Are you ready to read the understatement of the year? The COVID-19 pandemic has been a rough time for most sales teams.
Huge swaths of the global economy are still shuttered. And even the industries that have more-or-less fully reopened are performing far below the numbers they saw this time last year. As a result, sales organizations across the globe are going through one of the slowest periods in living memory.
If there’s one thing the sales industry isn’t optimized for, it’s long stretches of downtime. This business is all about making calls, winning deals, and moving on to the next sale. The economic reality has slowed all of these activities to a crawl. Worse yet, the COVID-19 crisis seems to be sticking around much longer than predicted.
What’s a sales team to do if they can’t actually make more sales?
Maybe it’s time to rethink some things. What would happen if your team used this downtime to build, learn, and grow? Similar to the way people are handling their personal lives, now is the perfect time to tackle all of those little projects your team has been putting off for “another day.”
Let’s start with some basic assumptions. First, let’s assume that your sales have leveled off, and that there’s no reason to believe this trend will change very much over the next few months. Let’s also assume that sales will stay flat no matter how hard your team hits the phones or clicks “Send” on their emails. Finally, let’s assume that the new short-term goal is to put your sales organization in the best possible position to spring into action when the gears finally start turning in the post-pandemic economy.
With all that in mind, here are three strategies that will help your sales organization take full advantage of downtime:
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Rethink Your Workflows
Sales can be a surprisingly old-school kind of business. As a result, sales teams are often reluctant to streamline or update their processes. If the old way “works,” why change it? Sure, storing customer data in an Excel spreadsheet is less efficient than using a CRM, but does that really matter? Yes, it does. Every outdated process your sales team still uses for daily operations adds up, which creates serious drag on your organization’s overall efficiency. This outcome is something your company just can’t afford in a post-COVID-19 economy. Especially with the influx of remote workers, more competitors and customers alike will be utilizing technology in new ways and you don’t want to be left behind.
Now is the perfect time to rethink every step of the sales process—from the way your team acquires leads to the technology it uses to track completed sales. Now that much of your sales team’s work can be done online, what older workflows can be updated, upgraded, redesigned, or even completely abandoned? The end result should be a sales workflow that’s both more efficient and profitable than the one it’s replacing.
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Enhance Your Customer Relationships
One of the oldest mantras in our industry goes something like this: Sales is all about building relationships. It may be a cliché, but it’s true. The stronger your relationships are with your customers, the more loyal those customers tend to be during tough times. You may even be able to prove this sentiment by looking at your sales reports. A good customer relationship can even survive the one-two punch of a pandemic and an economic crisis.
Use this time to build up those customer connections. Chances are that most of the people on your sales team already love to talk. So why not put that chattiness to good use? Set aside some time for them to check in with their customers and clients. There should be no sales agenda on these calls. The only goal is to find out how things are going. This tactic gives your sales team an opportunity to strengthen those all-important relationships. In addition, the details you glean from these conversations can provide your company with an early warning system for big changes with your customers, such as a looming bankruptcy, downsizing, or acquisition. The pandemic affects every business in some way and we won’t know how we could potentially help customers now or in the future unless we have these conversations.
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Level Up Your Sales Team
If there was ever a time to invest in additional training for your sales staff, it’s right now. As the economy starts recovering from the effects of the COVID-19 shutdown, the entire sales industry is going to be flooded with hungry, highly motivated salespeople working for companies that are fighting to survive. Every potential customer will be considered fair game, and every company that can’t compete will be written off a just another casualty of the new economic reality.
Has your sales team been reluctant to learn your company’s CRM? Tough. It’s time for them to get with the program, watch some training videos, and learn to use it like their jobs depend on it. Everyone needs to improve their sales skills, across the board. There are great sales webinars, workshops, and training courses available online for extremely reasonable fees—or even for free! So make use of them. If your team isn’t comfortable using Zoom, FaceTime, or Skype as sales tools, it’s time for a crash course in virtual meetings. These tools are all going to matter, so your team needs to be ready.
If you get these things right, your sales team will be able to hit the ground running as the world starts reopening. Forget the old status quo. It’s probable that things will never go back to exactly how it was. We’re entering a new era, and your sales team should be ready to make the most of it.
To learn more about how FayeBSG’s technology and training solutions can prepare your company for the post-COVID economy, contact us today for a free consultation.
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