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Enable Your Sales Blog

News, discussions and Opinions about Sales Enablement and Sales 2.0 as well as all updates on our Sales Enablement Solution Suite


Archive for the ‘Sales Web’ Category

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Posted by Paul Krajewski on August 22nd, 2011 - No Comments

Recent statistics that show the business case for Sales Enablement


On August 22, 2011, Forrester’s TJ Keitt pointed out…

“…some key differences between Enterprise 2.0 users and the rest of the workforce:

  • They’re your highest paid employees. Over half of this group earns more than $60k a year, compared to just 36% of non-users.
  • They’re the most educated members of the workforce. Sixty-five percent of this group has completed at least a 4 year college degree compared to 55% of the rest of the workforce.
  • They’re the leaders in your office. It’s not surprising to see 49% of this group are managers are executives given management’s enthusiasm about social technologies. Just 31% of non-users are in similar positions.

On August 17, 2011, BDSolutions tweeted that its VP of Sales Enablement, Bill Golder, said:

“Alignment of sales and marketing impacts revenue growth up to 3x.”

In a post by Amanda F. Batista from August 16, 2011, IDC is quoted with the statement that…

“B2B companies’ inability to align sales and marketing teams around the right processes and technologies has cost them upwards of 10% or more of revenue per year, or $100 million for a billion-dollar company.”

Posted by Paul Krajewski on July 2nd, 2011 - No Comments

defining sales enablement once again


On June 30, 2011 focus.com published a report entitled “Defining Sales Enablement”. (You can download the PDF report for free once you provide some information on this link on focus.com) The experts included in the report are: Ardath Albee, Michael Fox, Robert Koehler, Christian Maurer, Russell Palmer, and myself (Paul Krajewski; part of the team at BizSphere AG).

One of my explanations of Sales Enablement was actually based on statements by Tamara Schenk (T-Systems International GmbH) as well as on Forrester’s definition of Sales Enablement. Here it is broken down:

“It’s a method of equipping sales channels with reusable tools that map to the buying process.

It is a strategic, ongoing process and it has very ambitious objectives:

To equip all people touching the accounts (more than just pre-sales and sales)

with the right information (sales playbooks, campaign information, ROI calculators and the like, documents/links, contact details of subject matter experts, etc.)

in a well-structured (What is applicable where? Who authored what? What can be used for how long?)

re-usable way (output in different formats or even auto-generation of tailored content)

across all silos in the enterprise and in the right language

at all stages of the customer’s problem-solving process/the customer’s buying cycle.

Having been on the enterprise side and having seen how many marketing dollars go into content production and toward polishing the look and feel, I want to highlight how important it is that the money is only spent on content that works (content planning, content intelligence like tracking usage and ratings/comments), and, if possible, can even be done in-house.”

Later in the report I am quoted with…

“A lot of people say ‘You are either in sales or you are in sales support!’ That basically shows that everyone should either contribute to sales enablement or benefit from it. Having so many stakeholders, sales enablement is owned by everyone and no one and suffers from that, unless an executive sponsor can be found who aligns people, processes, content, and technology.”

Posted by Paul Krajewski on June 2nd, 2011 - No Comments

When a Sales Enablement Strategy fixes redundancies it immediately contributes to the ROI in sales


I just found a great comment on Focus.com that nicely sums up Sales Enablement Strategy:

By Tamara Schenk, Senior Program Manager Sales Enablement, T-Systems International GmbH:

“[...] Getting started with sales enablement from a strategic point of view means to look at the whole sales support supply chain end-to-end, not looking at functions only – working cross-functionally and to collaborate is key to success.

Identifying all redundancies along the whole sales support supply chain, will be an eye opener! For instance, different product portfolio views, often not consolidated, a variety of different sales portals, content often not structured and not defined from a customer’s point of view, a variety of groups that offer trainings – trainings on what to sell and on how to sell, etc.

Fixing these redundancies, means contributing immediately to the selling systems’ ROI!

Next, the different fields of action can be tackled from an operational point of view, as e.g. broadcast messaging, sales content (derived from strategy, role-based governance including content inventory, content categories, RACI, internationalization, etc.), knowledge management, skills and trainings and how to measure the success. Additional fields of action are sales and engagement models, the sales and the sales operations processes – they have always to be considered and integrated!

