You already know that an optimized workflow can make or break your sales team. But do you know how to implement the right workflow and strategies for your sellers?
If not, we’ve got you — OurSales Engineering Manager Chris Turner and RVP of North American Commercial Sales Keith Cordeiro recently held a webinar on this very topic. They spoke about how to manage the unpredictable whirlwind that is the sales process these days — and most importantly — how to prioritize sales workflows to see results.
Keep reading to discover their four steps to predictable sales success, as well as strategies you can apply to your sales teams on the process, pipeline, and people who make up your organization.
To start, Chris and Keith bring up one very interesting stat: despite increased adoption in sales technology, the time sellers spend engaging customers has dropped from 25% to 23% since 2019.
Technology in a vacuum cannot solve this problem.
These two sales leaders shared how it’s important to take your team from occasional wins to repeatable success. And their 4-step recipe to achieve that predictable, repeatable success goes like this:
- Great prospecting
- Pipeline and deal management
- Analysis of what’s working and what’s not
- A culture of excellence
Great prospecting
Chris and Keith place a lot of emphasis on understanding your prospects. They stress how necessary it is to adapt strategies in response to shifting market trends. There are countless variables at play that make some of your prospects A-level, B-level, or C-level. With outside change comes the need to adjust your team’s ideal customer profile, or ICP, too. Use criteria gathered from reports and customer histories to help your sales team identify new opportunities to create structured workflows based on these different prospect levels, so that your team engages with them more effectively.
It’s not just about personalizing your approach. It’s about being relevant to your customer’s business, daring to present bold solutions, continuously auditing what succeeds and fails, and being flexible enough to adapt.
Pipeline and deal management
Chris and Keith posed a question to their live audience: what’s the difference between a sales methodology and a sales process? Keith defines it in simple terms with the methodology being the “how” or the way of interacting with your customers and approaching the market, while the process is the “what” or the steps followed by your team of sellers.
That’s why the technology your sales team uses is so critical.
The best sales tech should help, not hamper your team. And technology fatigue is real when you consider just how many tools your sellers are often swivel-chairing between on any given day. You want a technology that lets sellers do what they do best — engage in human-to-human conversations with your customers and prospects. Strong sales processes and data will allow your team to validate key trends so you can fill pipeline and win more deals.
What’s working and what’s not
Chris then talked through how important it is to tighten up your sales process, not just for your team, but also so your customers know what to expect. He mentioned how in particular, the Salesloft team implements mutual success plans, or MSPs, and account plans as roadmaps for getting customers to success with launching Salesloft’s technology. You can also use deal engagement scores to see if certain deals are at risk so you can properly manage how to mitigate that risk.
They also shared their preferred methodology — a shortened version of MEDDPICC called ICED that stands for identify pain, champion, economic buyer, and decision making process. It’s another great way to help you analyze risk earlier in the sales process.
Lucky for us, the right sales technology as a part of your workflow will streamline your sales process, which is what we like to hear. Because according to data from the TAS Group, 70% of companies that follow a structured sales process are high performers. That’s one surefire way to get more of what’s working out of your revenue team.
A culture of excellence
Chris and Keith are firm believers that sales is a team sport. Creating an environment where sales teams have a strong sense of trust in their SEs makes a world of difference in the outcomes you can achieve together. When SE partnerships are running smoothly, companies see 38% higher win rates. And that sort of interpersonal excellence across teams is what long term success is made of.
There’s more, too
At the end of the day, Chris’s and Keith’s discussion was full of actionable takeaways for managing chaos and prioritizing the sales workflow. But we only scratched the surface of it here. Watch their full webinar for yourself now. And let us know how you create the perfect recipe for sales success.