3 Types of Sales Tools for Your Business
Starting a business takes hard work and dedication. And after you’ve put in all the time, energy and money it takes to get off the ground, you want to see some return on your investment. That means you need a quality sales process that will bring in and convert leads.
One problem many businesses run into is that they create an awesome process but don’t have the tools to support it. The truth is we live in a digital world and you need digital sales tools to be effective in the marketplace. In this article, we’ll look at three top tools that can help you close deals and grow your business.
Why You Need Sales Tools
It might seem like your sales process can speak for itself — and maybe it can! But that doesn’t mean there isn’t room to improve. Even with a proven process and sales funnel, there are a few things sales tools can do that will greatly improve your team’s performance.
- Optimize workflows. Sales software that pulls together multiple actions and departments into a single workflow can make your team’s lives so much easier. With the right tools, you can automate the majority of your sales process so you know your business is always working in the background to generate and nurture leads while your salespeople close deals.
- Increase productivity. When your process is organized and streamlined, your team can focus on working with the most qualified and likely-to-close leads. This means no more wasting time on people who just wanted more information or will probably back out before the contract is signed. Your team’s time is spent on potential customers who will bring in revenue.
- Improve the customer experience. Every customer wants to feel like a priority. With an organized, streamlined process, your team (or software) can reach out to every lead and answer every question quickly and accurately. This shows you care about your customers and is the first step to building a positive relationship.
Now that you know how sales tools benefit your business, let’s look at a few key types of tools to invest in.
Customer Relationship Management
You might think a CRM tool is best used by your customer service team, but it can be invaluable to your sales team too. This is where every piece of customer communication is housed and where you can track deals’ progress.
Many CRMs offer automation features that can take much of the heavy lifting off your sales team. For example, automatically triggering a sales email campaign when people submit their information. Or allowing prospects to schedule meetings directly on your team members’ calendars. This streamlines the sales process and makes it easier to reach potential customers.
Data Integration
Your sales team needs a lot of information to do their job well and reach their goals. Having all of that data in one place makes it that much easier for them to get a pulse on what they need to accomplish this week, month or quarter.
It’s important to have sales tools that can pull data from multiple sources and compile them into one place. This includes the number of leads, qualified leads, deals in progress, closed/won statistics and more. All of this data will help your sales team know where to focus their efforts to push your business forward.
Sales Analytics
Analytics go hand-in-hand with data integration. They’re another way to measure performance and see if your business is hitting its benchmarks. They also help with things like goal-setting, sales forecasting and budgeting.
With analytics tools, you can gather and compile customer data to see where your sales strategy is hitting hardest and where it needs some help. These tools are invaluable if you’re looking to scale and need to find new avenues for revenue.
Building your business took time, but growing your sales doesn’t have to. Use these helpful tools to set your team up for success.