Executing all these activities successfully requires leadership, change, communication and sales adoption.”

Posted by Paul Krajewski on June 1st, 2011 - No Comments

Sales enablement systems have become very sophisticated in terms of how they deliver content that will help boost sales performance


On May 13, 2011, tribalknowledgetv.wordpress.com wrote ‘Convinced About Content’:

“This is something I have been harping on about for years, and I am delighted to see that some sales enablement vendors are adopting this reality:

Without good sales enablement content, it does not matter what bells and whistles your sales enablement solution might offer, it is of no value. [...]

Sales enablement systems have become very sophisticated in terms of how they deliver content that will help boost sales performance. But the quality and nature of the content that those system deliver is a critical component of the system’s deployment success. [...]

BizSphere CEO Jochen Moll not only understands the value of great content; he also understands that a sales enablement solution is just one component of an overall sales enablement strategy. BizSphere advocates for the development of a company-wide sales enablement plan to ensure that everyone in an organization can influence, directly or indirectly, the success of the sales team. Great direction, Jochen! You guys are leading the way. [...]“

Posted by Paul Krajewski on February 3rd, 2011 - No Comments

Content, People, Processes, and Technology make the Four-Legged Sales Enablement Chair


A few days ago, I noticed the following discussion in the LinkedIn.com group “Sales Enablement Content“:

“Sales Enablement: People, Processes and/or Technology?

How do you view sales enablement? How is it weighted across the traditional “people, processes and technology” model?”

One of the responses was:

“There are numerous sales enablement “solutions” available, each of which claims to offer some unique value. Ultimately, what I find repeatedly, is that the content for any of these solutions is an afterthought. Buying decisions for sales enablement systems are based on the capabilities the system will deliver, primarily using existing content. But the source and format of that content will continue to require improvements if the full benefit of a sales enablement program is going to be realized.

Ultimately, sales enablement systems are a version of knowledge management tools. The remaining challenge is in how to motivate target users of that knowledge to find it and use it effectively.”

Here is my answer to both the initial question and the response above:

Jeanne Hellman, who wrote a comprehensive case study on implementing a Sales Enablement system and who I worked with on this very task at Nortel Networks, always adds “Content” to “People, Processes and Technology” and then calls it “The Four-Legged Chair Analogy”.

However, the observations above are correct with regards to how Sales Enablement solutions are being sold/bought. What I can say to this is that a good Sales Enablement system will give feedback in real-time regarding which type of content works and which doesn’t (based on many metrics like views, downloads, star ratings, comments, sharing, etc…). In addition, it will also have a dashboard/report for the owner of the Sales Enablement solution to show the gaps / what is missing:

E.g. the…

  • offering in the product portfolio,
  • sales region / country,
  • industry vertical,
  • customer pain point,
  • sales/buying cycle step,
  • content type/format,
  • etc…

…that does not have customized or fresh content.

All the quantitative feedback mentioned above together with the qualitative feedback from the social / 2.0 features will tell you where to spend your marketing dollars for content creation and where you can stop producing content, nobody uses.
matrixed organizations
Yes, we are talking about Knowledge Management tools. Yes, the biggest challenge is to motivate users to use them (instead of emailing each other) and to contribute their own knowledge back into the system (tribal knowledge). However, there are features like customized dashboards, daily newsletters or RSS feeds that show each person based on their interest or assigned lead in the CRM system what might interest them. Yes, you will have to start with existing content. However, making “Content, People, Processes, and Technology” your mantra, will make sure no area is left out and get you closer to realizing the full benefit of a Sales Enablement program.

Best regards,
Paul Krajewski
–
The blog post above is a personal statement from Paul Krajewski and does not necessarily represent the point of view of BizSphere AG.

Posted by Paul Krajewski on November 8th, 2010 - No Comments

Defining Sales Enablement for your b2b sales force


On focus.com, LinkedIn.com and other places discussions about the definition of the term Sales Enablement keep on popping up. This question is from November 5, 2010:

“Sales Enablement – It’s not all the same. What does it mean to you?”
What do we mean by the term “sales enablement?” I was at an executive level meeting on Wednesday in the Silicon Valley area, where a comment was made by a senior VP of worldwide sales, that the term would need to be defined for the sales force, because it meant different things to different people. What does it mean to you?

