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GullySales

Your sales team gets a leader now, not after a six-month search.

Gully Sales places an experienced sales leader inside your business for an agreed part of each week. They manage your salespeople, own the pipeline and the forecast, and report to you the way a full-time head of sales would.

  • A written mandate, so the team knows what the leader decides and what you decide
  • A weekly operating cadence your team keeps running after the engagement ends
  • A forecast and pipeline report you can put in front of a board or a bank
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Gully Sales Private Limited builds and runs sales, marketing and revenue operations for small and medium businesses across India.

In one paragraph

What is Fractional Head of Sales for Indian SMBs?

A fractional head of sales is a senior sales leader who manages your sales team for an agreed number of days each week instead of full time. Gully Sales provides that leader. They take a written mandate, diagnose the team and pipeline in the first thirty days, set priorities, run the weekly and monthly cadence, coach your salespeople and report to you in a form a board can read.

The problem

The team has salespeople, but nobody is actually running sales.

Most growing businesses reach a point where there are four, six or ten salespeople and the founder is still their manager in name only. Targets are set, but the review is a WhatsApp message. The CRM exists, but each person uses it differently. Deals close when the founder steps in. Nobody is wrong here; the business simply outgrew the way it was managed before anyone had time to notice.

You will recognise it as

  • The founder still joins the important calls, because the team cannot close without them
  • Every salesperson reports their pipeline differently, so the total means little
  • The month-end number is a surprise, up or down, more often than not
  • A senior salesperson has been made manager and is now selling less and managing little
  • The search for a full-time head of sales has been open for months, or the last hire did not work out
  • Sales reviews happen when there is a crisis, not on a fixed day

What it costs the business

  • Good salespeople leave for businesses where someone manages them, and the ones who stay settle into habits nobody corrects
  • The forecast cannot be trusted, so production, purchasing and cash planning run on guesswork
  • The founder's calendar becomes the ceiling on revenue, and growth stalls at whatever one person can personally carry
  • Marketing leads arrive and go cold because nobody owns the response time or the follow-up

Why it persists. A full-time head of sales is expensive, hard to find and risky to get wrong, and a business that has never had one cannot easily judge the candidates. So the founder keeps managing on the side, the senior salesperson keeps covering, and the decision gets pushed to next quarter. Meanwhile the team learns that nobody is really watching the numbers.

If it stays unresolved. The business keeps adding salespeople to a function nobody manages, cost per order rises, and the founder ends up working harder in sales than before the team existed. When a full-time leader finally arrives, they inherit habits that take a year to undo.

What changes

What you receive, and what tends to follow when it is used.

In the first weeks

  • A written leadership mandate agreed with you before the leader meets the team
  • A thirty-day diagnosis of the team, pipeline, process and numbers, with findings you can act on
  • A short list of priorities for the next two quarters, each with an owner

In how the work runs

  • A weekly pipeline review, a monthly performance review and a quarterly plan review that happen on fixed days
  • One pipeline definition and one set of stage rules used by every salesperson
  • Coaching plans for each salesperson, with the conversations documented

In sales and marketing

  • A forecast built from stage-weighted pipeline rather than from optimism, reviewed against actuals every month
  • Deals that progress without the founder joining the call
  • Pipeline coverage tracked against target, so a shortfall is visible months before the quarter ends

In what management can see

  • A monthly board-ready report on attainment, coverage, forecast accuracy and productivity
  • A clear picture of which salespeople, territories and products are carrying the number

Over the longer term

  • A sales function a full-time head can take over without starting from scratch
  • A team that keeps its own rhythm after the fractional leader steps back

Gully Sales controls the mandate, the diagnosis, the cadence, the coaching and the reporting. Revenue attainment, forecast accuracy and productivity also depend on your market, your pricing and your team's willingness to be managed. We report on all of them; we promise only the work.

Who it is for

For businesses that need a sales leader before they can find a full-time one.

