Sales engagement is the key to closing more deals, and it’s a huge part of any successful sales team.
But what exactly does “sales engagement” mean? How do you improve it? And what’s the best way to approach it?
We’ve got answers for you! In this post, we’ll walk through everything you need to know about sales engagement—including implementation steps, tips, and platforms.
What is Sales Engagement?
Sales engagement is a way to ensure your sales team is well-equipped to handle communications, from the most basic questions to the most complex challenges. It’s about empowering your team to have an engaging conversation with prospects so that every interaction has a clear path toward closing the deal.
Why Does Sales Engagement Matter?
Sales engagement is one of the most essential parts of a sales process. It’s the time when you connect with your customers, understand their needs and pain points, and build trust with them.
When your sales reps and potential customers interact, they can have different things to discuss. For example, they might talk about what products or services your company offers or discuss how much money should be spent on a product or service.
For these conversations to happen effectively, both parties need to feel comfortable with each other. If that’s not the case, your sales reps might lose the chance to move the prospect down the sales funnel and convert them.
With sales engagement in place, you can understand your customers better to create experiences that resonate with them emotionally. It also helps you determine what motivates your sales reps to work more effectively.
What is a Sales Engagement Model?
A sales engagement model is a set of strategies and ways of communication to help sales reps build relationships with prospects and close deals.
There’s no one-size-fits-all sales engagement model—every company has its own approach built based on their sales process, target audience, and business strategies.
Steps to Start With Sales Engagement
Sales engagement is a great way to make your prospects happy and ensure they keep coming back to you. Here are the steps you can follow to start engaging with your customers:
Step 1: Planning
The first step is to get your team together and discuss sales engagement strategies. What are you trying to accomplish? Is there a specific problem you want to address, or do you want to improve customer satisfaction?
You’ll also want to discuss what kind of sales engagement historically worked best for your company. Did you have customers who only bought from you every once in a while? Or did you have many new customers who weren’t familiar with your offerings at first? Historical data can help you understand who you should target next and what you should put into your sales engagement plan.
Step 2: Prospecting and Researching
Next, identify who you’re trying to reach and where they might be hanging out. You can use various methods, including email, direct messages via social media, phone calls, or face-to-face meetings.
Then, collect information about your potential prospects: their demographics, interests, goals, and challenges. The more data points you have, the better equipped you are for making informed decisions about how best to engage with your prospects.
Step 3: First Pitch to Prospects
After identifying your prospects and doing your research, it’s time to start pitching!
The first contact with a prospect is often done via email or phone call. If you send an email, try to make it personal by referencing something from their LinkedIn profile or website. Or if their business just got featured in a well-known magazine, mention it in the email subject line.
When making your first pitch, focus on informing the prospect about your products or services and what makes them unique. This isn’t the time for hard selling—they’ll know if they like what you offer and will be more likely to return your calls or emails if they want more information later.
Step 4: Lead Nurturing
If you’ve made a great first impression, you’ll want to keep momentum by engaging with your prospect. This is where lead nurturing comes in handy.
Lead nurturing is the process of keeping in touch with your prospects over time so they don’t forget about your business or lose interest before they become customers. You can do this by emailing them content relevant to their interests and needs—like product updates, industry news, and helpful tips—and then following up with them periodically to see if they need help with anything else.
Consider sending them a survey every once in a while to get feedback on how they like your products or services or what else you could be doing better.
Step 5: Closing the Deal
This is the most exciting part of sales engagement — where all your hard work and preparation come together, and you finally get to turn that prospect into a customer.
Make your prospect feel comfortable with their decisions and that they have everything they need for a successful purchase.
Step 6: Follow-up
After a deal is closed, it’s vital to maintain the relationship with your customer. This can be as simple as sending them a personal email thanking them for supporting your business. You can also follow up with a survey, asking for feedback on the onboarding experience.
Don’t bombard your customer with many emails — just being observant and showing that you care about staying in touch is enough to make a difference.
Tips to Level Up Your Sales Engagement Strategy
1. Diversify Your Outreach Channels
If you’re still only focusing on one channel, you’re missing out on the full potential of your sales engagement strategy.
