Driving Sales Success with the New Virtual Normal
The pandemic has driven success in many online-focused businesses, from online delivery platforms to virtual events, virtual hiring, and virtual sales. Founder and CEO of Selling Power magazine and premier B2B sales event, the Sales 3.0 Conference, Gerhard Gschwandtner, says that our new virtual paradigm is not going away.
Founder and CEO of Selling Power magazine and premier B2B sales event, the Sales 3.0 Conference, Gerhard Gschwandtner
"Virtual is here to stay. The pandemic has done two things: it has accelerated the digital transformation and changed the way people think about work as a location. So people now think about a global digital headquarters," he explains.
Many companies have shifted to the virtual onboarding of salespeople, the virtual training and development of salespeople. Dozens of innovations are happening. Being able to hire people from anywhere in the world has also changed how both hiring and onboarding processes are being thought about.
"Technology does a better job training and onboarding than people can. For example, Second Nature is an AI-based salesperson training platform where salespeople can rehearse their presentation with a bot. The bot is actually more effective than a real person at giving you authentic and valuable feedback. With this type of technology available, you can compress the normal three-month onboarding training cycle to one month. So technology is a big change factor directly related to the changes the COVID-19 pandemic has brought."
The Principle of Sales
According to Gschwandtner, despite the disruptions of the pandemic, the principle of sales has not changed. It still takes information to take action despite the format of that information changing from in-person to online. However, now we have too much access to too much information, and a company's sales message can get drowned out if it is not speedy, accurate, and relevant.
"If you do not have relevant information, you're going to lose. If you have relevant information, but it's too late. You're going to lose. A tool like Owler can put salespeople in a better position. You are giving relevant information about activating events that lead to sales opportunities. So you're expanding its scope, the vision of the sales leader, and the addressable market, and when the market gets active so that users can jump on it without delay," Gschwandtner notes.
The upcoming Sales 3.0 Conferences
February 24th to 25th, 2022: Sales Leadership in the Hybrid World
In February's Sales 3.0 Conference, the focus will be on how to lead sales in the hybrid world. Expert Brynne Tillman, CEO, LinkedIn Whisperer, Social Sales Link, will talk about leveraging LinkedIn to create more sales opportunities. A best-selling author who is also a professor at Harvard Business School, Frank Cespedes, will speak about managing in a world that never stops changing.
"We also have industry leaders who will talk about digital transformation and training and onboarding. We have a sales enablement leader from RingCentral, Sheevaun Thatcher. She has a team of about over 200 people that work in sales enablement, but now they're expanding the enablement function across the entire company. So they have learned that when you have a system for ongoing learning for everybody, then the culture becomes a learning culture, and the learning is embedded in the workflow. People need to be aware of exciting changes," explains Gschwandtner.
The rest of the speakers and event information can be found here.
April 21st-22nd, 2022 Sales 3.0 Conference
In April, Bill McDermott, the CEO of ServiceNow, will be speaking at the event.
"When he joined ServiceNow two years ago, the company was at a market value of about $39 billion. Two years later, it's worth over $116 billion, which is astonishing. He's one of the most illuminating thinkers in management, leadership, and creating systems that work and has an enlightened sales force where they embrace diversity. The Glassdoor rating for the CEO is one of the highest of any CEO in America. He is a wonderful storyteller. He's written a book that is still on the bestseller list. It'sIt's called Winners Dream, A Journey from Corner Store to Corner Office. It was published maybe five years ago, and it's still on the bestseller list," stated Gschwandtner.
Learn more about the April 21st to 22nd Sales 3.0 Conference and other upcoming conferences here.
Key Advice for Sales Leaders from Gerhard Gschwandtner
"I want to make an analogy between chess and sales leadership. Chess moves get exponentially more complicated. So after the fourth move, you're already looking at 121 million potential combinations on where the game will go. With every move, you need to assess the entire situation and all possibilities. You cannot comprehend everything you need to make your move in time, or you will lose the time to counter your opponent's situation. You have only three ways to think about it: do I attack, do I defend more effectively, or do I wait it out and make a lateral move to gain time? The key principle is that you, as a sales leader, must make a move without having all the information available and make that move with confidence. Without confidence, nobody is going to follow you."