Here is my answer:

Every analyst firm and every business has their own definition. On focus.com and LinkedIn.com you can find many of them. Some use a very broad and all encompassing definition, some a very narrow, and some do not use the term Sales Enablement at all. I like the saying “You are either in sales or you are in sales support!” Basically everyone in a business should make sure that those who directly touch accounts have more valuable conversations with them and have everything they need to close.

You can have philosophical discussions whether the “support”/”enablement” should be spearheaded by the sales leader or the marketing leader, you can talk about “sales and marketing alignment” or you can get to work and put people, content, processes and technology in place that make sure that everyone (no matter whether they report to global, a regional team, a product line or a business function) can contribute the following:

- Contact details of subject matter experts per specific intersection in the matrixed organization,
- Knowledge about up-selling&cross-selling opportunities,
- Knowledge about customer pain points in specific industry verticals,
- Tools (like ROI calculators),
- Insights from the field (like customized presentations that resonated well and why),
- Collateral / marketing assets (branding approved vs. generated in the trenches) in different languages
- Comments / blog posts / questions
- Leads
- Pricing information for specific scenarios
- News etc…

When everyone globally can access, contribute, rate, and comment in an “Enterprise 2.0″ fashion then all that searching and re-creating/re-formatting that costs your sales people so much time can be cut down and through the wisdom of the crowd they will be better prepared to face the buyer who thanks to “Web 2.0″ is also better informed than ever. Now that terms like “Buyer Enablement” start to emerge, the buyer who is in the driver’s seat will not put up with the generic pitch and only listen to sales people after a lot of research which means the questions asked will be so specific to the buyer’s pain point that only the sales person who can tap into the wisdom of his/her entire organization can answer them.

matrixed organizations

Important is that all this knowledge is not tagged/labeled/structured in random ways and not all thrown in the same pot. Only if you provide people a context and semantic structures to contribute into and search in, you will allow for the knowledge to be accessible and to become wisdom. Without a semantic (web 3.0) approach where the systems knows what kind of information it is storing you would not be able to do things like presenting a sales person with all collateral that make sense in the sales step he/she is currently in. If you left this up to free tagging/naming by the hundreds or thousands of people who contribute, you would never get consistency and always miss some collateral e.g. per sales step.

Posted by Paul Krajewski on November 2nd, 2010 - No Comments

The Sales Enablement platform – sometimes called the sales knowledge management system – is taking its place alongside the Customer Relationship Management system


Solution for Sales just published this comprehensive look at the requirements for Sales Enablement solutions:

Sales enablement platforms – seven key requirements

“The Sales Enablement Platform, sometimes called the sales knowledge management system, is taking its place alongside the Customer Relationship Management system as one of the must-have platforms of an advanced sales organization. Any company planning to implement a Sales Enablement Platform will have a long list of requirements, but the true significance of some factors is not always clear ahead of implementation. This article draws on experience of implementing and using Sales Enablement Platforms to highlight seven key requirements and explain their significance. It focuses on the needs of larger, more complex companies – the ones that have most to gain from a Sales Enablement Platform. [...]“

Read it here. At this link you can also download a nicer looking PDF version of the article.

Posted by Paul Krajewski on October 22nd, 2010 - 2 Comments

Is sales training a component of sales enablement?


I’m honoured that focus.com has asked me to be one of their experts. Today, I answered the following question on focus.com:

Is sales training a component of sales enablement?
Are sales enablement or sales training two different groups are they part of the same?

Here is my answer:

Sales training is without a doubt a very important component of sales enablement. In most enterprises there is no shortage of sales training. However, in order to really enable sales people and to protect them from information overload a proper sales enablement approach would align people, processes, content, and technology to answer…

…which sales training is best (maybe based on ratings)?
…what is the most current and what needs to be updated?
…which formats are available?
…in which languages is it available?
…for which customer needs, industry verticals or countries / sales regions is customized training available?
…what are the cross-selling, up-selling, etc. opportunities that need to be kept in mind?
…who are the specific subject matter experts and how can they be contacted?

If you present your sales training in these different dimensions and make it easy to find for each product, service or solution, your sales force will start to save time, have better informed meetings, win more often and increase the average deal size.

By mapping your sales training as described above and tracking ratings, downloads and search queries you will be able to identify gaps and see which of them are the most important to focus on. By allowing comments and user generated content, you will crowdsource a lot of valuable insights from the field.

