Sales was once a profession largely carried out on the road with attendant images of dynamic suit-wearing professionals driving all over the UK and beyond, sealing deals on handshakes and living out of their briefcases. Face to face communication and personal time spent servicing accounts was key and much engagement was done individually with a healthy corporate entertainment account to hand!
Today, however, the application of technology has begun to change certain elements of the sales industry beyond recognition. This isn’t a phenomenon that’s exclusive to sales as a sector. Technology is revolutionising business and consumer markets everywhere we look, from powerful customer management databases to managing business operations, social media tools for business communication, e-commerce platforms for online trading and web-based conference calls.
Power of the internet
At the heart of these changes lies the power of the internet and the steep change it’s made in the way salespeople and customers manage and control information flow. Nowadays, anyone with a search engine can find as much information themselves as a salesperson can give although quality and accuracy of content is obviously a concerning factor. Information flows are no longer top-down from salesperson to potential customer. The buying process has become more conversation based, with the customer ever more informed.
Experts believe that this transformation is set to continue, as new technologies appear that continue to alter traditional buyer and seller relationships. Every time a newly adopted technology appears, buying behaviours change and evolve. With change moving at an ever faster pace, the pressure on companies to adapt and evolve, keeping abreast of what’s new and responding to it, becomes greater. Training of sales staff becomes more important, as does market research, speedy product development, organisational intelligence and responsive leadership.
Patterns and personas
For the new social media driven buyer, organisations need to first understand new buying patterns and personas, which are predominantly more customer oriented. Greater and more meaningful customer insights are required and research must focus on qualitative data, as well as hard MI. Salespeople need to be smart, reactive and intuitive about what makes their customers tick in the information age. They must also understand changing buyer journeys and the nature of rapidly developing market readiness. Five-year marketing and sales strategies simply won’t be enough. Planning must be fast and responsive to change and processes must allow opportunities to be capitalised on by smart sales staff.
At the same time, organisations must always be seeking to understand customer buying patterns, customer readiness, changing markets and the impact of new technologies. Behaviours, goals and patterns will change and evolve at increasingly fast paces. Smart organisations need to be set up to understand and respond to this. For example, how is social media being used and capitalised by salespeople? What is the strategy for monetizing this channel?
Of course, even in the midst of rapid change, some old factors hold true. The customer is still central, they still have needs and a good salesperson will use available channels to satisfy these needs with their products and services and build a mutually satisfying and profitable relationship. Salespeople will still need to advise buyers during their journey and uphold the brand experience.
What sort of things should salespeople be getting their heads around today? Digital marketing is a key area, with online advertising and social media activity providing paid-for and ‘free’ conversation that shares information and can then be used to drive sales and build a company’s brand. There is also content marketing which will mean recognising the importance of good quality content online to move buyers towards a purchase decision.
For sales directors, training delivery for staff is essential. Often, it will need to be online, daily and possibly app driven. Building closer links with marketing, digital development teams and PR is key to driving forward effective usage of the new available channels. Making sure sales staff are comfortable with new technologies and engaging with potential customers via social media channels is also hugely important.
As with all business, the maxim remains that you either sink or swim. Change is a constant and good organisations will recognise the opportunities that come from new technologies such as the opportunity to reach new markets and reduce the cost to sell via social tools. Organisations that embrace change and find ways to respond to it, or even drive it, will remain competitive. Those who attempt to ignore change and hope it goes away will be disappointed!
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