Who Needs Sales Enablement Anyway?

How do you know when an organization or sales team is ready or even needs a sales enablement program?  You implemented a CRM, so that’s good enough, right? 

It’s easy to assume sales enablement is only with large enterprises with lots of people and resources.   But that just simply isn’t true.  ALL sales organizations want to achieve more sales and better productivity. Unless you aren’t actually selling and are just taking orders, sales enablement is for everyone.

For increasing sales and revenue at any size, here are many ways to adjust outcomes without changing your whole organization or adding lots of resources.  The secret is how you approach sales enablement: change the focus on HOW to sell, and more specifically how you can help yours salesforce sell better.

How Do I Know if I’m Ready for Sales Enablement?

While you consider your situation, here are some signs you’re ready for a sales enablement solution:

• You’re already doing great. The best companies look to double down on success when it happens and want to continue the trend. Sales enablement solutions can analyze what you’re doing right and ensure that you can repeat it, share it among your sales team, and build on it.
• Marketing and sales teams aren’t working together well. Sales enablement can help understand both pieces and get them in sync to be more efficient and effective. A good sales enablement program will unify sales and marketing teams.
• Onboarding new sales reps is a struggle. You may need extra support for training and coaching to get the reps up and running quickly and making sales.  Traditional, classroom only programs just simply aren’t enough in today’s digital, dynamic world.
• Difficulty moving deals through the sales cycle. Good sales enablement programs will align content to each sales cycle and help to identify what will accelerate opportunities through the sales process.
• Improve retention. Turnover is costly and hurts sales momentum. Having good onboarding, continuous training, coaching and clear processes will reduce confusion and frustration among reps. These elements lead to a stronger, more stable sales force.

Sales enablement solutions refine and focus the process of interacting with your prospects and customers. The evidence is compelling that sales enablement strategies work, and impact real business results; no matter what size your company.  For example, in its 2015 Sales Optimization study, CSO Insights found that those with a sales enablement function saw an 8 percent increase in sales reps’ hitting their revenue targets, translating into a 10.2 percent revenue increase!

Interested in learning more?  Check out our recent webinar: “Optimizing Sales Enablement for Salespeople.”