SPEAKER_00: Hello everyone and
welcome back to the Innovative
Revenue Leader podcast.
This past month, we've brought
together three sales leaders to
talk about how they're using AI
to drive value within your sales
organizations.
This was backed by a report that
we did just around how you can
get more efficiency from your
sales team and then also find a
way to get more value through
training and enablement to drive
more efficiency as well.
So in this episode, we're going
to talk a little bit more in
depth about some of the insights
around this concept from the
report and then bring in some of
the key insights that came out
of the last three weeks in
talking to our to our guests.
And then at the end, I'll
announce what the topic is that
we're going to talk about for
the month of November.
So to start things off, I'll
start with a quote that Mary had
that I thought was really great
at the beginning.
She said, the future of sales
isn't about replacing humans
with AI, it's about reimagining
how we work together.
And that technology is evolving
faster than we can consume it.
So we've got to continue to
reimagine how this stuff works.
And I think that's really
important because if you're not
doing that, one, if you're not
looking at your world
differently with these new tools
that just are fundamentally
different, that makes it
challenging for you to
understand how they work and
understand how to adopt them.
And then when it's moving
faster, if you don't take the
time to really think about what
that looks like, it kind of
consumes you.
So you you end up paralyzed not
understanding what you can do.
So you either do nothing or you
do things that are too far
afield.
And we see both.
Like you see both when you look
at different businesses.
So when you think about the
discussions, they were grounded
in the concept that CROs can use
AI to grow their business and
build more capacity with their
sales team.
So to be specific, the concept
that was used was you could take
five percent out.
So there's a Salesforce study
that talked about non-selling
time used to prepare for
selling.
And one of the key concepts with
that is you can't just take time
away from a seller or tell a
seller they they shouldn't do
these things because those
things are valuable.
So the only reason, the only way
to actually get capacity is to
continue doing those things but
do them more efficiently or more
efficiently.
And I think that gets lost in a
lot of cases.
But fundamentally, looking at
those five concepts, and you can
you can get the report to talk
through what that looks like.
And for those of you on YouTube,
you'll be able to see this in
the background with it with a
figure.
But the to get that five percent
out, you have to you go through
each one of those five
components and just take one
percent.
So that's the challenge that I
have to anybody that's
listening.
Look for each of the concepts.
So if I'm trying to do to be
more efficient with admin, more
efficient with quote creation,
all of that stuff, there is one
percent efficiency that you
could pull from each one.
So the idea with that is I get
one percent from each, I
redirect that into direct
selling with your with your
customers.
So say three percent more
prospecting, more time on the
phone with customers, more time
uh in person with them.
So you increase your selling
time from what was in the study
29 to 34.
So 17 plus percent more time
actually selling.
And the idea there is if you do
that, you can create five
percent more in growth just from
that transition of effort,
because now you would hire a
salesperson.
If I can give you five percent
more time for each of your
salespeople, they they should
actually be able to give you
more sales because you have no
rank period, you have
experienced people, and that's
the concept there.
And in talking with the the with
with the team, the the three
people we have on, the sales
leaders we had on, all three of
the guests felt like this was a
very conservative estimate of
what is possible.
Like this is this is something
that's very tangible, something
that you could really do.
Key thing is to do it.
I think sometimes the when you
look at something that's small,
you don't think it's big enough.
But think about the power of
adding sixty thousand dollars in
additional revenue per seller
driven straight by efficiency
and without hiring a person.
Multiply that by your sales
team, the number grows really
quickly.
So it's worth the effort.
One thing that Phil talked about
was like the headcount math of
that.
So going back to, I mean, most
people would look at it and say,
I need more headcount to be able
to do it.
Challenge that I'd have for you
is to look for the capacity to
get more out of each salesperson
rather than the math of I need
two more people to hit my
number.
Then another key insight that
Phil had that was a little bit
different than the way I was
thinking about it, because I
look at it from uh once you get
capacity, you need to consume
it.
Like you can't just let a
salesperson do their own thing.
You need to have an initiative
or something to be able to grow.
And I still think that's it,
that's an important thing to do.