The businesses it suits

  • Founder-led businesses with four to twenty salespeople where the founder is still the de facto sales manager
  • Companies that have been searching for a full-time head of sales for months and need the team led in the meantime
  • Businesses whose last sales head did not work out and who want to see the role done well before hiring again
  • Manufacturers, distributors and B2B service firms selling through quotes, proposals and dealers, where deals take weeks
  • Owners who are stepping back from daily selling and want a leader in place before they do
  • Investor-backed or family-owned businesses whose board wants a reliable forecast and a sales function it can read

What usually prompts the call

  • The founder has counted the hours spent managing salespeople and found there is no time left to run the business
  • Two quarters missed, and every explanation points to a different salesperson
  • A new territory, product line or dealer channel is starting and the current team cannot be stretched to cover it
  • A bank, investor or board has asked for a forecast and nobody trusts the one the CRM produces
  • A senior salesperson promoted to manager has asked, in effect, to go back to selling

What Gully Sales does

The work, component by component.

Leadership mandate

A written agreement on what the fractional head of sales decides alone, what they decide with you, and what stays with you: hiring and exits, pricing and discounts, territory changes, incentive changes, key account escalations. It also fixes the days per week, who they report to and how the engagement ends.

Why it matters:
Without a mandate, a part-time leader becomes an adviser whom the team can wait out. With one, the team knows the decisions are real.
You receive:
Leadership mandate document signed by you and the leader
Business value:
Your team treats the leader as a leader from the first week, and you keep the decisions you want to keep.

First-thirty-day diagnosis

The leader spends the first month reading the CRM, joining calls and customer visits, reviewing recent won and lost deals, interviewing each salesperson and checking what the numbers say against what people say. The output is a plain statement of where the function stands.

Why it matters:
A leader who starts changing things in week one changes the wrong things. Thirty days of listening earns the right to set priorities.
You receive:
Diagnosis note covering team, pipeline, process, tools and numbers
Business value:
You get an honest picture of your sales function from someone who now has to live with it.

Priorities for the next two quarters

From the diagnosis, three to five priorities that will move the number most: a stage definition rewrite, a follow-up standard for marketing leads, a key account plan, a territory reshuffle, a hiring decision. Each has an owner, a measure and a review date, and everything else is explicitly parked.

Why it matters:
A sales team can absorb a few changes at a time. A list of twenty fixes is a way of doing none.
You receive:
Priority list with owners, measures and review dates, agreed with you
Business value:
Everyone, including you, knows what sales is working on this quarter and what it is not.

Operating cadence

The fixed rhythm: a weekly pipeline review by stage, a weekly one-to-one with each salesperson, a monthly performance review against target and a quarterly plan review. Agendas set, data pulled before the meeting, decisions recorded, actions followed up the following week.

Why it matters:
Discipline in sales comes from the calendar, not from motivation. The same meeting on the same day is what makes a forecast believable.
You receive:
Cadence calendar, meeting agendas and a decision log
Business value:
Reviews stop being crisis meetings, and the team hears about a problem while it is still small.

Team coaching and selling standards

One-to-one coaching for each salesperson based on observed calls and deal reviews: discovery, qualification, proposal quality, negotiation and follow-up. The good practice found in the team is written down as its way of selling, and the leader recommends, with evidence, where a role change is needed.

Why it matters:
Most salespeople in SMBs have never been coached; they have only been told the number. Coaching is where the productivity comes from.
You receive:
Individual coaching plans, call review notes and a written selling standard
Business value:
Your team sells the way the business wants it to sell, and the strong performers stay because someone is investing in them.

Board-ready reporting

A monthly report in a fixed format: revenue attainment against target, pipeline coverage by quarter, forecast accuracy against last month's call, sales productivity per person, and the actions taken. Written so that a board member, investor or bank can read it without a walkthrough.

Why it matters:
A sales report that only the sales team understands protects nobody. A fixed format lets you see the trend, not only the month.
You receive:
Monthly sales report and a quarterly review pack
Business value:
You and your board see the same numbers the leader manages by, in a form you can act on.

What you will have at the end.

