Sales Prospecting Perspectives

First, Happy New Year to everyone – I hope 2013 is starting well! 

In my last post of 2012 I discussed the importance on the types of questions our teams are asking as inside sales reps when they are having a conversation with a prospect.   So to carry the theme loosely across to my first post of 2013, I wanted to discuss the importance of listening. 

So I am sure everyone has started to take a look at their business as they begin to plan for 2013 and the upcoming new year (if you have not you should!).  I know that it is a busy time for everyone trying to close out the quarter/year as well as dealing with the holiday season on the personal side. It can be difficult to think about the upcoming year with everything that is on the table.

I think we can all agree that when managing an inside sales team it is critical to be constantly evaluating the performance of your team and yourself as a manager.  This can be done a number of ways – whether through individual coaching of reps, team strategy meetings, analysis and review of specific metrics, or feedback sessions with your team members. 

Isn't technology grand?  I woke up this morning to that annoying alarm sound that makes us all cringe when we hear it.  But once I turn off the alarm, I hear a nice soothing voice that tells me the temperature outside, the forecast for the day and any traffic concerns with my morning commute.  It's amazing what we can do with the amount of data that is streaming across our networks and the applications we have for this information is becoming more readily available. That bodes well for the sales industry, where having real-time access to customer information can be the difference between a closed or lost deal.

I recently attended a leadership workshop hosted by the Oz Principle that was focused on the topic of accountability on a personal and organizational level.

In this post I am not going to explore all the concepts that we discussed, primarily because I am still working on digesting all of the information we covered during the workshop.

That said, one idea they shared regarding the actions people take every day in their job and how those actions are influenced is something that resonated with me and I think anyone who manages an inside team or is responsible for results should be in touch with.  The Oz Principle uses their “Results Pyramid” to visually diagram what they have found to be the drivers behind the actions we take. 

Last week of September and you can already see the Halloween decorations and pumpkins being placed in people's yards.  The temperatures have begun to drop here in New England and apple picking is the top weekend family activity. 

I have worked with a number of clients over the course of my 9 years in the teleprospecting industry and something we are continuously asked by our clients is, “Our technology is very complex, will your team be able to adequately understand our entire solution?”

A few weeks back I wrote a post titled - Are You Providing 'Big Data' For Your Inside Sales Team? - and explored the concept of “informationalization” after reading Thomas Redman’s post on the Harvard Business Review’s blog.  I discussed its relationship to the importance of managing a successful inside sales team by providing them with big data.

I was once again reading the Harvard Business Review blog and I came across an article focused on integrating data into your product offering.

In this article, Thomas Redman explores the importance of a concept called “informationalization” – defined as “make existing products and services more valuable to your customers by building in more data and information”.   As I continued to read Thomas’ post, I began to think about my client portfolio, both past and present, and some of the different data demands that have been needed for a successful engagement.  As an Inside Sales Director and organization we have tried to both iterate our offering in the market but also tailor the data that we are capturing and delivering back to our clients in the form of weekly reports.  I also began to think about viewing my inside sales team as my client and my responsibility to provide them “informationalized” support.

There are a number of items that an inside sales team needs to be successful, from the daily operations and employees to management.  A good manager puts their employees in a position to succeed, which requires the right tools and best practices in place to do so.  Below is a list of things to start with.