What is sales productivity?
Sales productivity, in its simplest form, is bookings per sales rep. It measures the output the sales team generates relative to its size.
It is a headcount-efficiency check. Adding reps should add bookings, and productivity per rep tells you whether each new hire is actually contributing or just diluting the average.
The formula.
Bookings per rep = total bookings divided by the number of sales reps over the same period. Decide whether to count all reps or only fully ramped ones, and keep that choice consistent.
The metric is only as fair as the comparison. Reps in different segments, with different quotas and ramp stages, are not directly comparable on raw output.
A worked example.
A team of 5 reps books 1,000,000 in a period. Sales productivity is 1,000,000 divided by 5, which is 200,000 per rep.
What is a good sales productivity number?
There is no universal figure, because it depends on segment, deal size, and ramp. An enterprise rep closing a handful of large deals and an SMB rep closing many small ones produce very different per-rep numbers, and both can be healthy.
Output per rep depends heavily on what enters the pipeline. Reading it next to how efficiently sales converts spend connects rep output to the cost of generating it.
How to improve it.
Raise lead quality, shorten the sales cycle, and strip non-selling work off reps' plates. Productivity rises most when reps spend their time on qualified, winnable deals.
The fastest lever is usually better pipeline, not more activity. Organic search supplies demand that turns into bookings without adding cost per deal.