Cold calling and email spamming, or the famous spray and pray method, is not an effective way to spend your time or to reach your customers. Unfortunately, sales automation has become synonymous with spam, and some organizations might find their emails end up in their customers’ trash folders or even perpetually suppressed and never delivered to inboxes.
Like any tactic, too much of a good thing or improper technique is behind the bad reputation. Sales automation combined with accurate, reliable data is a massive time-saver and a pipeline-builder. Below, we discuss how to leverage this technology for good and how to ensure your message not only gets into inboxes and actually gets opened.
Cut Out Costly Administrative Tasks
For sales reps, time spent crafting individual emails, scheduling follow-ups, building records in the CRM, etc., is all time that could be spent with customers or closing deals. Each of these tasks adds up to lots of lost time. In fact, we found after surveying over 700 sales reps that they spend just over a third of their time (35.2{da2ef7ff2781dfb5887db3e3a6cf03c7c894e23a27536de3f64bd799872794d1}) actually selling—only 14 hours out of a 40-hour week.
A good portion of reps’ time is eaten up by manual tasks such as product issues, approvals, internal policies, paperwork, etc. And while automation can’t solve all these problems, it can significantly reduce them and get reps back to selling.
With automation, AI and algorithms work behind the scenes to:
- Eliminate time-sucking administrative tasks
- Automatically record and update information in your CRM
- Set time-based reminders for reps
- Implement custom tiered rules
In many cases, these automated tasks not only save time, but they can be more accurate and consistent than relying on sales reps to complete them manually every time.
Engage With the Right Leads in the Right Way (Based on Data)
Playbooks simplifies and automates the data gathering process, and, with AI, produces buyer intelligence to guide reps as they engage with leads, contacts, and opportunities.
Buyer intelligence can predict how a customer might prefer to be contacted, the best days and times to reach them, and recommends other contacts to bring in to close deals. These tools look at past and current behavior to predict future outcomes, so the more they’re used and implemented, the better the data gets. For instance, Playbooks can identify the level of influence a contact may have on buying decisions, their behavior (including channel preference and how and when to engage), and suggest other contacts that may influence a deal.
Leveraging data is critical to staying above the constant noise customers receive in their inbox. Sales engagement automation goes far beyond just personalization in an email and can be the difference between winning and losing a deal. Buyer intelligence and sales engagement automatization can prioritize tasks so reps know which steps to take next, identify and score accounts that are most likely to take action based on behavior, verify customer data to minimize wasted time calling dead phone numbers, and give insight into customer behavior to identify potential opportunities.
Proper use of AI and sales engagement give a key strategic advantage in the new landscape of sales—it’s no longer a luxury but a necessity. With an ever-changing sales landscape that is reliant on digital tools, the pace will only get faster and faster. Sales leaders who take advantage of platforms get a leg up on the competition by increasing targeted outreach and guiding efforts. Increase rep productivity and see consistent results with data on your side.
The post Sales Automation is Your Strategic Advantage appeared first on XANT.
SOURCE: XANT – Read entire story here.