Mike Stokes: Indicator CEO on the survey of sales team leaders and company growth

Sales teams are still bracing for some tough months ahead, according to consultancy firm Indicator's latest survey of sales team leaders. 

Only 39% of respondents say they’re achieving growth – the lowest seen since the survey began in 2008. 

Indicator CEO Mike Stokes told Mike Hosking four in five don't think we're out of the woods yet. 

He says most say we'll recover in the second half of the year at the earliest, while some think we won't recover until next year. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Might have some new insight from the business coal face
of this country. The Sales Teams is a survey five
hundred liters eight thousand reps. The word is it's still
very tough, no kidding, but there is lights if you
look at the indicator. CEO and founder Mike Stokes is
with us on this morning.

Speaker 2 (00:14):
Good morning, Mike.

Speaker 1 (00:14):
This optimism we find in your survey and the recovery
coming our way in the latter part of twenty twenty
five that driven by hope or fact.

Speaker 2 (00:23):
A little bit of both. I think I would call
it realistic hope. So there is optimism there, but there's
also a realization that there are some challenges still, particularly
in the first six months of the year.

Speaker 1 (00:35):
And does it very widely depending on the industry you're
dealing with.

Speaker 2 (00:38):
No, pretty much right offs Streer industry. We saw really
tough the year last year. But the optimism is the
same for this year.

Speaker 1 (00:45):
And so the banks are saying first half as hard,
second half is better. You would agree with that. Your
survey suggests that year.

Speaker 2 (00:53):
Yeah, we're strongly seeing that minute earliest that sales letters
saying in the survey that the earliest will from a
recession will be second half of the year, but a
number of still saying twenty twenty six as well.

Speaker 1 (01:05):
Okay, so thirty nine percent of companies, this is how
bad it got. Thirty nine percent of companies got growth
last year. That's not many. So it was as bad
as it gets.

Speaker 2 (01:14):
It was the lowest we've seen since we started the
survey in two thousand and eight, so it was tough.
And not only that, it was thirty two percent that
declined in revenue, so some pre start numbers there.

Speaker 1 (01:27):
So when we talk about the stuff you know, at
our level, inflation, interest rates, the commercial level in the
real world, all that sort of stuff, is that what
affects you guys as well?

Speaker 2 (01:37):
Yeah? Absolutely so. I think the biggest the biggest hit
that we had from a sales perspective, a revenue perspective
last year was the budgets declined. Companies took a lot
more time to make decisions about whether they would purchase
specifically you know, good size investments, and what we noted

(01:59):
that that really that because of the nature of the
reduction in demand salespeople really only hit about forty three
percent of them at their targets for last year.

Speaker 1 (02:12):
Is that budget thing psychological. I mean, if I feel bad, therefore,
what do I do? I know, I'll cut my budget
and so it becomes a vicious cycle.

Speaker 2 (02:20):
Definitely a confidence thing, Definitely a confidence thing, and it
certainly is a vicious cycle. Sales leaders and salespeople who
notes a pretty optimistic bunch. So if they're saying that
we still got some challenges ahead, it's likely to be
the case.

Speaker 1 (02:34):
And what about the comparison between New Zealand and Australia.
What can you tell us Australia was similar.

Speaker 2 (02:40):
They were expecting a better last year than they got,
which was interesting. But their optimism is slightly higher than
in New Zealand, slightly higher than what we see.

Speaker 1 (02:52):
All right, Mike, appreciate the insight. Mike Stakes indicated CEO
and the founder.

Speaker 2 (02:56):
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