Field sales teams spend a significant part of their week on the road. Yet in most B2B organizations, sales routes are still one of the least optimized parts of the commercial process.
Routes are often inherited, repeated, and defended — but rarely questioned.
In this article, we’ll break down why most B2B sales routes are inefficient, what it’s actually costing teams, and how modern sales organizations are fixing it.
How B2B Sales Routes Are Really Built Today
Despite all the technology available, most routes are still defined using some combination of:
Historical territories (“this has always been Juan’s zone”)
Static account lists exported from a CRM
Rep intuition and habit
Excel or Google Maps lists updated manually
Once a route “works,” it tends to stick — even if the market changes, demand shifts, or new opportunities emerge nearby.
The result is routes optimized for familiarity, not for opportunity.
The Hidden Cost of Inefficient Routes
Inefficient routes don’t just waste time. They quietly erode performance in ways that are hard to see from dashboards. Here are the most common hidden costs:
1. Missed Opportunities in Plain Sight
Sales reps drive past potential customers every day without knowing it. Not because they’re careless — but because those opportunities were never surfaced or prioritized.
2. Low Value per Visit
When every account is treated as equally important, reps end up spending time on low-impact visits while higher-potential accounts wait.
3. Rep Fatigue and Friction
Longer drives, unnecessary detours, and poorly sequenced visits increase fatigue. Over time, this directly impacts execution quality and morale.
4. Managers Managing Blind
Sales managers see visits logged in the CRM, but they don’t see:
What was missed nearby
Why one route outperformed another
Whether the plan made sense in the real world
Why CRM Alone Can’t Fix This
CRM systems are essential — but they were not built for on-the-ground execution.
CRMs are great at:
Storing accounts
Tracking pipeline stages
Reporting historical performance
They struggle with:
Geographic context
Real-time prioritization
Dynamic route changes
Answering the question: “Where should I go next?”
That’s not a failure of CRM. It’s simply not its job.
What Efficient Sales Routes Actually Look Like
High-performing field sales teams don’t just “visit accounts.” They operate with commercial routes that adapt to opportunity.
Efficient routes share a few common traits:
Accounts are prioritized, not just listed
Routes adapt based on proximity, timing, and potential
Reps know why a stop matters before they arrive
New opportunities are surfaced along the route, not weeks later
Feedback from visits improves the next plan
In short: the route thinks ahead, not just the rep.
How to Fix Inefficient Sales Routes
Fixing route inefficiency doesn’t start with adding more pressure on reps. It starts with better intelligence.
1. Shift From Static Territories to Dynamic Routes
Territories are organizational constructs. Routes are execution tools. The best teams optimize routes week by week.
2. Prioritize Accounts in Context
An account’s value changes depending on location, timing, and nearby opportunities. Prioritization must be contextual, not static.
3. Bring Intelligence Into the Field
Recommendations must appear before the visit, not in a report reviewed weeks later.
4. Close the Feedback Loop
Each visit should inform the next route. Over time, this compounds into better decisions and better performance.
Final Thought
Most sales teams don’t have a discipline problem.
They have a route problem.
When routes are built on habit, execution suffers. When routes are built on intelligence, performance follows naturally.
The future of B2B field sales isn’t more visits — it’s better routes.
