Hey everybody, my name is Scott Fristachi, I’m the Vice President of Sales at Extu. I’m excited to speak with you all today about B2B sales enablement strategies that will help you get more revenue in 2024.
If you’re watching this, my first question is: are you a mid-sized dealer/distributor or reseller feeling the pressure to boost sales in 2024? Is your sales team struggling to outgrow their status quo?
If you answered yes to either of those questions, you’re not alone. But there’s good news! By implementing effective B2B sales enablement strategies, you can empower your team and unlock significant revenue growth.
In this video, we’ll explore three key strategies:
1. Reward curiosity and real problem-solving.
2. Leverage automation for modern learning.
3. Centralize your data so you can improve sales and marketing.
Let’s dive in!
1. Reward curiosity and problem-solving.
One of the biggest issues in industries like HVAC and automotive right now is the skill gap. You don’t want “parts swappers,” as Gary McCreadie calls them on his podcast HVAC Know It All. You want techs that can trace the circuit and read the legend on a schematic. You want detectives that ask questions and use their senses to solve problems. Cultivate curiosity. This is where incentives and rewards can make a big difference to change behaviors. Reward techs for:
- Passing courses or quizzes
- Earning certifications
- Asking the right people the right questions
- Diagnosing problems
- Demonstrating system knowledge
Remember, incentives don’t have to be something you dole out routinely every sales promotion. If you have a flexible reward program, you can reward on-the-spot immediately for any reason, reinforcing behaviors with immediate recognition.
2. Leverage automation for modern learning.
Once you’ve developed a curiosity culture, you still have to reinforce it. Getting somewhere is one thing, staying there is another. People forget stuff, that’s just how it is. Science tells us that people lose knowledge within weeks or even days if it’s not reinforced repeatedly. Some tools and tactics you can invest in to help reinforce and review training are:
- Microlearning modules
- Content management systems that keep all your education content in one place and track learning performance
- Sales call recording, transcription, and analytics are really en vogue right now.
- Personalized learning paths
- Huge one here: Gamification features like Spin-to-Win and daily trivia that give those little dopamine hits that make learning more fun and engaging
The best thing about modern sales learning is that you have so many tools at your disposal to make learning more engaging. Your sales reps might finish a huge milestone like an 8-hour course on your product inventory. Or they can get reward points just for answering daily trivia questions. You can deliver and redeliver the same information to make it stick. But your sales team won’t get bored or burned out because you’re delivering the info in fresh, diverse ways.
3. Centralize your data to improve sales and marketing.
One of the best things you can do for your salespeople is unify sales and customer data. Especially if you’re asking them to go out there and get warranty registrations and customer info. All things that traditionally take time and effort. Make all that data as useful to them as it is to you and your vendors. (And remember, vendors love your data, so they’re willing to help you with marketing and sales platforms that get all this data in one, easily accessible place.)
Build your data centralization efforts around these policies:
- Clean customer data that’s accurate and up to date
- A resource hub that has product specs, thought leadership, industry news and reports, etc.
- Total platform integration, i.e. your CRM, incentive program, and marketing platform are all sharing data. The closer you can get to a single sign on experience for all users, the better.
- Automation tools that capture data in real-time so you don’t have to chase it down later are highly recommended
Centralizing data can be a big undertaking, especially if you have a lot of it. We just went through it ourselves at Extu. But hey, it’s 2024 – any piece of channel technology worth its salt should have integration capabilities. Consolidate systems where you can. Make your life as easy as possible. Anytime you store customer or sales data, make sure you have two-way data exchange. Your goal is for all your salespeople to get the data they need, when they need it as easily as possible. But also be able to provide you the data you want, when you want it.
So, there you have it! Three powerful B2B sales enablement strategies to consider in 2024. By rewarding curiosity, leveraging automation, and centralizing your data, you can unlock significant revenue growth and empower your sales team to thrive in today’s competitive market.
I hope you all found this information both educational and useful. If you have any questions at all about any of the strategies discussed or if you are at the point where you are ready to put some of these strategies into action, please feel free to call us at 866-567-7432 or visit our website extu.com for access to tons of additional resources and tools to help you transform your sales enablement efforts.
Thanks so much for listening and I hope you have a lovely day.