But another thing he said was
really around how do I get the
KPIs understood in a way that
when I implement these changes,
I should see those go up.
Like I should see the number of
activities go up.
I should see certain things
happen.
So when you implement an
initiative, look at it from uh
either I'm gonna put it, or when
you implement a change that's
gonna provide efficiency, you
should either have an
initiative, have an initiative
that you can consume that, or
you should have metrics that
you're looking at.
And that was a key insight that
I really thought was was
valuable from Bill.
To say, I'm gonna see my
activities go up, I'm gonna see
different things go up, so you
can see the impact happening in
your group.
As a leader, it's not just gonna
magically happen when you give
capacity.
So we talked a little bit about
the the efficiency piece.
There's also an equal benefit
for the effectiveness side.
Like if you get a seller that is
trained and doing a good job and
doing the things you want.
Like there was a study done,
admittedly, a a while ago, but
there isn't much around this
around how ROI could work.
And what they what they found
was there's very few people that
got the most value out of their
training.
But when they did, they had 10%
higher performance than those
that didn't get value from the
training.
Now, the technology that's out
there, and there's a lot more
that's gonna be coming around
this, is gonna make it much,
much easier for you to ensure
that the training that you're
provided is actually being
implemented and done.
So that's gonna pull you into a
place where you can actually you
can get lift from being able to
do that that training to be able
to get the most out of it.
And if you can improve your tent
your win rate by 10%, which is
what that study said for those
who've got training that was
valuable to them, it's an
additional hundred K that you
can pull into your business.
And that is a significantly
valuable piece.
There was another part that Phil
talked about that I think is
really important is all that
training piece and getting
people up to speed, it like
using role play, using using
other different tools, your ramp
time for new sellers should be
significantly higher than it was
before.
Like if you're not looking at
that and saying I need my ramp
time to be half as much as it
was before and putting
initiatives in place to do that,
I think it's it you're not going
fast enough.
Like there is a real
opportunity, and anybody who's
running a sales organization
knows that one of the biggest
inefficiencies in a business and
one of the biggest costs, like
or revenue, cost and revenue
problems is how do I get that
seller ramped quick enough to be
able to contribute?
Another thing that came out
around the effectiveness side
that I thought was really good
for Mike is he started to he
talked through around stacking
AI and coaching.
So instead of he thought about
some of the time that he would
get back, instead of diverting
it into efficiency, he would
have them reinvest it into more
depth and higher quality
engagements.
So I thought that was a very
good way to look at it, or in a
different way of looking at it.
Like you do one or the other
depending on on what works best
for you, but that sounds like a
really that that that makes
sense to me in how you're trying
to improve the results in these,
especially in deals where
there's very limited
opportunities and you really
need to make the most of them.
And another thing that he talked
about that I thought was
important was he looks for
tripwires in these individual
engagements to see at the
individual interaction level
whether a seller is performing
or not performing, so he can go
and engage well before the deal
is lost.
That has never been easier.
When you talk about conversation
intelligence and building
triggers to be able to identify
moments and call, that's all at
hand and ready and can be done
today.
So it's something that everybody
really should set up.
Take the time to build the
triggers, take the time to
understand what that looks like
and to build that out so you can
start identifying problems that
are happening in a deal well in
advance.
You don't want to find out about
that when you lose the deal, or
right at the point where you're
at the moment where you have to
save it.
All right.
So those are some of the key
things that that I just wanted
to wrap on in these four weeks
where we talked about kind of
how CROs could get value from
AI.
Hope this topic was useful for
you.
If you want to access the
report, we will put a link in
the podcast notes for that.
Our next topic going into
November is another one that I
think is very valuable for CROs
and sales organizations, and
that's this transition that's
happening between contract
typical status pricing, where
you sign a contract up front,
and the game is really about how
to get the contract and term to
usage-based, where it's more
about how do I get you signed up
and on the tool and then
increase sales based on having
you use the product, which is
tricky because it takes the
revenue component from an
upfront to an over time.
So we'll spend November
unpicking that with revenue
innovators that are doing that
across all sorts of different
industries.
Look forward to talking to you
about it in November.