It’s time to start thinking about how to use multichannel outbound outreach for maximum results. Your sales engagement should reach your prospects across channels (call, email, Facebook, LinkedIn, TikTok, forums, offline events, etc.) and wherever they are.
The trick is to tailor your message for each channel and use data points from previous engagements to help you better understand what makes sense in each context.
2. Always Deliver Value
If you want your prospects to engage with you, you should be a valuable asset.
Share content that helps your potential solve their problems and improve their lives. Aim to excite your prospect whenever you reach out to them to maintain their engagement and interest.
3. Use a Sales Engagement Platform
Using a sales engagement platform is the best way to communicate with prospects, manage all interaction touchpoints, and optimize your sales process. To improve your sales engagement, deploying a sales engagement platform is necessary.
According to Craig Rosenberg, Gartner VP Analyst, sales engagement platforms are rep-centric and built around email capabilities. “In today’s digital world, sales communications center around email, which is the most efficient and effective method for connecting to prospects at scale,” he said.
Forrester researchers also added that “sales engagement platforms play a leading role in optimizing and improving sales and revenue development, operational efficiency, and outcomes. These platforms and their insights are enabling revenue teams with a single pane of glass to work from.”
The question is, what sales engagement platform should you choose? Let’s move to the next section to find out.
Sales Engagement Platforms for Your Business
If you’re looking to grow your sales, you might be wondering which best sales engagement platform is right for your business.
The answer is simple: there isn’t just one. Each platform has its own strengths and weaknesses. The best one for you will depend on the type of products or services you offer and how much time and money you’re willing to invest in tracking and analyzing data from multiple platforms.
Consider these tools:
1. Revenue Grid
Revenue Grid is a revenue operations and intelligence platform that helps improve sales performance. It allows you to shift your CRM from the “view mode” to the “do mode” by giving you real-time visibility into your revenue pipeline, so you can see exactly where deals are at any given time and take action quickly.
Pros:
- A comprehensive revenue intelligence platform powered by artificial intelligence
- Include a set of tools such as data capture, deal guidance, team analytics, email automation, CRM integration, and more
- Optimized for B2B companies, organizations, and enterprises
Cons:
- Not an ideal choice for B2C businesses
2. Zendesk Sell
Zendesk Sell is a sales CRM software tool that helps manage the entire sales process, from prospecting to closing the deal. It makes it easy for you to get leads, track their progress, manage your pipeline, and close deals faster than ever.
Pros:
- Support typical CRM features like internal chat integration, lead qualification, and email marketing
Cons:
- Not revenue-focused
- Doesn’t support features like sales forecasting, pipeline visibility, and deal guidance
3. Pipeline CRM
Pipeline CRM is another CRM-based platform designed for small and mid-sized businesses. It offers unlimited storage for all company documents, data and communications, so you can easily access important information when needed.
Pros:
- A powerful tool for managing new accounts, keeping track of existing clients, and integrating with other systems
- Easy to add new fields and columns to track anything from customer service callbacks to social media posts
Cons:
- Not revenue-focused
- Not an ideal choice for large companies and enterprises
How Does Sales Engagement Software Work?
Sales engagement software is a tool that helps salespeople stay organized and up-to-date on their leads and sales opportunities. It’s like a CRM system but for salespeople.
For example, a sales engagement platform like Revenue Grid allows you to track your leads, contacts, and customers through a single interface. This means you can see everything about them — from when they first interacted with your company to what they bought — in one place. Hence, you won’t waste time on dead ends or follow up with people who aren’t interested in your product or service. You’ll also be able to build stronger relationships with prospects by staying organized throughout the entire process.
Revenue Grid also provides you with automated emails. You can create sequences of emails to follow up with prospects over time. These emails can be sent automatically or manually, depending on your preferences.
Apart from that, Revenue Grid gives you critical insights at every stage of your sales process. It unifies all your departments (sales, marketing, customer service, etc.) and helps identify what has worked and hasn’t so your teams can take action together.
Put Sales Engagement Into Practice
Sales engagement can help you increase your conversion rates and, ultimately, your bottom line, but it does take some work to put into practice. Keep in mind the goal here: for your prospects to end up with a better experience—and an increased likelihood of buying.
If you’re looking for a sales engagement platform to create a successful game plan for your outreach strategy, try Revenue Grid here.
