is influenced by several factors, including the effectiveness of the sales representatives.

The workload method: more dynamic, but limited

The company must begin by quantifying the customer base across the territory covered by the company and segmenting it — for example, according to customer type (private individual or business), distribution channel, sector of activity, and so on. Sales representative software is a valuable tool for this essential task.

The next step consists of evaluating the sales effort required for each identified customer category: how many times do they need to be visited each year? How much time should be devoted to each appointment? The total workload is obtained by multiplying the number of customers in the category by the number and duration of visits.

While the approach is dynamic, it has certain limitations:

Standardization during segmentation
- While some customers want to meet their sales representative on a regular basis, others are satisfied with a half-yearly or annual meeting, or even remote exchanges.
- A visit may last more or less time depending on the customer’s needs.
- A territory is not necessarily covered by a single sales representative.
The working capacity of sales representatives must take into account travel time, which varies depending on how dispersed customers are across the area and how far they are from the company’s headquarters or the sales representative’s place of residence.
Beyond a certain point, the market becomes saturated: sales plateau regardless of the sales effort deployed.
Each sales representative has their own technique and organization, which makes them more or less effective than their colleagues.

How to optimize your sales force?

Neither of the two approaches is 100% foolproof. Furthermore, today, an omnichannel approach that combines direct contact and other traditional marketing actions with digital communication is the most effective. To optimize the sales force, it is therefore essential to define the key stages and moments that require the physical intervention of a sales representative, and those where the customer relationship can be maintained without travel, thanks to other online or offline tools. This more “intelligent” organization is a source of appreciable performance gains.

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