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Should you adapt your business to the new era of remote virtual sales?
Valuable insight on how to transition from a traditional sales organisation to a remote sales organisation.
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Key Takeaways
For years sales professionals and entrepreneurs have been adapting to changing circumstances, markets and buying behaviour.
But the requested (and somehow obliged) change has never been more prominent than in the last two years.
Digital transformation in sales has been on steroids since the start of the pandemic and forced many companies to adapt quickly not to lose contact with their prospects and, in the end, lose market share.
Moreover, the “remote sales team” has made many sales managers more than a little nervous.
Everyone works remotely, and sales leaders need to manage virtual sales teams.
According to Gartner, the definition of Virtual Selling is:
"the collection of processes and technologies by which salespeople engage with customers remotely with both synchronous and asynchronous communications."
In my vision, Social Selling is "the process of developing relationships as part of the sales process (either online or offline), often via social networks such as LinkedIn and Twitter." Social selling is not trying to make online sales via social media!
And then there is remote selling, a complex buying cycle where most sales conversations occur with buyers and sellers in different physical locations.
Remote selling requires no in-person interaction; it simply identifies that most interactions are remote.
The successful combination of Social Selling & Remote Selling is called Virtual Selling!
Sales enablement leaders need a clear strategy to support the sales force in a virtual selling environment. The key to a more permanent shift toward virtual selling is a shift in enablement strategy.
Progressive enablement leaders realise sellers need to stop assuming live meeting practices transfer seamlessly to virtual settings, and they must prepare sellers to sustain digital-first selling behaviours.
Virtual selling is not about transferring your offline meetings to video meetings.
The Virtual Selling framework below shows the following formula:
SCE + ACE x VSE = EVS
Which will finally lead to Effective Virtual Selling (EVS).
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From market experience, these are the main reasons why companies hire remote sales teams:
No office rent, no parking issues, no utility costs, and no paying business travel expenses!
On average, office space in Europe costs about 1,492 euros per m² a month.
Add to that the costs of desks, chairs, computers, phones, internet connection, utilities, maintenance, cleaning and more. Your business can reinvest in assets, resources, tools, and training with those savings.
According to McKinsey, regardless of the vaccine and expected recovery from COVID-19, anywhere from 19 to 46 per cent of corporate travel could be gone permanently.
Another substantial financial benefit of hiring remote teams is avoiding employee replacement costs.
As an example of what it means for your budget to lose an on-site employee, particularly in a department that generates profits, such as sales, here are the stats:
Leveraging a remote sales team is crucial to keep up with the competition.
By not being strictly limited to a specific city or region to hire your sales force, eliminating geographic constraints to find the best talent is necessary for today’s society.
When you limit your hiring only to people who can commute to your office, you’re restricted to local talent or the few people willing to relocate (and if they do, you may have to offer expensive perks or cover moving expenses).
Hiring remote teams open up the talent pool without restriction to other regions.
Because the cost of living in some of these countries is less than in the U.S. and European metropolises, the salaries are at a lower scale, and you end up saving money.
Global talent also brings a fresh perspective that often results in innovation in your company.
People educated abroad and with job experience in other parts of the world bring a different perspective that sometimes is lacking in local talent.
Recruitment agencies have access to sizeable on-demand talent pools.
This means that whenever a client needs to replace an employee or scale up, competent recruiters make a new hire within 2 to 3 weeks, depending on the employer’s criteria.
According to McKinsey, the future of B2B sales is hybrid for specific industries and remote-first for all the rest!
On LinkedIn, buyers are hesitant to visit Seller's Profiles (only 30%) or engage with sales-related profiles.
This is likely because they don't want to receive spammy follow-up calls or emails after engaging with a seller.
However, they do visit the profiles of Product Development (80%), relevant C-level (65%) and Company Page (60%).
Progressive marketers have shifted from spec sheets and product overviews to digitally rich buyer enablement.
They are helping customers manage the complexities of an end-to-end purchase decision and navigate the implications for their business.
This has implications beyond business development activities and extends to how sales organisations onboard and train new team members.
As business dealings and communications development, we will exist in a world with a significantly reduced number of in-personal annual internal gatherings.
The sooner companies understand the implications, the better off they will be.
McKinsey found that three out of four respondents felt digital sales methods had become more effective than traditional ones.
This is likely a reflection of a growing comfort level that we, as consumers, have with digital engagement and how it is now spilling over into B2B.
Virtual selling - when implemented correctly - provides you with:
Furthermore, virtual meetings are less time-consuming, more effective and easier to schedule from both sides.
As 85% of the prospects indicated, they are more willing to spend 30 minutes on a virtual call than engage in an offline meeting.
Buyers are constantly looking for relevant and insightful content that addresses their challenges and brings them one step closer to a solution.
Next, they engage in remote conversations when they trust in the expertise and knowledge of the person on the other side of the screen.
Sales professionals that are seen as thought leaders convert three times more to business opportunities (leads) than traditional sales professionals.
A ‘thought leader’ is someone with profound expertise and knowledge on a specific topic and a large base (for example, on social networks like LinkedIn).
A well-thought and diverse content strategy, active networking and looking for the proper stages to speak to your audience will boost your success.
This strategy is highly effective in driving traffic through your sales funnel.
The more accustomed your Team becomes to the “new” workflow, the more you draw awareness from the market, create demand, and consistently increase your lead generation, thus improving your chances of closing deals.
Have you ever been to a party where everybody is dancing, and you don't know the style of music and don't get your feet going?
Well, imagine your sales professionals losing touch with the market and their prospects because they don't know how to do this 'virtual dance'?
Successful virtual sellers outperform traditional sellers by far. On average (Gartner), they realise up to 80% more leads and opportunities.
But traditional selling skills can still be used in virtual selling once you can identify the different phases.
It becomes fun when you get the people who take you to the dance floor and show you the steps.
By providing you with the sales talent fit for your organisation, we make your success scalable in numbers and approach.
When you are running your own business, there are tons of duties and responsibilities that you have to fulfil.
Your time is essential and has to be saved at all costs to develop your business further. This can be ensured by implementing Scaling Sales with the Talentroo Global Workforce Solutions.
Sales Recruitment | Marketing Recruitment | BPO Recruitment
Talentroo’s sales recruitment team ensures high customer satisfaction and, thereby, an increase in net revenues and net profits.
Our team at Talentroo will assist you immediately.
Get in touch with us at mail@talentroo.com to set up a call.
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