  • A signed leadership mandate covering decision rights, days per week, reporting line and exit terms
  • A thirty-day diagnosis note on team, pipeline, process, tools and numbers
  • A priority list for the next two quarters with owners, measures and review dates
  • A cadence calendar with agendas for weekly, monthly and quarterly reviews
  • A single pipeline stage definition and forecast method applied across the team
  • Individual coaching plans and call review notes for each salesperson
  • A written selling standard for the team, from qualification to follow-up
  • A monthly board-ready sales report in a fixed format
  • A decision log recording what was decided, when and why
  • A handover pack for the full-time head of sales when the time comes

How it runs

The engagement, step by step.

  1. 1

    Agree the mandate

    Before anyone meets the team, we agree what the leader will decide, what stays with you, how many days a week, and what the first two quarters must achieve. We also agree how the engagement ends: a full-time hire, a promotion from within or a planned step-back.

    You provide:
    Your targets, your current team structure, the decisions you want to keep, and time for two working sessions
    We produce:
    Signed leadership mandate and engagement plan
    Done when:
    You and the leader have signed the mandate and the team has been told.
  2. 2

    Diagnose in the first thirty days

    The leader reads the CRM and the last two quarters of results, joins calls and visits, reviews won and lost deals, and interviews every salesperson. Nothing is changed yet beyond the meetings needed to listen.

    You provide:
    CRM access, results history, introductions to the team and a few customers
    We produce:
    Diagnosis note with findings on team, pipeline, process and numbers
    Done when:
    You have read the diagnosis and agreed what it says about where the function stands.
  3. 3

    Set the priorities

    From the diagnosis, three to five priorities for the next two quarters are agreed with you, each with an owner and a measure. Everything else is written down and parked so the team is not pulled in twenty directions.

    You provide:
    A decision on the priorities and any constraints the leader must respect
    We produce:
    Priority list with owners, measures and review dates
    Done when:
    The priorities are agreed and have been presented to the team.
  4. 4

    Install the cadence

    The weekly pipeline review, one-to-ones, monthly performance review and quarterly plan review go into the calendar with agendas. The first cycles are run by the leader and then handed progressively to team leads where they exist.

    You provide:
    Your attendance at the monthly review and a fixed slot for the leader's report to you
    We produce:
    Cadence calendar, agendas, decision log and the first month's reviews
    Done when:
    Three consecutive weekly reviews have happened on the scheduled day with the data ready.
  5. 5

    Coach and set standards

    The leader observes calls and reviews deals with each salesperson, writes an individual coaching plan, and turns the good practice found in the team into a written selling standard. Where a person is in the wrong role, the leader says so with evidence.

    You provide:
    Backing for the coaching plans and a hearing for any role recommendations
    We produce:
    Coaching plans, call review notes and a written selling standard
    Done when:
    Every salesperson has a coaching plan and has had at least two documented coaching conversations.
  6. 6

    Report and forecast

    From month two, a fixed-format report goes to you each month: attainment, coverage, forecast accuracy, productivity and actions taken. The forecast is built from stage-weighted pipeline and checked against actuals so the method improves.

    You provide:
    Your review of the report and decisions on anything it escalates
    We produce:
    Monthly board-ready sales report and quarterly review pack
    Done when:
    Three monthly reports have been issued in the same format and the forecast method has been reviewed against actuals.
  7. 7

    Plan the handover

    When the function is stable, the leader helps you define the full-time role, sits in on interviews if you want, and hands over the mandate, the cadence, the standards and the reporting so the new head starts from a working function.

    You provide:
    A decision on the full-time hire, promotion or continued fractional cover
    We produce:
    Role definition, handover pack and a transition plan
    Done when:
    The successor has run the cadence for a month with the fractional leader available but not leading.

Ways to work with us

Choose the level of cover your team needs.

Fractional head of sales

An experienced sales leader inside your business for an agreed number of days each week, holding the full mandate described on this page: diagnosis, priorities, cadence, coaching and reporting.

Interim sales leadership

Heavier cover for a defined period while a full-time head is found or a vacancy is filled, with the handover to the successor built in from the start.

Fractional leader with sales operations support

The leader plus Gully Sales support on CRM configuration, pipeline reporting and forecast tooling, for businesses whose systems cannot yet produce the numbers a leader needs.

