Throughout this complex process, you must support B2B sales reps so they can effectively execute. Collaborate with marketing, sales enablement, customer success, and other divisions of the business to ensure your team has the enablement tools it needs to succeed.
Training Materials
Creating comprehensive training is essential for any sales process. Reps must be trained on numerous topics to improve performance, including:
- Company: Value prop, stakeholders, competitors
- Product: Features, capabilities, target users, use cases
- Process: Methodologies, expectations, goals
- Customers: Industry, budget, key decision makers, common pain points
- Competencies: Communication, empathy, objection handling, negotiation
Live, lecture-based training should focus on imparting key knowledge to sales reps. This can be done through annual SKOs and QBRs that set expectations and objectives for the months ahead.
Sprinkled between these larger meetings should be informal team gatherings that allow for open discussions, knowledge sharing, and the opportunity for reps to practice their skills in a safe environment.
Finally, provide reps with other on-the-go learning materials like bite-size videos, quizzes, self-assessment tools, and other materials that reinforce key concepts and keep your sales team up-to-date with the latest strategies and techniques.
Customer Relationship Management (CRM) Tool
A centralized system for account data, your CRM helps sellers manage their relationships with both existing and potential customers.
Some information is gathered automatically (form-fills, email and content engagement, etc.) and some can be entered manually (call notes, company/contact details, etc.) to track the status of sales opportunities and provide access to customer information for every member of the sales team.
Content
Access to data is one thing — but using that data to facilitate outreach takes it to the next level. To effectively engage prospects, sellers need personalized marketing materials that demonstrate the value of their products and services across all stages of the sales cycle.
Work closely with marketing to develop brochures, case studies, product pages, sales decks, and other materials that can be easily tailored for different buyers based on their unique attributes and the business problem they’re trying to solve.
Along with customer-facing materials, sellers need scripts and playbooks to aid in navigating conversations. These provide consistency, help to guide interactions, and keep reps on track. Rather than using a canned script, playbooks should offer a level of flexibility for sales reps to make conversations their own.
Internal Support
Sales is a team sport. Although reps can often feel competitive amongst each other to hit their individual numbers, no deal is closed alone — and it’s up to leadership to create an environment that fosters teamwork.
Conduct team meetings to open up opportunities for sharing challenges, best practices, successes, learnings, and more. Encourage reps to practice pitches for peer review or provide each other feedback on real sales calls. Regular one-on-one coaching sessions allow managers to establish trust and guide each rep toward success.
It’s also important to promote cross-departmental collaboration. Make introductions to subject matter experts and colleagues from marketing, customer success, product, and other divisions that will serve as critical partners along the sales process.
