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Do You Treat Your Sales Teams Like The Hunger Games?

March 26, 2012 in Sales 2.0, Sales Intelligence, Social Media for Sales, Social Selling by Koka Sexton | 4 comments

Professional Hunger Games - Fighting

The Hunger Games is the #1 movie in US box offices with $155 Million dollars. I haven’t seen the movie but I have read the book and I couldn’t help but think about how the Hunger Games can be applied to business environments. No one should expect camouflage training a cornucopia of weapons and supplies when they start their job but their should be some training and  tools provided.

The Hunger Games in Sales

The mentality of hiring a bunch of sales people and leaving it to them to sink or swim is barbaric. Your company will not benefit in the long run if that’s how you approach driving revenue. There are career sales people (Tributes) that have been trained for years that you will have to go up against and to compete, you need training. Great sales leaders understand that in order to build a winning sales team you need to invest in them and teach them everything there is to know. Not just about the product or service but advanced selling skills that give them an edge over the rest of the sales people they are in competition with. Even if  someone is interested in what you are offering, they are extremet busy and there is a good chance you don’t even know they are a prospect if you’re not actively listening. 70% of the buying process is happening online and in order to stay ahead, sales people need to move faster and use better tools.

One that comes to mind is training from Vorsight around how to navigate company switchboards turning the switchboard into a prospect’s direct contact info. I’ve seen them train on this on numerous occasions and I have to say that it works.  There has been a shift in the sales environment as described in this post called Sales 2.0 Redux. In the post Tom explains many of the typical sales tactics and how they have been reshaped by social media and technology.

Being the Tribute Winner in Sales

Just like in the Hunger Games, only one person can win. Your prospect needs a solution to a problem and probably only enough budget to purchase one. Instead of being on the losing side of the deal, you need to have a starategy that will deliver some key messages and position you to have an advantage.

Leverage connections: Just like the Hunger Games, you will need sponsors. Who do you know that can provide support to you when working with the opportunity? Chances are you should have identified a champion in the organisation that can help you navigate and give you insights on what’s happening. Hopefully you have a connection that also knows your decision maker on a personal level since we know that these types of connections are very important and helpful.

Have the right tools: I don’t just mean your phone and your computer but those are important too. How can you use technology to do most of the research for you? Set up watchlists on your prospects, find them on social networks that can give you insights to what they are thinking and feeling. Leveraging social media for sales can accelerate the ordinary sales process. Sales intelligence gives you information that will keep you positioned to win.

Surprisingly there are still a large number of companies that do not leverage sales intelligence. The Aberdeen study on the Science of Sales Intelligence shows that most companies deal with some very specific business pressures that sales intelligence can help with.

  • 42% have insufficient knowledge of the business needs of prospects
  • 40% do not have the ability to identify the most likely buyers of their product
  • 34% complain of having a sales process that is too long
  • 21% See an increased customer churn forcing them to focus on filling the funnel

All of these point to companies needing to be more nimble and enabling their sales teams to move faster with more targeted information.

The Hunger Games as a concept seems to fit with a sales organization. Are you going to win?

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It Might Be Time for Sales Intelligence – 5 Signs That You Need It

March 8, 2012 in Sales 2.0, Sales Intelligence, Social Selling by Kevin Baldacci | 4 comments

“Sales intelligence is the combination of not only business data, but social context, how you’re connected to a lead or prospect, valuable news insight, and real-time triggers that inform you when to take action. In fact, we’re delivering 35 million unique news trigger events to our users a year to help them sell better and generate more revenue.” -Umberto Miletti, CEO of InsideView

1. You are buying lists for your sales team

Last year I was interviewing for a sales position and was analyzed by how well I could cold call a list of 100 low-priority prospects. This would have been fine and dandy if the list wasn’t a year old and 20 of the 100 people had the wrong name or outdated phone number. Think about it…after one year, 1/5 of the list was deemed almost completely useless.

Organizations are changing the way they collect information and contact prospects and customers - 98 percent say they waste their budget each year on inaccurate contact data. (DataMyth.com) With data being poured into in the Internet everyday, there is no way lists of contact information should be cutting it anymore for sales professionals.

The age of lists and phonebooks are over for sales teams. The tools you need are out there on the Internet and sales intelligence can bring it to you all in one package. 

