Traditionally, technology sales have been developed and optimized over time. If sales would be redesigned holistically, it would follow a shift in senior management. However, a meticulous assessment of current practices and sales redesign implementation don’t come without disruptions. When it comes to technology sales transformation the secret “go to” strategy for remote business development have been inside sales.
B2B sales transformation
Senior leaders continuously face high cost of business development, gross margin decline, and growth stagnation. Unfortunately, more than 75% of accounts remain dormant for long periods of time. It is because traditionally high-tech sales were relying heavily on outside sales.
However, during the Covid-19 epidemic the focus shifted, and sales functions had to be transformed. The confinement called for sales redesign, which included better account segmentation and gave way to creating new structures of inside sales operations. As a result, dormant accounts gained vigor and revenue increased somewhat, even during crisis indeed.
The real transformation challenge in fact was organization-wide skepticism that tech products and solutions could benefit from sales on the phone, because IT companies offer very complex portfolios. True, traditional sales functions are slow to adopt more flexible processes. A large number of enterprises still lack proper resources and inside sales technologies. The belief that technology sales experts teams were the only capable units that could grow revenue blocked sales acceleration. The majority of high-tech companies who implemented inside sales teams to support their outside sales teams (now working remotely) made real progress. A decision that may have been an emotional dilemma previously became easier now that location and transport costs are low.
Why outsource technology sales now?
For a good decade outsourcing has been a cost-cutting choice for decision makers, but usually for IT and marketing services. The 2020 global lockdown revealed the true value of outsourced sales: access to remote sales expertise and a broad range of capabilities (not yet adopted by most companies) to drive sales transformation successfully. Slowly, senior leaders began tapping into new coverage models, sophisticated segmentation and localisation and continuous process improvement fueled by the latest technology. What is more, sales as a service (Saas) often comes with global staffing, payroling and continuous training.
B2B Sales service providers have experience in change management and are flexible to fit their teams in part of or the complete sales process, without emotional ambivalence that often blocks sales transformation efforts. In a highly competitive role as sales, inside sales teams are actually very comfortable to support a process. Not surprisingly, during the past six months, global sales leaders began to understand that outsourcing a part of their sales process does not translate into losing control over it.
What We Do
OnboardCRM supports a number of global technology companies to implement remote sales processes. This includes recruiting and hiring localized inside sales teams. The return on investment for our clients is deep account penetration and sales talent availability, revenue growth and sales cost optimisation. During the past months, we continue to prove that complex sales processes can be followed remotely through inside sales.
If you’d like to see what OnboardCRM could do for you and your sales channel partners, get in touch with us for a sales process assessment.
