How to Improve Sales Team Performance Using CRM Solutions

Customer Relationships Management software (CRM) solutions can provide an all-in-one solution to all things related to your customers. A CRM can serve as a wealth of knowledge for sales team members trying to connect to customers on a personal level to leverage their interest in your products. 

CRM software solutions give your sales team the right tools to bridge the gap between product and customer to build lasting solutions and promote customer brand loyalty for your products. With a centralized view of all customer interactions across all of your sales channels, a CRM solution ensures that your sales team doesn’t walk into customer interactions blindly. 

CRM solutions enable your sales team to interact more efficiently with customers and provide a better customer service experience. It also allows sales team reps to personalize their efforts based on the information about prior customer interactions to know which leads to follow within your sales funnel and optimize your CRM sales pipeline. 

A good sales team depends on the type of leadership and the chemistry of the sales team itself. The sales team must always learn to communicate and collaborate instead of competing. A great sales team must be well-trained, empathetic, great listeners, and able to multitask while providing quick solutions to your customers. A CRM for small businesses and enterprises offers excellent tools for sales teams. 

Below are some methods sales team managers use to improve communication and maintain a consistent level of customer care using your sales team. 

Role Playing

When introducing new messaging, don't train it by handing out a bullet list and talking through it. Get your reps comfortable with the messaging by acting it out in simulated prospect conversations. Some organizations go as far as to have a live role-playing "test" for new sales team reps to ensure they're comfortable using new messaging. But even if you don't go that far, use role-playing to introduce messaging and occasionally incorporate "refresh" sessions to keep it fresh and top of mind.

Scripting

Good sales team reps will use a word-for-word script. It's OK to give them messaging in a training environment that is written out - in bullet or paragraph form - but you can't expect them to use this verbatim in a sales pitch. It will come across to the prospect as wooden, contrived, and inauthentic. Instead, highlight in your messaging the keywords and phrases that are most important, and use role-playing to reinforce that these words & expressions are making their way into conversations.

Research & Examples

Want your sales team to believe in the new messages? Prove to them that it's accurate and will work with their prospects by backing it up with research and outside examples. Give them confidence that these messages will resonate with their prospects and help them sell more.

Conversation Tree Approach

When you structure new messaging for presentation to the sales team, consider putting it into a "conversation tree" format. In other words, map out the progression of questions or back-and-forth you'd expect will happen on the call. This will show sales team reps what messages they want to be used and how to introduce them into a natural conversation contextually.

Keyword Reminders at Each Desk

Even if you use bullet or paragraph-formatted messaging to educate & train the sales team, don't expect this same format will be helpful when they're on a live call and need a reminder. Instead, give your sales team something they can pin at their desk that focuses on the keywords. If trained well, these keywords will remind them "on the fly" of the broader messages, phrases, and themes they need to use on the phone.

Monitoring & Reinforcement

If you can do remote call monitoring, use these sessions to check for your sales team's correct and consistent usage of the new messaging. Afterward, call out those within your sales team who are using it well and anonymously cite examples where it may not have been used, with suggestions for how it could have been incorporated. This will reward those using the new messaging with some peer recognition while providing an ongoing training opportunity without calling out sales team members who may still be struggling.

With all the CRM software options available in the current market, selecting the right solution for your business can be overwhelming. Below are some popular CRM software for sales teams vendors:

Pipedrive 

Pipedrive is a customizable CRM solution that allows your sales team to carry out business negotiations quickly. With its user-friendly product interface, Pipedrive can be used from wherever your sales team may be with their mobile apps, all at an affordable cost. When your sales team can update the information immediately following a customer interaction, Pipedrive is a great solution to record agreements and customer commitments for other sale team members’ reference. 

Salesforce Sales Cloud

Salesforce Sales Cloud is one of the most popular CRM solutions, with its fully cloud-based functionalities to make remote work for your sales team more accessible than ever. With all the collaboration tools, your sales team can work like a well-oiled machine using Salesforce Sales Cloud. Your sales team can close more deals with efficient management of customer data. The opportunity management feature of Salesforce enables accurate lead scoring and assigns the right sales team rep at the right stage of the lead management process. 

To learn more and compare the best CRM software solutions for your sales team, visit our CRM software page to streamline how you manage and leverage customer data for better sales.