2. Social Selling is not a part of your sales cycle

Marketing should not be the only department interacting through social media – sales teams across the board need to immerse themselves in the social world as well. Buyers are turning to social media for feedback and answers to business challenges. Don’t wait for your phone to ring, generate opportunities by reaching out and answering questions or at least let them know you’re listening.

One of InsideView’s sales representatives sent this tweet the other day:

I know many people are thinking, “So what? It’s just a tweet. And great, they responded.” However, Megan is now on Xata Nation’s radar – they know she is out there listening to their success.

As Koka Sexton likes to say during a lot of his speaking engagements: Be different, Be better.

Potential prospects are on social media asking questions and seeking answers. You need to be out there answering these questions or showing your prospects that you are listening – otherwise your competitors will. Sales intelligence packages social media with contact information so that you are able to sell to the person rather than the business card.

3. You are spending half of your day researching prospects – “I can use search engines to do my research.” 

As a salesperson, you should never be pushing the clock researching prospects or not devoting your fullest efforts to effectively finding the right people prospects. Time is precious in the world of sales but you should never feel overwhelmed by it.

Do you really want to search for a company and get this kind of result?

751,000 is a little dramatic but I think you get the picture. Search engines are great for research but they eat up a lot of time. More than 50% of the average sales professional spends 1/4 of their day researching potential prospects. (Aberdeen)

Consider leveraging technology and sales intelligence so you can cut that amount of time in half and free up some of that precious time to be talking to prospects and customers. If InsideView were to create a contact page for Darth Vader, this is what it would look like. Imagine the sales force you would have selling to a guy like Anakin Skywalker…

4. You are shooting from the hip and not using trigger events

Identifying key triggers or reasons to get in touch with prospects at just the right time is extremely valuable. Barbara Giamanco, EVP Sales and Social Media at Social Centered Selling, wisely pointed out in a recent webinar of ours that timing is everything in sales.

Look at it this way…Give somebody a tissue in the street randomly and they’ll think you might have lost your mind. Give them a tissue after they sneeze and they’ll probably be more inclined to thank you and strike up a conversation.

Sales Intelligence brings you Watchlists that alert your sales representatives of trigger events (leadership changes, mergers, executives in the news, etc.). Imagine the effectiveness of your sales team with trigger events being delivered to each representative on a daily basis.

5. You are not hitting your sales marks

Sales intelligence is heading in the direction of changing the sales cycle forever. Remember how sales was done only a decade ago? Lists of phone numbers, cold calling, mail marketing, dialing for dollars. With today’s social revolution, you now have more weapons at your disposal as a sales professional than ever before. Sales intelligence brings you contact information as well as connections, sales alerts, social platforms and a lot more. Empower yourself with this tool and don’t be left behind.

Check out this graph below. The Best-in-Class companies utilize sales intelligence and see numbers like 28.4% average year-over-year increase in total company revenue.

To see the rest of the incredible results the Aberdeen Group found about sales intelligence, download our whitepaper: Chance Favors the Prepared Mind: Understanding the Science of Sales Intelligence

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4 Steps on How Focusing on People, Not Contacts Will Increase Your Revenue

February 23, 2012 in Sales Intelligence, Social Media for Sales, Social Media Tips, Social Selling, Software Tools, Technology by Kevin Baldacci | 5 comments

Do you really have a good understanding of a potential prospect with just his or her contact information? Looking at our friend, Anakin Skywalker, it is clear that there is more to a person than what you see on a business card. The sales professionals who are making it in your industry are the ones leveraging unique people insights gleaned from social media and other resources to reach the right person, with the right message, at the right time.  Click on Anakin’s business card to see what I mean. Here are some steps that are sure to increase revenue by focusing on the person rather than the contact.

1. Shift the mindset from a contact to a person

Do you sometimes feel like your contact information is being passed around between companies, being abused and reused? How many cold calls and unsolicited emails do you receive each day? (And how likely are you to respond to them?) Your prospects are feeling that same pain. 

People are not putting their information online because it is a “trend” or “everyone is doing it”. People are looking to be acknowledged as individuals – the desire to be acknowledged is human nature. As a sales professional, you need to be utilizing social media to its fullest potential to get your emails and phone calls (even your prospecting tweets) to stand above the hundreds of others.

Check out the difference between the red and blue mock notes to a potential prospect. 

 Which email are you more likely to respond to? Ditch the scripts and start digging around LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook to add some personality behind your initial emails and phone calls.

