It’s safe to assume that if you’re reading this, your sales representatives aren’t performing to your expectations. First of all, IT’S TOTALLY NORMAL; It’s not just your company that faces a problem with sales productivity. Sixty-five percent of B2B firms report that sales productivity is their top business obstacle.
Acknowledging a problem is the first step toward improving sales productivity. As a result, thank you so much for stopping by. The next stage is to identify the barriers that are preventing your sales team from reaching their full potential. For instance, consider the following:
- How long does it take to have your sales reps up and running?
- Where do your employees spend the most time?
- How much time do your representatives spend on administrative duties?
Your Sales Productivity might be hampered by numerous obstacles. Remember to keep an eye out for bottlenecks that suck up valuable time from your salespeople and divert them to other tasks. For the time being, though, we’d like to assist you in breaking out of your rut and accomplishing more in less time.
Table of contents
A. Practice ongoing sales training and coaching
Faster ramp periods allow sales representatives to begin selling effectively sooner. Sales training is more than just a week of orientations and shadowing sessions. Sales training and coaching that works is continual and tailored to the specific needs of each rep.
The problem is that 26% of salespeople think their sales training is ineffective. 84% of salespeople claim that their three-month sales training is forgotten. These stats could have a significant impact on the productivity of salespeople. Salespeople who don’t understand or retain enough from their training and mentoring may experience more hurdles in the sales process.
As the sales force grows, it is critical that training and coaching methods grow as well. Traditional in-person training boot camps are no longer sufficient. Digital sales training and coaching must adapt to the changing landscape of business.
There are many advantages to working with a sales trainer or instructor remotely. As opposed to lengthy lectures, salespeople can benefit from interactive classes lasting 15-20 minutes each, allowing them to better recall information through practice. Sellers can learn how to engage buyers in simulated buying scenarios by substituting long PowerPoint lectures with role-playing games.
In addition, digital sales training and coaching allow enablement leaders to monitor performance and understand where each seller is.
” When you’ve established that a seller has mastered managing objections, you can move on to teaching them another skill that will help them work faster and more effectively.”
B. Align sales and marketing on shared goals
It is essential for sales productivity to ensure that sales and marketing strategies are aligned. It’s estimated Marketo estimates that collaborative sales and marketing teams close deals at a rate of 67% higher.
However, what does it mean to have sales and marketing teams who are working together in harmony really mean? Understanding that sales and marketing teams must work together in order to provide the greatest customer service is at the heart of sales and marketing alignment.
Both sales and marketing leaders can work together to develop a combined plan and decide the steps their respective departments take to accomplish it. How many leads are generated, how many phone conversations are booked and how many demos are required to meet the $20M pipeline objective can be determined by sales and marketing management.
In order to boost efficiency, go-to-market (GTM) teams should work together to develop client journeys. When sales professionals distribute relevant material at the right time, marketers can keep transactions moving ahead by creating content for each stage of the buyer journey.
C. Centralize the management of sales content
Go-to-market strategies are propelled by compelling content. It’s the inability of sales representatives to access the materials that causes them to lose momentum. For sales reps, content discovery is an all-too-common problem. In a recent survey, 81% of sales leaders rated content search and use as the most important area for productivity improvement. In addition, sales representatives look for material for an average of 440 hours per year, according to Aberdeen.
Using content management software, sales reps may access all deal-related content from a single point of access. Marketers can upload, store, and update the most up-to-date information, such as PowerPoint presentations, datasheets, and solution briefs.
Your sales staff will benefit from the manner in which your organization handles its materials. To save your salespeople time and effort, you need to think like a buyer. This is essential. By organizing content based on things like sales stage, industry, persona, or segment, sales reps can easily change the content they give based on the opportunity at hand.
D. Utilize automation with artificial intelligence (AI)
Your sales professionals don’t have to spend time finding the relevant content and matching it to the right buyer personas and sales stages. This content is known to deliver results, so why wouldn’t they be able to accomplish all of the things listed above with confidence?
That’s exactly what AI-guided selling is doing for sales personnel. Artificial intelligence is being used by data-mature firms to help their sales representatives make better use of their data and insights. It would take weeks for humans to recognize the same trends and patterns that can be deciphered by AI and machine learning (ML). Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools can identify the most effective content to share with a Chief Sales Officer (CSO) in the manufacturing industry who is comparing your product x against your competitors, for example.
It’s all about keeping things simple. By removing the burden of finding and sharing the greatest information, sales reps can devote more time to building relationships with customers. To put it another way, AI-guided selling ensures that vendors consistently link buyers with relevant, up-to-date content. What works best can be repeated more often.
E. Measure and improve performance
An effective approach for sales enablement must be monitored and refined over time. As your sales operations generate valuable data and insights, so does the content your salespeople consume and share.
Your organization’s KPIs should be aligned with your goals for selling productivity. You may find chances to increase sales productivity by analyzing important indicators such as average ramp time, content utilization, average deal duration, and time spent selling. Reviewing the metrics dashboard with salespeople on a regular basis helps them understand where the team and their own performance stand at different points in time.
Summary
This year has been a record-breaking one for your sales team. Even if meetings and administrative responsibilities will never entirely disappear, there are a few things you can do to help your representatives save time and enhance productivity. First and foremost, make sure your salespeople have the tools and resources they need to build meaningful relationships with their customers There are a number of ways to boost the efficiency of your sales staff by using the correct tools and strategies.
