Artificial intelligence is something we hear about all the time in today's society. Many people believe that AI will help us with everything from driving to work to choosing a movie on Netflix, but what about sales?
Automation is a trend in the sales industry, and it's a good one. AI will soon be a part of every company's sales strategy, so you need to start getting acquainted with how to use AI for sales today.
There are many benefits to using automation technology in your sales process - increased predictability, better forecasting capabilities, optimized pricing strategies.
This post outlines six ways companies are using artificial intelligence to drive ROI for their enterprise.
AI for sales allows sellers to focus on people and not process - a game changer in an industry where relationships are paramount.
It can optimize their pricing strategies with more accuracy than ever before. Not only is this important because it drives increased revenue, it also allows a company to focus less on discounts and using other sales tactics that could damage a brand's image.
Sales provides the seller with a better understanding of their pipeline - not just what stage a deal is in or how much it might be worth, but where a lead originated from, whether they are transactional buyers or a new-to-the-company account, and what a company's return on investment is for a particular salesperson.
How they compare to competitors in terms of price point or post close metrics like customer satisfaction. This allows sellers to make changes that are necessary for a company to stay competitive.
It helps the seller optimize their forecasting abilities by helping them take into account more information than ever before - like data about a customer's organization or how much money they have spent with a company historically.
Finally, using AI for sales in your business allows you to make better use of a sales team's time by focusing more of it on strategies that require a human touch, like negotiating or planning.
If the seller isn't careful about which tools they use and how they implement them into their business, using AI could actually harm a company's chance of growth.
It can create a culture that isn't conducive to building relationships or one that only focuses on the numbers and doesn't consider other factors outside a specific metric like deal size.
You need someone who understands how AI works, what it is capable of doing (and not doing), and has a deep understanding of how a company's sales strategy works before implementing this technology into your business.
Without the right preparation, a company could end up using AI in a way that doesn't drive results and makes them less competitive in their industry.
This post outlines six ways companies are using artificial intelligence to help sellers get ahead of their competition - a must read for a seller looking to stay competitive in the future.
Salesloft- a CRM that uses AI to improve a company's forecasting abilities
Zylo- a sales engagement platform that allows sellers to focus on what matters most.
It helps companies prioritize their accounts, uncover hidden insights from the data they have about a customer and use this information strategically when planning an account strategy. It also provides predictive intelligence so a company can uncover a customer's future needs and be ready to sell them a solution before they even know it.
Drift- a sales AI powered sales assistant that helps a company's website visitors get a response from a business in less than 60 seconds.
It provides sellers with a way to engage their customers, qualify them and guide them through the entire sales process - all without taking up hours of a seller's day or requiring specialized training.
Hatchbuck- a sales AI platform that uses a company's data to drive their entire sales strategy.
It provides sellers with recommendations on how they can increase pipeline by uncovering hidden opportunities in the leads and accounts they already have, using historical information about a client or account when creating a personalized engagement plan, and helping them identify new potential clients through predictive AI.
Conversica- AI powered sales assistant that automatically engages leads and qualifies them as they come into a company's funnel.
Once a lead is qualified, it uses a mixture of machine learning and human expertise to help the seller create personalized outreach campaigns with relevant messaging based on a customer or account's interests, pain points and objections.
This tool also helps sellers prioritize a prospect's needs and adapt a message to fit them.
Exceed.ai- a AIpowered sales assistant that allows a seller to create a personalized engagement plan for a customer or account based on the data they already have about them.
This tool learns from a company's messaging and provides insights into what works, helping sellers prioritize their accounts and increase pipeline as well as qualify new leads without requiring any input from a seller other than a few initial questions.
Automation Anywhere- an AI powered sales assistant that helps a company automate their selling process and increase productivity by up to 400%.
It uses a mixture of machine learning capabilities, natural language processing and human expertise to power a seller's entire customer journey from start to finish -
including research, opportunity identification, validation, outbound messaging and a personalized engagement plan.
If a company doesn't have any experience with AI or automation technology before beginning to implement it into their business, they should start by consulting a reputable IT support firm that specializes in the type of artificial intelligence being used.
This way, a seller can avoid jumping headfirst into an AI sales process without fully understanding how it works and the potential risks associated with doing so.
Artificial intelligence (AI) highlights three key traits: predictive, prescriptive and cognitive. Predictive AI analyzes data to help a company forecast future opportunities or identify problems before they arise so that a seller can react before a customer does.
Prescriptive AI, on the other hand, takes a look at a company's past data and uses it to provide them with recommendations that will help increase their sales or improve a business process in some way.
Lastly, cognitive AI is all about making human-to-machine interactions more natural and allowing a company's technology to mimic human behavior as closely as possible.
AI in sales helps sellers focus on people, not processes. Optimizing pricing and forecasting a just a couple of the benefits that AI brings into a business today - but there are many more ways companies can use it to get ahead of their competition tomorrow.
1. Understand the basics.
Before a company can begin to implement AI into their business, they need a strong understanding of how it works and what potential risks come with implementing a technology like this.
2. Learn more about the critical skills you need moving forward.
Critical skills a seller should be aware of include a working knowledge of AI, big data and machine learning.
Salespeople should also focus on strengthening their soft skills to make them more adaptable to a changing work environment.