“Remember that trust and credibility are key to lead generation. Nothing improves a sales pitch more than incorporating commonalities and shared experiences.”
- Maria Pergolino; Senior Director of Marketing, Marketo

2. Integrate the people approach across the organization

Marketing should not be the only department interacting through social media – sales teams across the board need to immerse themselves in the social world as well. Buyers are turning to social media for feedback and answers to business challenges.

A recent study of more than 700 B2b marketers, conducted by Wildfire Interactive, found that 58% of the companies saw increases in sales and partnerships as a result of including social media as part of their overall strategy.

Potential prospects are online asking questions and seeking answers. Your sales representatives need to be out there answering these questions, otherwise your competitors will.

3. Avoid social silos

Many B2B firms are mistaking the individual social activity of their employees for a social strategy. Your organization needs to unite under a set of common goals and develop a cohesive strategy that fits the company’s social graph. A company with a sales team united and active in the social world is a powerful unit. Your customers are talking online, asking questions about your business – develop a strategy within your team to make a united, cohesive effort to seek out and lend a helping hand. Companies cannot do this relying on individual sales reps who can only cover a fraction of your industry’s social graph.

4. Reach the right people at the right time

As a sales professional, it is hard to not put your head down and go 100 mph trying to make those sales marks. However, you have to realize there is a science with sales and that it is important to reach the right person at the right time – timing is everything when making that initial call. How exactly is that accomplished?

“After implementing InsideView, we’ve gone from dialing for dollars to targeted social selling. Our team now spends most of their time learning about and understanding their prospects and how to best leverage relationships. As a result, our meeting acceptance rates have gone from 15% to around 60%.“ Michael Lodato; Senior VP, Sales and Marketing, NHR

Sales Intelligence is becoming one of the most powerful tools for sales teams across many industries. Through a platform such as InsideView, sales teams have the ability to receive alerts to connect with people after a major event (a.k.a. trigger event), such as an acquisition, promotion or relocation. This allows your team to effectively connect with potential prospects because there is much more value to those initial calls. Relevancy is key with today’s buyer. 

Secret Step. Use the Sales Force!

This blog post is only a minor piece of the puzzle. Download this guide: Shifting the B2B Marketing Paradigm from Contacts to People, to unleash the full power of the sales force in you.

Click HERE to download this guide to increase revenue

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Why is Sales Intelligence Becoming So Critical for Professional Experience?

February 14, 2012 in Sales 2.0, Sales Data, Sales Intelligence, Social Selling, Software Tools, Technology by Kevin Baldacci | 3 comments

There is little to no doubt that as sales intelligence continues to emerge in the industry, it will become a crucial component in your job resume. As companies continue to sense the empowerment sales intelligence brings to their sales teams, experience with such platforms are beginning to become a standard for incoming sales professionals.

Here is an example of a job description for a Sales Associate Specialist:

How does experience with sales intelligence empower a sales professional?

It is best to answer this question by deriving some of the key duties from this job requirement and how sales intelligence can bring these duties to their fullest potential.

Identify key client prospect contacts: Sales intelligence platforms, such as InsideView, has the ability to build  Watchlists - Watchlists help you track and monitor a list of companies for relevant business opportunities and challenges. By building a company list through sales intelligence, representatives have the ability to easily find companies within their targeted industry without spending hours of time researching.

Market to the key client prospect contacts: Using People Insights from InsideView, sales professionals now have the ability to approach the right people, with the right message, at the right time. With this tool, representatives no longer have to go digging through the Internet finding recent news about key prospects – People Watchlists deliver them daily notifications where it becomes easy to market.

Set up phone qualification calls for the territory Account Executive: The standard of cold calling and using data has begun its final bow out of the sales cycle. Of course it has its benefits of dialing 100+ people in one day and getting a couple of leads out of it. However, sales intelligence platforms brings real-time “people” information. It’s not just contact data (phone, email, address, etc.)…it’s contact information combined with social profiles (Twitter, Pandora, Facebook, etc.), University experiences, news articles, and more. When sales representatives make that initial call, they have everything they need to make a personal connection with the potential client.

Why are sales intelligence platforms becoming a job requirement?

Today we are in the midst of a social revolution. As more people across the globe become connected through the Internet, our methods of business are rapidly changing. Sales is at the tip of the spear with this new transformation of business. The issue is, not all sales representatives are utilizing the incredible resources online – primarily because researching takes time, eating up sales productivity.

