No matter what business you are in, you need to have direction – an end goal. But, you also need a tactical approach – a step-by-step process of how to get there. You also need to understand the importance of the customer experience and data as part of your overall strategy. This supports one of the key tactical approaches of ensuring that your sales team is equipped with the data that’s needed to engage and inform buyers at every step of their buying journey.
Enter sales enablement: The technology, and processes that are used to empower sales reps to sell effectively, and at a greater velocity. The efforts you put into achieving this depends on several factors.
Let’s explore 5 tenants of Sales Enablement to pinpoint how and where to make changes in your selling process to improve the performance of your team.
1. Buyer experience
To fulfill sales enablement, we need a clear picture of the problems and needs customers are facing. Equally important to what your prospects need is when the perfect time is for asking for it. According to DemandGen Report, 95% of buyers choose a provider that provides content to help them navigate through each stage of the buying journey. Your sales enablement pieces need to reflect that – from the awareness stage to consideration, to when the time comes to make a purchase decision.
2. Content should speak to “Accounts.”
Account-Based Marketing (ABM) is a method by which we target all the decision-makers – not just a single person in the organization. By getting more than one person in the prospect’s company involved in the conversation, engagement across the entire customer account becomes possible.
To achieve success with this method, content has to be easily understood by all contacts – from CFO to CEO, tech experts and sales team members. Content needs to address each department’s concerns, and the information has to be tailored in a language this is understood by all.
3. Content management
Delivering content to buyers is a big part of sales enablement. Things like reports, demos, and articles need to be in place. However, you shouldn’t just stop at client-facing content; your internal collateral must also be spot-on. Your entire organization, including research, training, social listening, and information technology, should be involved in sales. Internal processes need to be optimized internally for you to be successful externally.
When reps are trained, organized, and they have access to the best available information to answer customer questions they are prepared for the engagement. And, as a result, they can deliver the right content at the most opportune time.
4. Gathering data and measuring results
Tracking and measuring performance is a must-have. Additionally, the process of on-boarding, training, and preparing sales reps to understand customer engagement needs to be measured and tracked. Each rep needs to know exactly how to approach the customer at each stage of their buying journey.
Which channel should we connect through with a prospect, and when? Through a single platform, we can track customer activities to push actionable data in a single place to make better decisions about when to engage, and through which channel to do so.
5. Predictive intelligence
The right technology makes predicting sales success more predictable. It uses data from real-time interactions to determine intent toward making purchase decisions. And, with predictive intelligence you will be able to better understand when the prospect is ready to buy. Knowing this throughout the customer life-cycle works to identify the most lucrative opportunities.
Things like analytics and forecasting mean gathering data that will help your sales reps be better prepared for interactions. The focus becomes customer-oriented and content is consistently updated to stay relevant.
In conclusion
To enhance the performance of your sales team, you need to align content with the needs of your sales reps to help them streamline the process of engagement – and, ultimately, sell. The best content serves the greater good of your company – both internally, and externally.
As the process of engagement through the buyer experience improves, customers are more prone to listen. Further, sales enablement will also help you make better decisions regarding the best time for engagement. And, through measuring customer engagement, you will enable your sales team to become more in tune with customers. So, are you ready to improve your sales process? These are the components that will help you achieve your long-term goals and the tactical approaches in between.
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