In the ongoing game of business, nothing seems permanent. Change is just part of the process, especially when it comes to methodologies for achieving growth. You likely engaged in activities that were working to grow your sales five years ago. However, since it’s impossible to step in the same river twice, those previous strategies might not be working as well today.
In order to deal with this fluidity, some companies choose to reinvent themselves from time to time. But it doesn't necessarily mean changing your business name or services offered. Instead, it could simply mean adopting new approaches to sales growth. One of the most effective strategies at the moment is to apply Sales Enablement to your professional service business.
What Is Sales Enablement?
Sales enablement is the process of giving data, tools, and/or resources to the sales team to help them close more deals. Gone are the days where people are required to get their information straight from the horse’s mouth. With the growth of the internet and search engines, it’s possible to let your fingers do the walking to find the information you need. If the information you are seeking is about a product or service, you don’t even have to rely on sourcing that information from those selling the product or service.
Imagine for a moment, however, that instead of going to those who aren’t actively engaged in the business of providing those desired products or services, that you could go directly to the horses mouth. What if the businesses actually providing the product or service can become experts at providing information and resources about that product or service to assist consumers in their buying decision process? That’s the foundation of Sales Enablement Strategies and Programs. When a company’s marketing team and sale team work together, that leverage can have a material impact on the bottom line. Charge your marketing team with providing your sales reps with helpful content that can be shared with interested prospects to assist them in better understanding what it is exactly that you do and what you are offering. Sales Enablement Strategies have the potential to increase sales by up to 70% over letting your sales team navigate the sales conversation ill equipped. It's much easier to nurture interested prospects through the sales cycle with targeted and relevant collaterals.
Why Sales Enablement Is Important
According to Hubspot, Sales Enablement is important because it will help your business achieve a higher conversion rate by way of equipping the sales team with the right data, resources, and training developed by the marketing team. Why is that important? Well, the marketing team is the apparatus that develops your brand’s voice. It has done the research to know exactly who it is that you serve and the interests of your target audience. Armed with materials derived from that informed perspective, your sales team will improve their odds of success regarding the sales pitch phase of your sales cycle. Sales Enablement Strategies work to smooth out the frictions that exist in the process of closing deals.
Sales Enablement In Professional Service Businesses
1. Learn New Selling Techniques
As we have said, some of the things you may be doing in your sales process might have been perfect years ago. However, today, you may need to refresh your selling techniques. Some have never even engaged formalized sales processes and they may simply be relying on winging it every time an interested prospect raises their hand for attention. Our strong belief is that if you are taking this approach, you are essentially offering your competitors an opportunity to put you out of business.
Think about it, you are "in business." That means you are in sales. If you are not honing your sales skills, or at least the sales skills of your sales team, regularly you might as well just close your doors and sign up to be an employee for someone else. Sure that might sound harsh, but our job is not to sugar coat things. It’s to tell you the truth so that you can march forward well informed in your journey toward success.
With Sales Enablement, your sales reps have the opportunity to reassess their techniques and apply new ones where they seem appropriate based on their interested prospect’s behavior. Moreover, new selling techniques encourage more engagement and build a stronger relationship with prospects and clients. As a result, Sales Enablement Strategies can improve the customer experience by as much as 500%.
Takeaway: Sales enablement is more concerned about the buyer's preferences and behavior than sales itself. Thus, customer satisfaction is the primary goal. Sales are just secondary. But don’t be dissuaded. Salesforce found that 67% of customers are willing to pay more for a great experience.
Quick Tip: Before presenting your sales pitch, provide value to your prospects and customers through content like videos, testimonials, blogs, and other marketing assets that give them information about what you do. First build trust, then help them to learn to like you.
2. Commit To Ongoing Training
When you apply a Sales Enablement Strategy, you'll come to better understand your sales reps. When implementing Sales Enablement, part of the process will require you to dive into the strengths and weaknesses of your sales team. You’ll provide resources that can be used in the sales pitch, but you should also invest time and energy setting up opportunities for your team to practice and improve upon their techniques. Imagine your sales team like a professional sports team. You wouldn’t think twice about having members of your sports team practice and train to improve upon their natural skill sets. Your sales team should be approached in the same manner.
Quick Tip: Assign a sales team leader to guide and encourage your entire team in their ongoing journey of improvement.
3. Provide Valuable Content
Content has become the most practical way of attracting your target market and convincing them to convert as loyal paying clients, such as webinars, blogs, white papers, email, and infographics. But it needs to be valuable and relevant to what it is that you do. It can be informative about who you are and how you do what you do. It can educate the consumer of the content about the value of what you offer. Ensure that the interested prospect is more informed or better positioned to move forward with your product or services after being exposed to your content. The ultimate goal is to make sure that when you pitch your offer to an interested prospect that they already have a good understanding of your product or service beforehand.
4. Leverage Technology
Embracing technology nowadays is a necessity in business. Sales Enablement Strategies are no exception. There are a number of sales applications and tools that are available to help you run a Sales Enablement Program smoothly. Making use of excellent sales tools will work to boost conversions by organizing every sales appointment with the appropriate resources needed to close each interested prospect into a paying client.
5. Encourage Teamwork
Of all the listed practices in this article, teamwork is the best of them. Why? Teamwork may not guarantee instant success, but it cultivates business growth in the long run. Even if you have the best Sales Enablement Program, high-quality sales tools, and great members of your sales and marketing teams, the real leverage comes from teamwork. Again, going back to the sports analogy, the best teams are the best because they leverage the strengths of each of their various team members amongst their various departments to compound those strengths toward a common goal. For your business, that goal is growth.
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If you're interested in growth resulting from a killer Sales Enablement Program for your business, click here to see if you qualify for a Vimagery Strategy Session. Together, we can help you to gain an unfair advantage regarding your efforts to cultivate, convert, and close new clients in the weeks and months ahead.
