Jarrett O’BrienSr. Product Marketing Manager at Jive

10 Steps to Sales Software

Adoption

Adoption is the foundation of any software ROI. Over the last 10 years, studies found

that between 30-70% of CRM projects failed.

And, the scary reality is that the most widely-used sales

tool is a 40-year-old piece of technology: EMAIL.

“Just in case” training versus just in time. Doesn’t reflect real selling or learning from peers. Content is out of date and costly

Why have traditional sales tools failed to gain ADOPTION???

LMS

CMS

CRM Transaction focused and historical data Primary value is for management. Not used by experts who support sales

Built for authoring, not accessing information. Static repositories and one directional. Not collaborative / based on a selling situation.

Executives

Forecasts:IncomingRevenue

Dashboards

CustomerData

Marketing

SegmentCustomers

Leads

Campaigns

Experts

???

Sales Mgmt

Forecasts

ManageRegion

TrackActivities

SalesProcess

Sales

Opps / Act

Track Data / Notifications

CallPlanning

Value: CRM is ONLY Valuable for SomeAll roles enable sales and drive deals

VA

LU

E

low value + low adoption

= ROI

DEEP USE CASESCreate and verify them with sales and create high-level benefit statements for audiences with key metrics to track.1

RFPs / Proposal / Presentations

Competitive Intelligence

Objection Handling and ?’s

Deal Rooms / Team Selling

New Sales Process

Creating / Giving Presentations

Sales Playbooks

Buyer Collaboration

Ops / Finance / Legal

Cross Selling

Sales On Boarding

Field Communications

Selling New Products

Territory InconsistencySharing Wins

SellerChallenges

CREATE A PLANTreat deployments like external campaigns. Develop an adoption roadmap (Top-down & Grass Roots) 

GET SALES TALKINGMake sure sales are communicating in the tool at every level where they used to in email or on phone calls:

Executives need to have bought into social and contribute content in order to create the culture. Video blogs are a great way to accomplish this.

Sales leadership groups can also collaborate and share monthly best practices or create regional groups.

Create a sales mentoring program to incent top reps to share with newbies and cross-pollinate best practices.

 

SEED THE FIELDPlant new content in your new system and shut down locations where they can access old content. 

DON’T HAVE CONTENT???

Ask questions about topics and elicit responses from sales and experts. 

Have ideation jams on missing sales collateral.

Crowd-source content to create the best pitches and proposals.

 

RAISE THE BARNHave in-person & virtual events and let sales submit content, whittle it down to the best messaging.

Leverage Your People:

‘Like’, rate, and and socialize the content

Create polls to vote on top content.

Track impact stats to see what was really the best

 

RECORD EVERYTHINGVideotape and record live events, QBR’s, sales call, etc. Serve them up as a series for those who couldn’t make it.

Don’t Miss the Memo:

Sales Leadership Video blogs

Weekly Sales Calls

Top reps doing the sales pitch

 

ADD VALUE TO SYSTEMSSellers have already adopted other tools; make sure your new solutions are integrated with all systems. 

7On Boarding Enablement Deals / Accts

Event based training Situational learning

App Specific Web Integration Any Browser

Static content What Matters and Interactive

Transaction focused People with Deal Hub

LMS CMS CRM

PPT Word Desktop Integrations Outlook XLS

Deep App Specific Integrations

ACCESS ON THE ROADIn the world we live in you need to have access from any mobile device, including smart phones and tablets.

Give your team members the ability to create content, ask questions, present pitches, and accelerate the deal, online or off.

MAKE IT FUNUse gamification to create contests, assign missions, and give rewards for behaviors you are trying to incent.

Leverage Your People:

Incent behaviors with missions.

Track progress.

Award badges and prizes.

 

EXPERIENCE IS EVERYTHINGIf it isn’t as easy to use or slicker than the tools sellers know and love, don’t roll it out.  Try BEFORE you BUY.

10

Do you have other ways that you have rolled out software

to sales with high adoption rates?

Comment below to add to the discussion.  Also,

download our free best practices paper on Sales Enablement: click here.