As part of Solutions Review’s Contributed Content Series—a collection of contributed articles written by our enterprise tech thought leader community—Nina Simosko, the Chief Revenue Officer at Revenue Grid, outlines how advanced revenue intelligence can help companies improve their sales operations.
In an increasingly fast-paced world, sustainable competitive advantage will belong to organizations that can intelligently leverage the power of data to make informed decisions and drive revenue. Before revenue intelligence software, sales processes were far from seamless. Manual updates to spreadsheets, extensive data entry into CRM systems, and the arduous process of running reports and creating pivot tables defined typical working methods.
The introduction of revenue intelligence platforms marked a major shift. Today, we can leverage generative AI to rapidly analyze sales data, a process that previously took a team of DevOps analysts a month or more. Inefficiencies, including manual processes and rep wrangling, led to lost revenue and negatively impacted the broader sales organization.
Revenue intelligence capabilities have been a game-changer, providing the tools needed to analyze data and structure insights for sales teams on the front lines.
Six Benefits of Advanced Revenue Intelligence
Sales teams that leverage advanced revenue intelligence platforms powered by AI can more effectively assess pipeline health, forecast revenue, and drive business growth in six tangible ways:
1) Real-time Signals and Insights
Siloed data across various platforms hinders efficiency. Automatic activity capture ensures relevant sales interactions from wherever they happen—Outlook, Gmail, Teams, Slack, Zoom, LinkedIn, DocuSign, or dozens of other places—are seamlessly integrated into the CRM, freeing up valuable time for sales teams and enhancing overall pipeline health.
2) Faster and More Accurate Forecasting
The challenges of aligning potential and actual revenue each quarter are met with advanced forecasting capabilities. By drastically reducing one-to-ones and leadership forecast calls, teams can spend more time on accurate forecasts, uncovering risks, and spotlighting lucrative deals. For example, at Revenue Grid, our revenue team can create forecasts for the entire company in less than an hour. In the past, this would have taken hours of manual spreadsheet work each week. Revenue intelligence makes forecasting more accurate as well.
3) Opportunities for Revenue Acceleration
Up to 42 percent of companies leave revenue on the table, according to MGI. Addressing revenue leaks becomes more straightforward with advanced tools. Revenue intelligence platforms can stop the loss of winnable revenue due to inconsistent processes and missing information. As a revenue or sales leader, you will likely create and share a forecast with your CEO. Sales-qualified leads will go to your account executives for a discovery call, who will multithread the account. The closed deal will go to legal for implementation, then to your customer success team and account managers.
While this process looks pretty failsafe, you will likely have five different playbooks: marketing, SDR, AE, renewal, and expansion. Every touch point is an opportunity for your organization to provide excellence. But it’s also an opportunity for your company to leak revenue through issues like a drop in conversion rates from inbound channels, an improperly qualified lead from an SDR, or errors in playbook execution. The right technology can guide teams to achieve greater impact.
4) AI-Driven Deal Monitoring and Coaching
Sales strategies should be generative, where calls, emails, and other sales data points are continuously aggregated and analyzed. Generative AI analyzes sales data points, providing real-time insights into opportunities. This functionality not only aids in deal monitoring but also provides sales reps with actionable playbooks.
5) Reducing Salesforce Burden
Sales reps spending excessive time in CRM systems is a red flag. Research indicates that 65 percent of an AE’s time is spent on non-selling activities. Revenue intelligence can free your reps from CRM chores to close more deals. Advanced tools powered by AI automatically capture various data elements, such as email communication and Zoom meeting highlights, and bring that data into Salesforce. This reduces the need for granular manual updates and allows reps to work within their preferred tools.
6) Cross-Departmental Collaboration
The impact of advanced platforms extends beyond sales to various business functions. SDR teams, AEs, customer success, revenue leaders, leadership/C-suites, CFOs, and marketing teams benefit from these platforms. Adopting an AI-powered revenue intelligence platform has significantly enhanced my role as a sales leader and the overall effectiveness of my sales team. Our sales leaders make smarter decisions, dedicate more time to coaching, and unlock hidden revenue opportunities.
We can no longer afford to live solely within our CRM systems, validating pipelines and manually updating deals. The right revenue intelligence capabilities allow sales leaders to focus on solving core business issues and maximizing revenue potential.