If you’re in sales ops, comp, or even just managing a team, you probably know the drill: every month, you’re buried in dashboards and spreadsheets, trying to figure out who’s crushing it, who’s struggling, and what on earth is actually moving the needle. Enter Performio, a sales performance management tool that promises analytics to make this all easier. Does it? Well, sort of—if you know what to look for and don’t get distracted by shiny, but useless, charts.
Here’s a no-nonsense guide to using Performio analytics to pull out real sales trends—so you can do less guessing, more acting, and skip the data-induced headaches.
Step 1: Get Your Data House in Order
Honestly, no analytics tool in the world can save you if your data’s a mess. Before you start slicing and dicing, make sure:
- Your sales data is clean. Junk in, junk out. Double-check your CRM and commission data for duplicates, missing fields, and weird outliers (like a $10M deal from a rep who usually closes $10K).
- Your comp plans and territories are up to date. If Performio’s working off last quarter’s territories or old product SKUs, your trends won’t be trends—they’ll be fiction.
- You’ve got access. Make sure you (and anyone else who needs to) have the right permissions in Performio to see analytics dashboards, not just pay statements.
Pro tip: Run a quick comparison between what Performio says and what your CRM or ERP says for last month. If they don’t match, fix it now. Don’t wait.
Step 2: Decide What “Performance Trends” Actually Matter
Performio spits out a lot of charts. Not all of them are useful. Here’s what’s usually worth tracking (and what isn’t):
What to Watch:
- Quota attainment over time: Are more reps hitting quota, or fewer? Is there a pattern by month or quarter?
- Top performer consistency: Are the same people always on top, or does it change?
- Ramp speed: How fast do new hires start hitting targets?
- Product/region breakdowns: Are certain products, teams, or territories outperforming or lagging?
- Payout vs. plan: Are you paying out more (or less) than you budgeted, and why?
What to Ignore:
- Vanity leaderboards: Who’s #1 this week is fun, but tells you little about real trends.
- “Engagement” widgets: Unless you’re running a comp plan as a morale booster, likes and badges are mostly noise.
- Overly granular filters: Slicing by every possible variable (left-handed reps in Q2 who sell software in Nebraska) just muddles the big picture.
Before you build a dashboard or run a report, decide which 2-3 questions you actually want answered. Start there.
Step 3: Build (or Tweak) Your Dashboards
Performio comes with standard dashboards, but they’re generic. The best way to see real trends is to customize:
- Clone a template dashboard, don’t start from scratch.
- Use the “Quota Attainment” or “Earnings vs. Plan” dashboards as a base.
- Remove or hide any widgets you don’t care about.
- Add key filters.
- Time period (monthly, quarterly)
- Team or region
- Product or SKU group (if your comp plan is product-based)
- Stack up your metrics.
- Put quota attainment, payout rate, and win rates on the same page if possible. This lets you spot correlations, not just isolated numbers.
- Set up alerts for real anomalies.
- For example, if a region’s quota attainment drops by 20% month-over-month, get a heads-up—not just a pretty red bar.
What works: Keeping dashboards simple and focused. Two to four charts, tops. More than that, and you’ll stop looking at them.
What doesn’t: Trying to impress the exec team with fancy visualizations. Most people just want to know: Are we on track? If not, where should we look?
Step 4: Dig Deeper With Ad Hoc Analysis
Let’s say you spot a trend—like, suddenly, a bunch of reps miss quota in one region. Now what?
- Drill down by clicking into the dashboard.
- Most charts in Performio let you filter down (e.g., by team, individual, or product).
- Export the data if you need more control.
- Sometimes, it’s just easier to do a quick pivot table in Excel or Google Sheets.
- Ask “why,” not just “what.”
- Did something change in the comp plan?
- Did you lose a big customer?
- Are there new reps dragging down the average?
- Compare against external data.
- Market changes, seasonality, CRM data—don’t assume Performio knows everything.
Pro tip: Don’t just compare people. Compare periods. Look for changes over time: What’s different this quarter vs. last? This year vs. last year? Patterns over time are where trends actually live.
Step 5: Watch Out for Red Herrings
Analytics tools can trick you into seeing patterns that aren’t really there. Here are a few traps to avoid:
- Small sample size. Two reps missed quota in one month? Might just be noise.
- Short-term swings. A spike or dip in a single week doesn’t mean you’ve got a trend.
- Changing definitions. If you tweak your comp plan or territory definition, your “trend” might just be the result of new rules.
- Overfitting. Don’t invent stories to explain every blip. Sometimes, sales is just lumpy.
If you see something weird, check the raw data. Ask around. Don’t assume the dashboard tells the whole truth.
Step 6: Share What Matters—Not Everything
Once you spot a real trend, you’ll want to share it. Here’s how to avoid overwhelming (or boring) your team:
- Highlight the “so what.” Focus on what’s actionable. “East region’s down 15% for two quarters” is a trend. “Leaderboard shuffled again” is not.
- Keep it regular, but not constant. Monthly or quarterly updates are usually enough—don’t blast the team with noise.
- Give context, not just numbers. Explain why the trend matters. “Ramp time for new reps is getting longer—maybe our onboarding needs work.”
- Tailor your message. Sales reps care about the path to making more money. Execs care about budgets and forecasts. Don’t mix them up.
Step 7: Iterate, Don’t Automate and Forget
The biggest mistake with analytics? Setting up dashboards and never looking at them again. Trends change. What you care about will shift as your business does.
- Review your dashboards every month or quarter. Kill what’s not useful. Add what’s missing.
- Solicit feedback. Ask managers and reps what data actually helps them.
- Don’t chase perfection. Start simple. You can always add more later.
Wrapping Up
At the end of the day, Performio’s analytics are only as good as your questions and your data. Skip the vanity metrics. Focus on the few trends that actually move your business. Keep your dashboards simple, check your data twice, and don’t be afraid to ignore half the charts. Spot a real trend? Act on it. If not, keep digging.
Simple works. Keep it that way, and you’ll actually get value—without losing an afternoon to dashboard rabbit holes.