Much is being said these days regarding the impact of the digital landscape on customer experience and doing business in the new world order ushered in by the Covid 19 pandemic. So much so, the term digital transformation has become something of a buzzword. However, be that as it may, it is important to correctly frame this so-called buzzword in a way that is not only meaningful but also offers tangible solutions to real-world problems.
In this new world, sales teams need to work from anywhere to connect with customers that have moved out of offices and across the globe. It’s the era of hybrid and flexible working frameworks and redefined digital engagements that are reshaping how people connect, collaborate and share information. It is also complicated, especially for B2B sales teams that have to now tick every customer connection box across more channels and platforms than ever before. Sales teams have to connect. They also have to stay personal, keep it relevant and redefine customer delight and loyalty. This is perhaps one of the biggest pain points impacting sales teams today – staying connected in a hybrid world.
McKinsey sums it up best, describing hybrid selling as a space where sales teams are expected to do more and connect more effectively while delivering personalized experiences while juggling an increasingly complex blend of in-person, remote, digital, eCommerce and self-service options. Teams have to collate notes and data about clients from multiple touchpoints and they need to store and access these notes with ease. It may sound like a small thing, but McKinsey’s 2021 survey into B2B companies and sales efficiencies found that companies willing to shake-up sales and embrace next-generation capabilities are showing revenue returns at double the rate of gross domestic product. Top performers, says the research firm, are those that get the basics right.
Making it easier for sales professionals to collaborate with customers
This is perhaps the most important step you can take when exploring sales optimization pathways and strategies. If your sales teams can easily access information and insights, they are far better equipped to build proposals and deliver personalized services that genuinely meet the needs of each customer. After all, three out of four top performers in sales use analytics as part of the sales planning process and two out of three use specialised tools to dig into customer data with precision, cutting out the insights that drive engagement and delight.
Solutions like Microsoft Azure Cognitive Services use cloud-based artificial intelligence services that helps you build intelligence into your applications that can be leveraged by Microsoft Dynamics 365 Sales. This integrated Sales platform streamlines and enhances the sales process and sales pipelines to deliver efficiency for the sales team as well as their stakeholders. With a rich feature set, Dynamics 365 Sales provides a means to track leads, opportunities, and proposals, right through to quoting and order fulfillment. This includes a log of each customer interaction along the way.
Integrating to the Sales Insights application, visualizations in the form of dashboards, and reports with real intelligence, helps to put the right information in the hands of the sales team and stakeholders at the right time. With the latter, your sales teams can also engage with customers across different platforms and collaboration tools – Microsoft Teams chat or video calls, in-person, or over email – and the system collates and stores the recordings and notes in a centralized database. With this tool, your team can then take all this data from calls, digital notes, handwritten notes and sales insights to create a cohesive customer and sales database that can be accessed by everyone on the team.
It’s time to say goodbye to customer frustration
When every member of your sales team can connect with any customer at any time, without the customer having to repeat themselves or circle the sales drain of frustration, you’re entering the realm of delight, sales optimization, and ultimately loyalty.
McKinsey’s survey found that 75% of B2B sales high-performers tend to be those with sales teams that work across silos and product lines to provide customers with fit-for-purpose solutions, and 68% combine multiple channels of engagement to ensure they connect with customers across every touchpoint on their journey. This is echoed by PwC – the firm points out that companies are not competing just on price anymore but on responsiveness and experience as well. Your customers want to know that your sales team understands their unique pain and pressure points and that they are important to the company.
Using Microsoft Dynamics 365 Sales with integrations to Sales Insights and Azure Cognitive Services, Mint Group UK can help you create a cohesive customer and selling ecosystem that delivers relevant data to your sales professionals on demand. We can help you implement and optimize this platform to overcome the connectivity pain point and manage your customer interactions more effectively.
