The Same Page

As the Web and cloud capability become  ever more essential tools to ensure smooth sales-process integration and implementation, some sales managers may think it’s insulting to question their reps’ readiness to execute a new strategy. After all, doesn’t everyone know what he or she is supposed to be doing? Didn’t everyone get the same memo?

According to Dario Priolo, chief strategy officer of Richardson, one of the most costly mistakes in implementing a new sales strategy is assuming reps and line managers know what they have to do. On the contrary, Priolo says, reps appreciate explanations. Moreover, detailed communication with reps ensures that leaders know which processes, technologies, and training they need to make the new strategy work.

In addition, reps constantly face customers who also wonder how a new sales strategy might affect their interests. Uninformed reps may not know how to appropriately address customer concerns, and that could bring trouble. “Don’t assume everyone knows what to do,” Priolo stresses.

Digital tools that tap the Web for crowd-sourced leads are transforming new sales processes. Data.com, part of salesforce.com, is a leader in this space. Most contact information for leads and prospects in business markets becomes stale or outdated within a year, but Data.com is constantly updated by its two million sales- and marketing-professional members.

Data.com uses state-of-the-art algorithms to scrub, enhance, and filter every contact. It flags duplicate and dead records and fills in missing contact and account data. That means your contacts are always clean, accurate, and easy to use.

Ken Krogue, president of InsideSales.com, knows all about another important sales transformation: the shift from outside to inside sales. “We help with the software, tools, training, and best-practice methods,” Krogue says.

The reason for the shift? The numbers: outside reps close on 40 percent of contacts, while inside reps close on only 16 percent. But inside reps make seven times the number of contacts, so they can close much more business in the same amount of time.

“Inside sales is really remote sales, done on the phone and Internet as opposed to face-to-face,” Krogue summarizes. Even outside reps now spend nearly half their time selling remotely.

The trick is to sell well while selling from a distance. InsideSales.com makes remote selling as close to face-to-face as possible, putting reps’ photos in email signature lines and exploring videos with Web conferences. It sends meeting reminders and emphasizes speedy follow-up of Website visits. Pouncing on a Web visitor within five minutes of that visit yields 100 times the results yielded when contact is made within half an hour, yet most firms still take two days to follow up.
rUsing InsideSales.com’s seven best practices, inside reps can make 80 to 90 contacts a day versus 50, which is typical for this channel. Specialist reps can get that volume up to 300 contacts per day, and remote sellers can close on 26 percent of contacts, rather than 16 percent.

Getting through to decision makers is where Reachable comes in. The company recently announced a new version of its solution that delivers new social-proximity selling functions for Salesforce users. Reachable enables sales organizations to exploit professional and personal connections to increase sales productivity.

“Business is all about personal relationships,” stresses Reachable CEO Al Campa. “People like to buy things from people they know and trust.” Cutting-edge sales departments use social proximity to improve sales productivity. For example, assigning key accounts to reps with the best relationships to those accounts is an obvious move, but that may be difficult in a huge sales organization. Reachable makes this task easy for even the biggest firms.

Reachable enables sales managers to see which reps have the strongest relationships with target accounts and then reassign these accounts in Salesforce – with a single click. In presales, Reachable enables managers and reps to rank leads and opportunities based on the strength of personal relationships.

Technology isn’t useful only when you’re managing leads and customer relationships. When you’ve reached the point in the sales cycle when it’s time to ask for the sale, technology can cut out wasted time and effort and help you communicate a stronger and more relevant case to buyers. To that end, Shark ROI (Return On Investment) Software provides everything you need to create customer-specific, ROI-based business cases for your company’s solutions. ROI software is easy to use and intuitive and can be used in collaboration with customers to estimate the likely ROI from investing in your solution.

This insight is critical in closing major deals, because only a fifth of professional buyers choose suppliers based on lowest price. Shark ROI Software formalizes the value selling that is so effective when selling in certain markets. In fact, value selling becomes automatic when using this software. It can be used by sales reps and presales, product-marketing, consulting, and bidding teams to ensure that proposals are cost effective and clearly distinguished from the competition.

Shark ROI Software is configurable for industries from transportation and manufacturing to communications, chemicals, and software. A step-by-step method helps the prospect evaluate your solution’s value to his or her business and creates a business case that is ready for the prospect company’s board to review in Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, or Adobe PDF.