7 Tips for Hacking Sales Enablement to Drive Readiness in a New Era

Leon Hassid on August 28, 2020

A lot has changed since March — the way we interact, the way we work, the way we live. But as a SaaS-based company with high growth and high sales velocity, Security Scorecard’s goals are one thing that hasn’t changed. Rather, what’s changed are the tactics we use to achieve our goals.

Now more than ever, sales organizations need smart and practical engagement, which probably looks a little different than it did at the beginning of the year. New tactics to ensure sales readiness must take into account the digital nature of our work world, where in-person interaction is now the exception rather than the rule. For the foreseeable future, leads no longer come in via live events, sales kickoffs are experienced through a screen, bootcamps and on-boarding new talent take place over video, and training and coaching are done virtually.

Faced with this, there are some hacks that sales reps and enablement leaders can employ to navigate these new challenges and stay engaged and connected — with each other, their larger teams and the customer.

Master the all-important virtual meeting. Aside from being familiar with the features and functionality of videoconferencing tools like Zoom, sales reps and leaders alike must ensure they have reliable internet service, quality headsets and a proper background to make remote communications as seamless as possible. This is especially important with customer meetings, as distractions and technology hiccups can negatively impact the flow of the conversation.

Maintain clear communication and coaching. Clear communication is absolutely critical now so that sales reps are aligned and don’t feel like they’re operating in a vacuum. Sales and enablement leaders can help by keeping their team informed about the company’s approach to the new normal, new messaging and training. In addition, boost morale by recognizing accomplishments, whether in one-on-one meetings or in a virtual group setting.

Align with marketing. Collaboration between sales and marketing hasn’t always been easy, but it’s more important now than ever. By working more closely together, sales can benefit from open lines of communication with customers across all digital channels to find and nurture leads and tie into the marketing side of the sale cycle.

Support sales with technology. It’s imperative to support sales and keep remote workers connected with technology. For example, at Security Scorecard, we use Slack to send out daily selling tips, a new piece of content or a new top track that a sales rep used to communicate ROI. We also use technology to record sales conversations to help with on-boarding and training, and Mindtickle to reinforce reps’ product knowledge with continuous learning, refresh messaging and re-certify through virtual role play and assessments. And short training videos — maybe three to five minutes long — are perfect for driving home new tips and information that help the sales rep be successful.

Engage with the customer in the context of the new world. More than ever, it’s critical for sales reps to understand that the customer is going through their own unique situation, and the sales rep must be empathetic to that. Messaging should be very deliberate and delivered in a way that keeps in mind the customer’s own circumstances: Perhaps their budget has been cut or they’re working from home; maybe they’ve been told to go through a risk exercise. In short, time saved by not traveling to meet a customer in person should be spent on building relationships against the backdrop of this new normal.

Keep an eye on data, metrics and feedback to determine where sales enablement can boost sales velocity. Clearly, sales enablement can’t expect that tactics and strategies that worked before will work now to generate higher sales velocity. But determining what, exactly, to tweak is difficult to pinpoint without the insight gleaned from data, metrics and even the minds of those in the trenches. Start by tracking the four factors affecting sales velocity using this equation:

number of opportunities in the pipeline x average deal size x win rate
————————————————————————
sales cycle

The resulting value is the amount of money coming into the company on any given day or month. Tracking this number over time can help optimize sales processes and tactics, and highlight what kinds of enablement programs can have an impact. Outside of hard numbers, sales enablement leaders can also tap into the reps themselves. Surveys or polls can yield insight that helps fine tune sales enablement programs so that they work for more reps, more often.

Plan for the future. Engage with marketing and the entire sales organization to determine how enablement programs and strategy should be adjusted for the future. Explore how the market opportunity has changed and how to optimize account plans for new market opportunities. Reps can provide insight into how demand has changed in their territory, what the most frequent objections are, which channels perform best and the ideal customer profile. External information, such as from market research firms and investment banks, can also yield information to help companies plan for the future.

As we move forward, sales enablement leaders must prepare for more of the same. Taking time to optimize training and materials so that they work for a remote workforce and finding new ways to communicate and engage with the team and customer are critical if sales organizations are to continue to come out on top in our new normal.

