The How-To of Sales Team Growth

By Duncan Stockdill

Most companies don’t only exist to make money, but to continue to operate and grow, making money is essential. When developing a plan for growth, sales is a key component of this process. Sales are the primary source of revenue, so building a team and process to support this is crucial to the success of any organization.

It is crucial to carefully think about the technology the sales team will need to be successful. According to a 2018 survey, sales reps spend more than 60 percent of their time in sales technology, things like emails and data collecting. Technology in the life of a salesperson is not going anywhere, so how can your team be sure that they are investing in the right technology that’s really going to help the team make more sales? Here are a few things to consider when selecting tools that will promote sales team growth.

Think Strategically

When thinking through tools used by sales teams, customer relationship management (CRM) likely comes to mind for most people. Gartner predicts by 2021 CRM will be the single largest revenue area of spending in enterprise software.

Businesses often find themselves stuck due to out-of-date software that restricts their ability to update processes and grow their team. CRMs are beneficial and necessary, but they require training and adjustment. Each new software implemented requires more training, which takes time and resources.

Don’t just think about what you need now. Instead, think ahead to where the company is going, and find a solution that can stay with the team through every growth stage. This means something that allows users to be easily added and managed. If a CRM cannot keep up with a growing sales team, then time and money are going to be wasted as new software is constantly being changed and implemented.

Consider User Experience

Sales teams spend a majority of their day working with social prospecting, data and list services, email engagement, phone, and sales cadence. Whatever the tool, whether it is the CRM or a lead generator, consider the user experience. If software is going to be such an integral part of a salesperson’s day, they can’t afford to not understand how to use it. This becomes particularly important at the small and medium-sized business (SMB) level. For example, often CRMs are not designed to be utilized by an SMB, which weakens the user experience.

When starting out, consider software options specifically designed for SMBs. Surveys have shown that CRMs are the biggest frustration for sales teams. This is due to poor user experience and complicated software. Finding an easy-to-use CRM will save time, money and help keep the sales team happier. And who doesn’t love happy employees?

Integrations

Finding tools that easily integrate with other services that the business is already using is critical, particularly with the CRM. The benefits of a CRM are maximized through its integrations. In the CRM, these integrations are a means by which customer relations can be solidified, data is transmitted and statistics from key sources like email marketing can be drawn in. The ability to pull everything into the CRM creates a central place for one holistic view of each customer. This will further enable team members to better individualize their sales efforts and hopefully close more deals.

Growing a sales team is not an easy process. Finding the right tools in the process is key. If you find options that are scalable, focus on the user experience and integrate with a variety of tools, your business will be set up for success.