Beat Planning Software for Field Sales Teams in the Philippines
For Philippine consumer brands: plan which sari-sari stores, supermarkets and drugstores each salesman visits each day, and track store visit frequency in the app.
Beat Planning
Scheduling AI Agent
Route Optimization
⊢Trusted by Filipino brands like San Miguel and Monde Nissin⊣
What is beat planning software?
Beat planning software decides which stores each salesman visits, how often and on which day. Then it tracks visit frequency and counts each store visit against the plan, so the plan leaves Excel.
A beat is a fixed set of outlets that one salesman visits on a set day. Most Philippine teams call the repeating version a route plan: the same beats on a weekly or monthly cycle. Reps also call it a permanent journey plan, or PJP.
Give salesmen only a call count, and they hit it with easy stops while the big supermarket waits. BeatRoute sets visits by what each store is worth. A large outlet with an order due comes before a small one that ordered yesterday.
Three ways Philippine teams plan beats today, and who each one suits:
Fixed beats in Excel
Same stores, same day, every week
Cheap to start, but nothing checks the plan against real visits, and Viber copies go stale.
Fine for a small team with a short store list.
Route-only tools
The fastest order for today's stops
Route planning cuts travel once you know where to go, but it does not decide which stores matter or how often.
Right when reps already have a fixed list.
Value-based beat planning
Which outlets, how often, on which day
Sets visit frequency by outlet value, builds the beats and adjusts them as stores open and close. This is what BeatRoute does.
Built for brands with distributors and big field teams.
1. Build the beat plan
Good visit planning starts with stores. Rank them, set how often each one is visited, and give every salesman a route plan to finish.
Classify outlets by value
Sort outlets into A, B and C classes by sales and potential, so a supermarket gets more visits than a sari-sari store.
Set visit frequency for each class
Visit top outlets weekly, the middle every two weeks and the rest monthly. The plan then knows the visits each salesman owes.
Build beats that fit a working day
Group nearby stores by distance and visit time. A beat a salesman cannot finish in a day is too long.
Assign beats as a permanent journey plan
Give each salesman a fair weekly or monthly route plan with room for urgent visits. A store with no beat shows up as a coverage gap.
2. Run the day in the field
Reps open the app to a ready list, check in at the store and do the task that matters most there.
Start the day with a ready visit list
Each salesman sees today's beat in order, with the task for every outlet: an order, a payment, an issue or a promo.
Check in with a geo-tagged visit
Each check-in records where and when the salesman was. You can set a visit to count only when it matches the store's saved location.
Move visits when priorities change
When a store's orders drop or a payment slips, the Scheduling AI Agent moves it up the day's list. With the agent, productive visits rose from 45% to 78%.
Cut travel with route planning
Route optimization maps the shortest route through each day's stops, so salesmen lose less time in traffic.
3. Check planned vs actual visits
See which stores got visits, and fix the plan before month end.
Track planned vs actual visits
See visits made against the plan, and which ended in an order, by salesman and by beat. A missed store shows up the same week.
Keep each class on its visit frequency
Watch beat compliance (also called PJP adherence), top-outlet coverage and missed outlets. When a class falls behind, its stores move up the schedule.
Redraw beats as the market changes
Rebalance beats as stores open and salesmen move on. Work out how many salesmen a territory needs from store count, visit frequency and time per visit.
How Nurturemed Pharma keeps its PMR network on plan
Nurturemed Pharma lifted PMR productivity 20% with BeatRoute.
BeatRoute helps us monitor, control, and boost performance across our PMR network. The platform is very helpful in aligning field behavior with our business goals. The impact was fast and measurable.
Resources
Relevant resources
Customer stories and product notes on planning beats and visits.
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Read moreFrequently Asked Questions
What is beat planning software?
Beat planning software, which many Philippine teams call route plan software, is a tool that plans each salesman's store visits and tracks whether they happened. BeatRoute adds a Scheduling AI Agent that moves a store up the list when its orders or payments change.
How does BeatRoute build and run a route plan?
You start by sorting stores into classes. Class A stores, the ones that sell the most, get a weekly visit. B stores get one every two weeks and C stores once a month. BeatRoute then maps store locations and groups nearby stores into beats. Each beat is sized to fit one salesman's working day. Within each beat, route planning sets the sequence of stops so traffic eats less of the day. The beats become each salesman's permanent journey plan in the app. Each week, planned vs actual visits, beat compliance and missed stores show whether the plan is working. Visit patterns show which beats need redrawing as stores open, close or change in value. For the method behind each step, read our beat planning guide.
Which software tracks retail store visit frequency?
Beat planning software, or a sales force automation app with beat planning built in, tracks it. In BeatRoute you set a visit frequency for each outlet class. Every geo-tagged check-in counts against it. A report shows which stores are behind plan by salesman and by beat.
How many stores should one beat have?
As many as one salesman can visit properly in a working day, and no more. Add up the time each visit takes, plus the travel time between stops. A big supermarket with an order and a shelf check takes longer than a sari-sari store. If the total runs past the salesman's day, split the beat. Dense Metro Manila areas fit more stores per beat than provincial routes, where distance and traffic eat the day.
How is beat planning different from route optimization?
Beat planning decides which stores each salesman covers, how often and on which day. Route optimization takes the stores on one day's beat and finds the shortest route between them. A sales visit planning process needs both. The beat plan sets the cycle, and route optimization cuts the daily travel time.
What should I look for in beat planning software?
Look for outlet classes with a visit frequency for each, and beats built from location and visit time. You need geo-tagged check-ins and planned vs actual reports by salesman, beat and class. The app should work offline, because many stores in the provinces sit where the signal is weak.
Can visits be scheduled around each salesman's available hours?
Yes. You set each salesman's working hours for each day, and BeatRoute fits the visits into the time they have. You can also pin a visit to a fixed day and time when a shop only takes orders in a set window.