More than 1/4 of sales teams use 50% or more of their time researching. (Aberdeen)

Sales professionals should no longer be expected to perform to their fullest capabilities spending half of their day researching potential prospects. Companies are starting to realize they can no longer afford to hire sales representatives who bring are not productive with research and given poor data quality. Sales intelligence platforms aggregate crucial pieces of material needed to empower sales teams in order to make effective sales calls. Companies, such as TriNet, are starting to realize that leveraging InsideView and sales intelligence cuts down time wasted researching and increases sales productivity.

“InsideView has helped us greatly improve our sales effectiveness. In doing so,we have been able to halve our research time, triple  our call-to-opportunity ration, and generate more than 20% more opportunities.” Mark Stock, Sr.Director of Sales

There is little question sales intelligence is becoming a crucial tool for sales teams and professionals throughout multiple industries. Companies that require the experience of these platforms understand the power it gives to their sales professionals and the enormous benefits it has for their sales infrastructure.

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People Insights: It’s Like Ancestry-com for B2B Sales

February 1, 2012 in Sales Intelligence by Koka Sexton | 3 comments

Selling tips - sell to people not contacts

Selling to people has not changed dramatically over the past hundred years. You have a product or service, identify a pool of prospects and then discover how many of them you can help. Sure thats over simplified but when it boils down, those are some of the key components. What has changed a great idea over the past few years is not so much the overall process but the details of how to sell to people.

Most sales people do not have the opportunity to walk into the offices of their prospects, see the awards on the wall, photos on the desk and bag of golf clubs in the corner. These were the details a salesperson would use to break the ice, find some common interests and start a conversation. Without these insights, a salesperson is left to their own devices and would be left with being just another sales guy with a pitch. Get beyond the contact data of someones business card and get to know your prospect as the person and not just a contact in your CRM.

People buy from people. Business is done not necessarily with the company with the best product but more often with the salesperson who has found a connection with their prospect through a shared interest or a referral. In the post on the 8 ways to increase sales we outlined some best practices to follow.

More than 90 percent of executives never respond to cold-call sales or unsolicited emails.

Sales intelligence can identify connections between colleagues within an organization and prospects to reveal opportunities for meaningful sales contact. By arming sales professionals with actionable information from social sources, media outlets, company information and changes in business dynamics they are more likely to trigger sales. Sales professionals can quickly identify relevant connection points and build profitable, trusted relationships with prospects and customers that win more business and drive revenue.

‘It’s like watching an Ancestry.com commercial’

You’ve seen the commercial, a site that starts connecting the dots between you and your family and then builds a map of your entire family tree. It lets you see your connections to people you may never have known existed just by following the trail of connections through out history.

How can that apply to B2B sales?

  • What if you could identify connection across multiple social graphs and include people you may not be connected to through a social network?
  • How valuable would it be to have social streams from your prospects so you could see the updates, pictures and interactions they share?
  • Would it be beneficial to be able to follow these people so anytime they were mentioned in the news or online you would get an alert so you could show you are listening?

Early adopters of People Insights like Network Hardware Resale are already seeing an impact in lead generation, opportunities and revenue.

“Social media mapping is my favorite feature. It’s just so cool. It’s almost like watching that Ancestry.com commercial- it’s like ‘I got a leaf!’ It’s when you find that connection that absolutely breaks you into an account; and once you’ve done that, your energy in looking for more of those connections goes WAY up. That becomes your best lead gen strategy ever. Now you want to have and create personal relationships with people through social media so that you can leverage those relationships.” - Michael Lodato, Senior Vice President, Sales and Marketing at NHR

Leveraging people insights isn’t just a good idea, it’s the only way you will increase your lead generation and create new opportunities in 2012. As explained in the post 5 ways sales intelligence can increase revenue, research shows that:

  • 59% of the best in class companies have leveraged sales intelligence tools to identify or disqualify prospects with more accuracy
  • 53% of companies have been able to identify existing customers that have upsell/cross sell opportunities
  • 48% of companies have increased the quality of leads intheir pipelines
  • 28% use technology to capture and share sales knowledge internally.
  • 21% of companies reduce the amount of time doing sales research

For salespeople and sales leaders, understanding how to sell to people not contacts will be the difference between hitting or missing your number.

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