Six Must-Have Capabilities Sales Organizations Need To Be Effective Today: Part 1

[Former Member]

Adoption / User Experience

Adoption has always been a key topic of CRM tools for sales, and it will continue to be a challenge. Just like when you pick up a well-designed fountain pen to sign a contract, how it feels to use a nice modern sales effectiveness tool just may determine whether you will use it to its full potential.  And if a sales organization can be more effective in its use of CRM, falling short on user experience will deflate an organization’s aspirations of gaining those efficiencies.

 

CSO Insights’ new white paper on Next Generation CRM digs deeper into the efficacy of “placing actionable information literally in the hands of sales professionals ... for more productive selling time, smoother sales cycles and a differentiated customer experience for their customers.”

 

Figure 1: SAP Cloud for Sales – with Consumer-Grade User Experience

 

Mobile

According to CSO Insights: “When mobile devices are used for mobile enabled sales calls, 71% reported that mobile had measurable or significant impact on sales”. Mobility in a selling tool today means more than having access to your contact management system on your smart phone.  The mobile devices in use today by successful selling professionals have  many visualization opportunities and social capabilities for a next generation selling team to leverage.  For example, if a field-based rep knows that a person in his network is connected to a customer because of a common interest on a social networking profile, that relationship is illuminated in real-time and can be a part of the discussion needed to connect to key people during a sales call. Leveraging modern usability techniques, mobile devices provide all important customer and deal information through an intuitive user interface, and can be quickly adapted to the needs and preferences of the individual user.

 

Figure 2: SAP Cloud for Sales Mobile – with Insight-Infused Homepage

 

Collaborative Selling

CSO Insights also shares the benefits of a collaborative environment in sales effectiveness in several ways.  First, sharing the information gleaned by others in the field in real-time means your successful wins techniques have an audit trail and can be replicated to fit the circumstances of other customers.  A sales knowledge management system that helps reps easily identify the right individuals, and recommends relevant answers and content so that subject matter experts can scale their knowledge to the entire sales organization.

 

Collaboration also happens by “bringing together the right people, conversations, content, and applications directly in the context of your sales process, to more effectively engage with customers throughout their buying journey.”

 

What happens in the back office can be critical to have at your fingertips so when the customer asks: “Can I have 2 million units by next Tuesday?” you will be able to definitively answer in that moment of truth and say “you have my word”.  Successful sales does not end at the CRM system, but covers the orchestration of the entire customer buying process, avoiding error-prone quotations and orders, inconsistencies in pricing, and ensures a delivery as per the promise.

 

Thanks for your comments / insights below!  Also get all the findings in CSO Insights White Paper titled: “SAP Cloud for Sales Delivers Next Generation CRM ” here. And read Part 2 of this blog for three more must-haves for sales effectiveness from SAP’s Ariane Lindblom.