For more information, check out my webinar, Sales Enablement Hacks: Keeping Remote Sales Teams from Falling Asleep Into the Next Normal.

Lessons Learned: Tales from a Virtual Business Review

Nick Salas on August 28, 2020

This month, we held our second all-virtual sales QBR (Quarterly Business Review) here at Mindtickle, and like the one we held last quarter, we had some successes, but more importantly some lessons learned. These points are what I want to focus on here in order to help fellow enablement professionals as they are thinking about executing all-virtual events, especially ones that hold as much importance to field reps as a QBR does. 

The Successes

Success #1: Gathering input from the teams is extremely important not only for setting the agenda, but also creating an atmosphere of collaboration. I sent a survey beforehand asking the field if they preferred two half-days, or one longer day of sessions. The consensus was that two half-days would be better, so we delivered sessions over two days, 4-hours a piece. This small change helped keep attention towards the sessions without getting Zoom fatigue. Also, using Mindtickle’s pre-built templates helped ensure that the content over the two days was aligned with the time expectations of the field. 

Success #2: Pre-work is just as essential if not more so than the actual QBR itself.  Work done before fosters engagement with the team that will help them get more out the session.  The pre-work we asked the field to complete included a series of videos highlighting each session with the following:

  • 3 objectives the participants can expect to learn as a result of the session
  • Best next action or takeaway that the rep can expect to take back to their territory as a result of the session
  • An opportunity to ask the presenter a question based on the topic they were planning to present

Completing this pre-work allowed the participants to get a glimpse of the agenda while providing context. An additional benefit is this drives more interactivity during the actual sessions with the built-in questions as pre-work.

Success #3: Another part of the pre-work was their response to a simple question: What do you want to learn at the QBR? We caveated that with the fact that we would not be able to address all topics, but I took the feedback and customized the topics to cater to the specific needs of the field. More importantly, as we prepped the presenters, we were able to verify that their topics matched the expectations of the team, which we further emphasized during our dry runs with each presenter.

Success #4: Having a theme for your QBR provides focus for the agenda, the speakers and the presentations. Last QBR, I wasn’t explicit or direct with a theme. This time, however, I made sure that our theme was emphasized in some form during each of the presentations. Additionally, the post-work we set up to follow QBR was specifically tied to the theme in order to reiterate the importance to the field. Furthermore, we put together role-play exercises so the field felt more confidence around that theme.

Lessons to Remember

Lesson learned #1: Keeping speakers on schedule and within their allotted times is difficult no matter how much you plan. But within a virtual environment, this is even more essential.  Although some flexibility is required, virtual meetings can quickly get out of hand in terms of time allotments, and it is important to moderate the time slots and keep presenters on topic. Always provide some buffer in the time allotted to each speaker and build that into your schedule.

Lesson learned 2: Ensure the team is engaged is a challenge regardless of how much you plan especially because of the volume of content and topics. For me, organizing sessions through a sales readiness platform such as Mindtickle allows other presenters and participants to review the agenda and enroll in individual sessions ahead of time. Also, I used quizzes and games tied to a leaderboard to showcase team members completed assignments and retained knowledge of what they learned.

Lesson learned 3: No matter how much you shorten the agenda, QBRs require a significant time commitment from the team. The virtual QBR is even more difficult because you’re either focusing on the video call intently or you’re easily distracted (e.g. emails, phone, etc.).  So remember to build in sufficient breaks for attendees. I like to fill breaks with small tasks and knowledge checks, but it is important that we give people TRUE breaks to let them take a breath and reset for the next set of sessions. 

Overall, a successful virtual QBR relies heavily on preparation from both the enablement team who is organizing the event, to the participants who will be consuming the content. Keeping the presenters aligned to the specific needs of what sales needs to know in order to sell more software is key. Knowledge fall-off is a real thing, and without a plan around reiteration and reinforcement, the topics will quickly be forgotten. If the presentations and topics are relevant, tied to a sales role, quick to learn, and aligned with the initiatives of both the department and the company, your QBR has a higher likelihood of success. The most important thing to remember is to have fun!

For more information, check out our Quick Start Kit for Virtual Sales Events.

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