New Year has come and gone. So often, as the initial weeks of the year creep by, they come with an avalanche of responsibilities and stressors. Some of these are old, such as the need to address neglected tasks from the end of last year. At the same time, new concerns creep into the picture, as well. Plans and strategies must be created to help you grow in the upcoming year. Here are 5 Things Your Salespeople Need to Crush It in 2021
For sales reps, there are many factors to consider. Improving sales pitches and client assistance are common priorities. Learning about the latest product specs or finding new markets can also be a focus.
However, all of these objectives are useless if your sales team doesn’t have the tools that they need to succeed. Here are some of the most important things your salespeople should have to help them crush it throughout the year ahead.
Table of Contents
1. A Good CRM System
If there’s one tool you want to equip your sales team with more than anything else, it’s a customer relationship management (CRM) system. The goal of a system of this nature is to help cultivate professional relationships.
A good CRM system provides a unique sense of organization. It does so by acting as an information hub for your sales team. You can store each client or potential client’s information within the system. Then, as soon as it’s needed, you can retrieve it with minimal effort.
A CRM system streamlines a lot of the grunt work that goes into sales. It doesn’t matter if you’re cataloging individual clients assigned to a specific salesman or you have different sales personnel interacting with the same client. Keeping client information organized and available can do wonders in improving your team’s effectiveness.
2. Email Tracking and Automation
Communication, particularly via email, is another area that you want to invest in. Two decades into the 21st century it’s hard to believe that email is still important. And yet, it remains a vital lifeline between sales reps and customers. This is why both email tracking and email automation should be high on your list of sales tools.
Email tracking helps you measure the impact of your messages. It helps you gauge open rates, engagement, responses, and so on. A good email tracker can save a salesperson significant time. This is helpful in a profession in which so much time is spent sending and receiving electronic communications.
In addition, the ability to track email analytics opens up the doors for other more subtle improvements. For instance, you can utilize A/B testing for subject lines or even email text and hyperlink clicks.
Along with email tracking, it’s also wise to invest in a good email marketing automation tool. There are a plethora of options available. Any one of these can help you provide quick, automated answers to common inquiries. They can also help to support sales strategies such as sales funnels and follow up emails.
3. Calendar and Meeting Apps
Many sales activities revolve around meeting with clients. It may be the post-coronavirus era, but people still need to plan meetings ahead of time — even when meeting remotely. With that said, meeting and calendar apps are two more tools that can empower your sales team.
As your sales reps plan out interactions with clients, they should have an easy-to-use calendar app available to track everything. In addition, there are numerous scheduling apps that can be utilized to your advantage. You can use these to proactively plan meetings with clients and even do things like send reminders beforehand.
4. Internal Communication and Collaboration Tools
When sales is brought up, most of the related tools tend to be in a customer-facing direction. They help with cultivating relationships, maintaining communication, and so on.
However, many sales teams also need to communicate and collaborate with their coworkers as well. Once again, this is even more important to consider with so many people working in a remote-first environment.
With this in mind, it’s important to equip your sales reps with the right applications to keep them in close communication whenever necessary. Fortunately, there are many communication apps out there that can do the trick.
Some of these are video-focused. Others are audio or text-driven. Make sure to consider your team’s needs and then equip them with the right combination of communication tools.
In addition, consider what collaboration tools can help them operate in a productive and efficient manner — even when working virtually. Utilize file sharing applications and workflow platforms. The former enables a team to collaborate together on an online document, often at the same time. The latter provides a cloud-based workspace for everyone to gather, organize their work, and share it with one another.
5. Survey Tools
Finally, remember to give your sales team the tools they need to request feedback. This is essential for multiple reasons:
- It provides information to help your organization improve its sales technique.
- It gives feedback to individual reps to help them hone their craft.
- It helps you identify disgruntled clients so that you can address their needs.
Implementing a quality survey tool is an excellent way to catch mistakes and build on existing success. It enables you to keep your sales force operating at a high standard throughout the year.
There are many key sales areas that you should address if you want to set yourself up for success in 2021. Email tracking can help salespeople remain responsive. Survey tools can gather valuable feedback. Communication and collaboration apps can enable your sales team to stay focused and on the same page. A quality CRM system can keep all of your customers’ information in one, organized, easy-to-access location.
Investing in sales solutions like these can seem like frills. And they aren’t always necessary to close a sale. However, if you want your team to operate at peak efficiency throughout the upcoming year, you need to equip them to do so.
First, review your salespeople’s current toolkits and consider where they can use upgrades. Then select the best tools and train your staff to use them. From there, you can sit back and enjoy the results.