Best,
Paul

Posted by Paul Krajewski on October 7th, 2010 - 3 Comments

The dimensions of Sales Enablement


My last post on the question where Sales Enablement lives got a comment requesting further clarification of the following graphic:

matrixed organizations

The comment was asking where to find sales people in the graphic and what the role of Sales Playbooks is. I have to admit that it is difficult to read, but the sales people are actually represented within the green area as indicated by the words Sales Force. (This is not a reference to salesforceDOTcom.)

This speaks to the point that sales people and the legacy sales portals, that are supposed to enable them, sit in between a highly matrixed organization on the one side and just as complex an organization on the client’s side. These legacy sales portals are one-dimensional (they fail to show content & contacts in the context of the highly matrixed organization and in context to what pain point on the client side is addressed) and there are often several portals as there are so many silos of information.

Each Sales Playbook is a great tool for a small subset of the sales force (as shown in the graphic), but comes out of one of the silos, fed by only some of the Product/Portfolio Marketing teams or one regional team. When all content (e.g. customer references from different regions or specific value propositions per industry vertical…) lives in a multi-dimensional business context like it is made possible in BizSphere (which was designed to cut across all silos), a completely customized Sales Playbook for any given sales situation can be auto-generated.

In contrast to legacy sales portals, BizSphere takes at least three dimensions into account. These could be:

  • Where is the seller going to a meeting? (Sales regions, countries…)
  • What does the seller want to sell (Portfolio of products, services and solutions.)
  • What does the seller need in order to be successful in the meeting? (Content types like white paper, case study, ROI-Calculator, contact details of a subject matter expert, etc…)

You might also want to define a taxonomy of customer pain points and map your products against those or add other dimensions that your company thinks in. BizSphere then lets you filter down by media type, language of the content, and/or the sales step you are in with the opportunity you are working.

The dimensions of sales enablement
  • Imagine the 1st orange arrow in the graphic above to be a customer reference from a Canadian client for a specific security solution.
  • Imagine the 2nd orange arrow to be the contact details of the sales engineer in South Africa who is the expert for a given service.
  • The 3rd orange arrow could be an ROI-calculator for the same service but it is really specific to the mining industry and therefore relevant in Western Australia.
    Can you already see how here the regional teams can have as much of say in which content is relevant for specific sales situations as the product marketing team?

    Can you get lost in BizSphere? No way, because nothing is easier than answering: What do I want to sell, where do I want to sell it and what would help me to close the deal? Once you set your context in these three dimensions you will have filtered down from thousands of marketing assets / pieces of collateral to only the relevant ones.

    Posted by Matthias Roebel on October 6th, 2010 - 1 Comment

    Which changes is the Sales Team facing?


    On May 26, 2010, Brian Lambert from Forrester Research wrote the blog post “What Changes are the Sales Team Facing – Right Now?”.

    I would like to thank Brian, for bringing up the “change” subject. From my experience, being able to manage and moderate change is crucial for the success of any sales enablement initiative.

    Let me give you one example from my time at Nortel. Back in 2006, the company had decided to become a services and solutions company – like many other tech firms before. Now, on the one hand we were facing the challenge of defining a solutions portfolio connected to the already existing products, on the other hand thousands of box selling sales people needed to educated to become solution sellers.

    One thing that helped us a lot was that we visualized the change for sellers. Executives often wonder, why people are not instantly getting how new structures are supposed to be working – what they forget is how long it actually took to agree on these new structures in the first place. So naturally, adapting to change needs time, but this can be supported, if the change of structures is not only communicated to but visualized for people leveraging inutive graphical navigation elements in the sales portal for example. During the Services and Solutions transformation this approach did help Nortel a great deal.

    So, a bucket you might want to add to the change discussion is the bucket of visualization of change. Making changing structures, changing selling context tangible makes change efforts like new solutions launches more likekly to be successful.

    Another interesting bucket might be the rapidly changing web and the impact on sellers and buyers – so called Sales 2.0. Only a few years back no seller would have thought that monitoring prospects on LinkedIn and Twitter for example will become key to sales success. Therefore, launching effective Social CRM tools for sellers aligned with the existing sales process will become an important change initiative for sales organizations.

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