Guided Selling 101 What Matters Most and What to Ask
2 What is Guided Selling? Think of Guided Selling as a GPS for the sales person, dynamically providing them the support and guidance they need to reach their desired destination fastest. It s software that intelligently recommends different types of content, from marketing collateral and training support to proposals, pricing and process. Guided selling incorporates sales analytics and points in the buyer s journey to help reps perform at their best.
3 The Challenge Finding the right guided selling software partner for your company can be difficult. The sales tools landscape is changing rapidly, and won t slow down any time soon. To succeed, you need to understand your organization s needs, as well as cross-functional support to get you across the finish line. This guide will help you think through the components of a successful guided selling software, giving you some questions you can ask so you can choose the solution that best fits your needs.
4 Start with Your Goals Take a look at your sales enablement goals and what you want to achieve. Choose a vendor with a vision that matches the trends in the marketplace and supports where your company is going. Ask yourself: What random acts of sales enablement are we doing today? What s working and what needs to scale to be more effective? Are there joint sales-marketing training initiatives to consider? What existing tools and systems does it need to work with? Where are the biggest opportunities for improving sales productivity and effectiveness?
5 What to Look For Look for a toolset that supports your sellers and how they sell. It should be integrated into their daily workflow, and smart enough to aid the selling process while giving you the data you need to improve your marketing and sales enablement efforts. Key Components to Evaluate Ease of Use Relevance and Guidance Content Management Compatibility Analytics and Reporting
6 Ease of Use Don t underestimate ease of use from a salesperson s perspective. Adoption is typically the biggest hurdle every company faces when rolling out a new tool. Did You Know? The average sales person wastes seven hours per week searching for and/or making customer facing content (IDC: Webster, 2012). If you have 100 sales people, a guided selling system could increase productivity by as much as 36,400 hours per year equivalent to 17 more sales people!
7 If it isn t intuitive, fast and helpful, they won t use it. Involve a handful of salespeople. Ask for feedback on: Interface Design Does the user interface feature modern and intuitive navigation, icons and labeling? Alerts and Assignments Can you set alerts, assignments and other ways of signaling urgency or importance to the user? Single Sign-On Login and passwords are a drag. Look for single sign-on capability for both security and easy of use. Search and Organization Engine How fast can they find what they need? Look for products that require only 2 to 3 clicks. Anything more cumbersome discourages use. Does the search functionality work with 100, 500, 1000+ pieces of content? Does the system organize and group content in an intuitive way?
8 Relevance Nobody needs yet another static content portal. Guided selling tools should bring nimbleness and intelligence to sales enablement. Did You Know? Relevant content provided in-context not only increases product adoption and sales productivity, it helps reinforce desired sales behavior.
9 Guided selling intelligently suggests the most relevant content based on context. Ideally, it s a predictive system that incorporates elements of machine learning, seller feedback and usage effectively becoming smarter with each use. Evaluate the following and see how they drive relevance: Forward looking/predictive ability Search depth: does the search engine factor in the text within the document as well as titles, tags and categories? Tagging burden Identifiers: roles, prospect intelligence, customer records, etc. Feedback and ratings
10 Content Management How robust are the tools for adding, authoring, managing and syncing content? Did You Know? Only 30% of the content that marketing teams put together is actually used by Sales (Sirius Decisions: Bégin, 2014). Having the content live where the sellers do, in the context of their daily activities, helps them make better use of it.
11 You have different types of content support for your sellers. From customer facing content and data sheets to short training bursts and job aids: the guided selling tool must be able to support it all. The ability to add PDFs and PPTs is a must, since they re the two dominant content formats. However, make sure the tool also features a robust authoring tool. Sellers need practice and opportunities to engage. Short training bursts and video examples they can mimic. Audio clips they can practice. As you mature your support system, you ll want to add quick hitting messages, job aids and training bursts to reinforce desired sales behavior.
12 Features to look for: Types of content supported Not just standard files types like PDFs, but also audio, video, and more Content authoring Can you author and assemble content? This is especially helpful when creating short training bursts and job aids that accompany marketing collateral. Updates and version management Products and process change. Can you quickly update your content and ensure the changes sync effortlessly? Groups, roles and hierarchy Are you able to assign relevant content based on role, team, partner type, business unit, geography and other like factors? Precise segmentation allows you to avoid inundating people with irrelevant content.
13 Compatibility Does it play nice with your existing systems and technology? Did You Know? According to a Gartner study, 66% of enterprises have more than six content repositories. The last thing you need is another static content repository that may or may not work with your existing tools.
14 Your guided selling system needs to fit the technology you have. Does it integrate with your CRM? Does it work with your marketing automation platform? Can you sync it with your content repositories, like Box and SharePoint? Don t take integrations for granted. Look for proven examples of where like integrations are working for other clients. CRM Sales and partner portals Content repositories Even more importantly: Does the guided selling tool support the devices your sales force uses? Crosscompatibility is not optional. Today s sellers work on tablets, laptops and their phones in the same day.
15 Analytics and Reporting Can you see what s working and what s hot? Did You Know? 37% of companies don t know which campaigns and content yield sales results (Aberdeen: Ostrow, 2013). A good guided selling tool gives you the data you need to make informed improvements, and cut back on effort that doesn t move the needle.
16 Analytics and Reporting Must-Haves Look for a guided selling tool that provides visibility on use, feedback and analytics. Core functionalities include: Dashboard reports that show user and team behavior by prospect type, sales stage, product line, etc. Feedback utilities that allow sales teams and managers to provide ratings and comments Content shared with prospects, and how prospects interact with shared content Competency scores, especially as it correlates to onboarding programs Revenue analytics and content ROI
17 Guided Selling Makes it Easier to Excel. Today s workforce is more connected than ever, with a wealth of information at their fingertips. Guided Selling helps filter the signal from the noise improving effectiveness and productiveness. About MobilePaks MobilePaks improves sales effectiveness with tools based in retention science: KnowledgeBoost, Guided Selling and Share & Present. We help companies develop and deliver effective enablement content based on how people learn, use and retain information, so sellers can learn faster, have better selling conversations and close more deals.