Leadership review and mandate design

For businesses with a sales manager already in place: we design the mandate, cadence and reporting with them and review monthly, without placing a leader.

Why Gully Sales

What you are actually choosing when you choose us.

The leader has run sales teams, not only advised them.

Gully Sales places people who have carried a number and managed salespeople in Indian businesses. They know what a dealer review in a district town looks like and what a missed month feels like.

The mandate is written before the work starts.

We do not start until decision rights, days, reporting line and exit are on paper. It protects you, the leader and the team from the drift that sinks most part-time leadership arrangements.

Sales, marketing and operations are read together.

Because Gully Sales also builds marketing, CRM and revenue operations, the leader can see when a sales problem is really a lead-quality problem or a systems problem, and say so rather than push the team harder.

The engagement is designed to end well.

The goal is a sales function that runs without us: a cadence the team keeps, standards written down, and a handover pack ready for the full-time head. We measure ourselves partly on how little the successor has to rebuild.

You see what the leader sees.

The same report the leader manages by goes to you every month, in the same format. There is no separate story for the owner and another for the team.

Where it applies

The same service, in different businesses.

Industrial manufacturing

The situation:
A components manufacturer with eight salespeople across three states and a founder who still closes every large order personally.
How it applies:
The fractional leader takes over the weekly pipeline review, installs one stage definition, coaches the two regional seniors to run their own reviews and builds a key account plan for the top accounts.
Likely benefit:
Large orders progress with the founder informed rather than present, and the regions run their own reviews.

Building materials distribution

The situation:
A distributor selling through dealers and project sales, where the team reports dealer orders but nobody tracks the project pipeline.
How it applies:
The leader separates dealer replenishment from project pursuit, sets a project pipeline with stages and coverage targets, and reports both to the owner monthly.
Likely benefit:
The owner sees which projects are real and can plan stock and credit against a forecast.

B2B services

The situation:
An IT services or staffing firm where a senior salesperson was promoted to manager and is now neither selling nor managing.
How it applies:
The leader takes the management load, coaches the promoted senior on running one-to-ones and reviews, and agrees with the owner whether the role is a fit.
Likely benefit:
A clear decision on the role, and either a working manager or a strong salesperson back in the field.

Healthcare and diagnostics

The situation:
A diagnostics chain or hospital with a corporate and referral sales team that has targets but no process for referral partners.
How it applies:
The leader builds a referral partner pipeline, sets visit and follow-up standards, and reports referral conversion alongside corporate contracts.
Likely benefit:
Referral partners are managed as accounts, and the board sees where patient volume actually comes from.

Agri inputs and FMCG distribution

The situation:
A business expanding into a new region with a small team and a distributor network it has never managed before.
How it applies:
The leader sets the territory plan, the distributor review cadence and the field reporting, and coaches the new region's team on how the company sells.
Likely benefit:
The new region is managed from day one instead of discovered a year later.

Renewable energy and capital equipment

The situation:
A solar EPC or machinery seller with long deal cycles, a pipeline full of quotes and no way to tell which will close.
How it applies:
The leader installs qualification criteria, stage exit rules and a weighted forecast, and reviews every quote above a threshold before it goes out.
Likely benefit:
The forecast the bank and the board see is built from qualified deals, not from the quote register.

Proof

Work we can point to.

Kambar Group

The problem:
Sales processes that needed strengthening across planning, lead generation, enablement and closing.
What we did:
Gully Sales worked on Kambar Group's sales processes through strategic planning, lead generation, sales enablement and closure techniques: the process, enablement and closing work a fractional head of sales leads inside a team. The case study describes consulting, not a leadership placement.
The result:
Improved sales processes and greater efficiency, as the case study describes. No figures are claimed here.
Read the case study

Questions buyers ask

Before you enquire, the answers you will want.

How much of my time does a fractional head of sales need?

Plan for a fixed slot each month to review the report and take the decisions it escalates, plus two working sessions at the start to agree the mandate. In the first thirty days the leader will also want time with you to understand the business and the customers. After that the point is to take management load off you, not add to it. Owners who cannot give the monthly review hour usually get less from the engagement, because decisions queue up.

