MAIN INSIGHT 36
Garry Myatt
SALES DIRECTOR
What role do salespeople play in a post-pandemic sales environment?
It remains true that people like to do business with people, and they want to know who they’re talking to as well. AI chatbots are an incredibly smart tool for low-value consumer purchases, but nothing beats speaking with a real person during larger, more complex purchases. Sales teams will remain a huge asset for winning and retaining customers within B2B purchases. A great salesperson tells stories, and the pandemic hasn’t changed this - it’s just made us think about the best way to tell those stories. The old rule of jumping in your car and physically seeing a customer to prove your interest no longer applies. The pandemic has made a video call the accepted first human touchpoint and still brings plenty of opportunities to build rapport. The benefit of this to sales leaders is that you can now be more strategic with your time and identify more valuable customers much quicker than before. If both sides perceive value from the initial call then a face-to-face follow-up is natural next step and is now a much warmer first, physical encounter.
Did the global pandemic change how customer service should be delivered?
The pandemic forced many businesses, including our own, to change the way they got in front of customers. But in reality, the core principle of delivering a great customer experience didn’t change - being there for your customers when they need you. In times of great uncertainty, we were their safe hands and it was important to us that they knew this and helped take some of the pressure off, particularly as a lot of our customers were crucial to the front-line response of tackling COVID. So whilst we couldn’t see them face-to-face, we invested in our customer service team instead. We also started weekly email newsletters and scheduled weekly calls with our customers so that they knew we were always there when they needed us. The communication wasn’t just operations focused, we made it human and personal so that our customers knew we care about them on both a personal and professional level.
The pandemic forced many businesses, including our own, to change the way they got in front of customers. But in reality, the core principle of delivering a great customer experience didn’t change - being there for your customers when they need you.
If you can offer prospects a solution that overcomes their challenges so they can achieve their growth targets, it becomes a no-brainer for them to engage with you.
How can businesses empower their sales teams to have more meaningful conversations?
To succeed in a digital sales environment, you need to balance building the brand and salience with shorter more targeted marketing activity.
Digital marketing content that focuses on adding value, educating, and entertaining your prospects is key. People and thought leading narratives, features and benefits of your services, and your own company vision are all great content pillars to build your outward facing strategy around.
Hyper targeting is also an approach that accelerated during the pandemic. The approach, particularly when used in conjunction with LinkedIn, can be a powerful tool to get in front of prospects with the right message, build a strong network, and gain interesting insights.
Hyper targeting is a stage gate process of identification and individual contact plans. The identification phase mirrors research techniques that the business has utilised for many years – identify market sectors and segments, find relevant prospective customers, and finally the decision makers within those businesses.
You need to find out as much about their business pains as possible before contacting them with potential solutions. This information will dictate your contact plan, what content and resources you’ll share with the prospect and ultimately, how you’ll get their attention and start a meaningful conversation.
Another great tip that allows sales teams to have meaningful conversations is to try and get a copy of your prospect’s financial report or audited accounts. The reason for this is that in their chairman’s opening statement, they will share their growth strategy for the next two to three years and what their challenges might be in achieving this growth. These challenges are pain points that you can focus on when talking to that prospect and if you can offer them a solution that overcomes their challenges and helps achieve their growth targets, it becomes a no-brainer for them to engage with you.
PP Control & Automation is an award-winning provider of strategic outsourcing solutions to many of the most successful and respected machinery builders worldwide.