This includes becoming a better listener, speaking with confidence, gaining empathy for customers and being able to connect emotionally with potential leads.
3. Experiment with the technology.
Experimentation is a great way to begin learning more about AIand gaining a better understanding of how it can be used for business.
Companies should look into implementing different types of AI technology, starting with low-risk projects that allow them to experiment without taking too big a risk.
This will help them determine if incorporating automation technology into their sales process makes sense for a company's unique business goals.
In a time when businesses need to become more agile and adaptable, AI in sales is a great way to help a company automate their processes while still ensuring they remain personal and effective at doing business with customers.
Here are some of the benefits AI in sales can bring to a company:
- a decrease in time spent on administrative tasks by up to 50%
- a 40% increase in revenue from deals that were previously considered lost
- a 200% improvement when it comes to forecasting accuracy and predicting future opportunities.
There are numerous ways in which businesses are leveraging People.ai's capabilities to drive even greater ROI for the entire enterprise. We've seen companies benefit in a few key ways when it comes to sales team efficiency:
-Boost CRM adoption. People.ai automates CRM data entry by capturing all contacts and activity and mapping it to the appropriate opportunity accounts. Sales teams begin to regard the CRM as a reliable "single source of truth," and adoption rises.
-Increase productivity. Without the need to log data, sales teams gain 27 percent of their time back to focus on engaging with prospects and customers.
-Sales coaching based on data. People.ai allows you to set goals for each rep and track their sales activity levels. Coaches can use benchmarking data to identify areas for targeted coaching, allowing each rep to perform at his or her best.
Forecasting, pipeline analysis, and deal intelligence should all be improved. Companies have more dots connected to see the big picture by exposing previously unseen data by the sales team.
People.ai provides real-time pipeline analysis and deal trend tracking, as well as key insights into the factors that won/closed deals have in common..
-Increase win rates. People AI enhances the sales rep's ability to qualify prospects, schedule meetings and predict close dates with a higher level of confidence.
-Optimize pricing. With a complete picture of company data, including historic deals, current customer contracts, industry trends and competitor prices—as well as easy access to powerful predictive analytics tools—sales teams can quickly determine a customer's willingness to pay and a price that maximizes company revenue.
-Contact database that heals itself. CRMs are notorious for containing inaccurate, out-of-date, or missing data.
People.ai continuously updates your CRM in real-time, ensuring that you always have the most up-to-date information.
-Increase the visibility of your buying group in a way that has never been done before. Buying groups are the key to a deal's success. However, determining who needs to be involved, when and where, can be difficult.
People.ai reveals this data to sales teams, providing them with the information they require to ensure they are engaging with the right people in the buying group at the right time.
-AI in sales allows sellers to concentrate on the people who make decisions. Artificial intelligence is humanising business by automating processes and forecasting.
It frees up time to focus on selling.
Salespeople must focus on selling, but they frequently waste time on time-consuming, manual tasks such as entering meeting and email notes into the CRM. According to research, sales representatives only spend about a quarter of their time selling to customers.
AI saves sales reps time by automatically tracking communications, appointments, and other key sales activities.
Instead of manually entering data, sellers can concentrate on selling and building relationships with customers. They aren't irritated by administrative requirements, which boosts morale and reduces sales rep churn.
Enhances customer engagement
Intelligent tools give sellers immediate customer insight, allowing them to better understand a customer's needs and build trust and loyalty.
Sales reps get a comprehensive view of the customer, including the pages they've visited on your website, the solutions they use, and the interactions they've had with your company.
Furthermore, AI automatically scores and highlights the most healthy accounts, allowing sellers to prioritise leads. Sales reps can focus on the most promising business if they have insight into the opportunities with the highest potential to close.
Pricing is optimised.
Salespeople no longer have to guess what price will help them win a deal thanks to AI. To determine a recommended price, machine-learning technology analyses all sales data about customers, including location, size, and previous successful deals.
Pricing is personalised and time-sensitive for a specific customer, increasing the likelihood of winning the deal.
This not only helps to shorten the sales cycle, but it also shortens the ramp-up time for new sales reps, who can start selling right away without worrying about pricing themselves out of a deal or providing too large a discount.
Optimal pricing enhances the customer experience by reducing the back-and-forth negotiations that slow down and make the process unpleasant.
AI can also assist sellers with upsell and cross-sell recommendations to ensure no money is lost and customers get what they need right away.
Enhances sales forecasting
A sales forecast is critical for business – hiring and payroll are dependent on it, and a missed forecast can cost a company credibility.
AI improves sales forecast accuracy by providing a real-time view of the health of each deal in the pipeline and assisting sales managers in determining when to advance or park deals.
Sales teams can fine-tune their forecasting process with historical data to deliver highly accurate forecasts by using AI-driven insights to generate deal scores. Keep in mind, however, that AI accuracy is dependent on high-quality data sets.
Improved coaching
When sales managers have visibility into pipeline health, they no longer have to waste time questioning sales reps about the status of deals.
With accurate, objective data generated by AI, a sales manager is free to provide effective coaching to assist sales reps in improving and driving better sales outcomes.
Individualized training from sales managers can help a sales rep develop their talent, increase productivity, and better align sales processes with the customer journey.