How much decision authority does the leader have?

Exactly what the mandate says, no more and no less. Typically the leader runs the cadence, sets priorities within the agreed plan, manages performance and recommends on people, pricing exceptions and territory changes. Hiring, exits, incentive changes and pricing policy usually stay with you, with the leader making a documented recommendation. We write this down before the leader meets the team, because a part-time leader without clear authority is quickly treated as a visitor.

How long does the engagement take?

There is no fixed timeline; it depends on why you need the cover. A business bridging to a full-time hire may need the leader until the successor has run the cadence for a month. A founder stepping back may want cover for longer, with a planned reduction in days. We review the shape of the engagement every quarter and agree the exit together, and the handover pack is built from the start so the end is orderly whenever it comes.

What inputs do you need from us?

CRM access and the last two quarters of results, targets and any incentive plan, introductions to each salesperson and a few customers, and honesty about what has been tried before. If the CRM is patchy, the leader works from orders, quotes and invoices and reconstructs a baseline. The most important input is your willingness to let the leader manage within the mandate and to back the coaching plans when a salesperson tests them.

How is success measured?

Against the baseline recorded in the first thirty days: revenue attainment, pipeline coverage, forecast accuracy, marketing contribution, sales productivity and execution velocity, reported monthly in the same format. We also track whether the cadence is being kept and whether coaching is happening, because those are the things the leader controls directly. Revenue depends on your market and your team as well as on the leader; the report shows all of it so you can judge fairly.

What is excluded from scope?

The leader manages your sales team; they do not become an additional salesperson carrying their own quota, and they do not generate leads. Marketing, lead generation, CRM implementation and hiring searches are separate services, though the leader will tell you plainly if one of them is the real constraint. Legal and HR actions such as terminations remain your decision and your process; the leader provides the evidence and the recommendation.

How is this different from a fractional chief revenue officer?

A fractional CRO looks across marketing, sales, customer success and pricing together and answers for the whole revenue model. A fractional head of sales runs the sales team: pipeline, forecast, salespeople and the cadence that holds them together. If your question is whether the revenue model is right, you need the CRO page. If you have a team and nobody is managing it well, this is the page. Some businesses need both, in sequence rather than at once.

What if we already have a sales manager?

Then the leader may not be needed, and we say so on the audit call. Sometimes the right answer is the leadership review option: we design the mandate, cadence and reporting with your existing manager and review monthly. Sometimes a manager promoted from selling needs a leader above them for a period while they learn the job. The diagnosis is honest about which case you are in, including the case where the manager is fine and the problem is elsewhere.

3 more questions

Will the team accept a part-time leader?

They accept a leader who has authority, keeps the same rhythm every week and coaches them rather than only asking for numbers. The mandate handles the first, the cadence the second and the coaching plans the third. What teams do not accept is a part-time adviser whose decisions can be reversed by going to the owner, so how you introduce the leader and back their decisions in the first month matters more than the number of days they are present.

Do you help us hire the full-time head of sales?

Yes, as part of the handover. The leader helps define the role from what the function actually needs rather than from a generic job description, can sit in on interviews and score candidates against the mandate, and hands over the cadence, standards and reporting so the new head inherits a working function. We are not a recruitment firm, so the search itself runs through your own channels or a recruiter; we make sure you know what you are hiring for.

Can the leader manage our dealers and channel partners as well?

Yes, where dealers and partners are part of how you sell. The leader treats the partner network as part of the pipeline: partner reviews go into the cadence, partner-sourced deals are tracked with the same stage rules, and partner performance appears in the monthly report. Designing a channel programme from scratch is a separate service, and we point you to it if that is what the diagnosis finds.

Talk to us

Give the salespeople you have a manager, before you add another one.

The free audit is a working session on your own team. We look at your salespeople, your pipeline and your targets as they are today, and tell you honestly whether a fractional head of sales, an advisory or simply a better cadence is what you need.

  • No obligation and no sales script
  • A reply from someone who does the work
  • Your details are never sold or shared

What you share about your team, pipeline, pricing and customers stays with Gully Sales and is used only to prepare for the conversation.

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