I have spent a lot of time over the last 3 1⁄2 years working in the world of sales. There has never been a time when I have seen more change. New technologies, new ways of doing things, and new regulations all have an impact on how sales jobs are done.
What I am going to talk about in this article is sales intelligence. This is a subject that I am actually very pleased to be able to speak about because sales intelligence is something that I am constantly learning about.
So what is sales intelligence?
Sales intelligence is about collecting and using data to understand your customers. By collecting and using data you can develop insights into the customer that you have never previously had.
The data that we are talking about can be anything from data already collected about your customers (such as email database and Facebook data) to new data that you collect about your customers (such as sales data).
How is sales intelligence used?
In the real world, sales intelligence is used in a variety of ways.
- Salespeople
Salespeople make sales. That is what they do. They treat people in a certain way, they ask questions and they know how to pressure customers. Sales intelligence can be used to help a salesperson understand the customer that they are talking to.
This information can be used a) to understand the customer better and, b) to help a salesperson sell a product or service.
- Sales managers
Analyzing data helps sales managers to understand who their customers are and what they want. This information is often used to help a sales manager identify a target market.
The target market is a group of people (e.g. individuals, businesses) who you want to sell your product or service. A sales manager will typically do this using sales data analysis.
- Sales director
Sales intelligence helps sales director to understand their salespeople. Using sales data analysis a sales director can look at the performance of the salespeople.
This information can be used a) to help a sales director identify salespeople who perform better than others, b)to help a sales director understand their customers.
- Customer service
Using sales data analysis a customer service department in a business can use the information to help them understand how customers respond to products and services. This information can be used to help a customer service department identify areas of weakness or areas where they are doing a good job.
This information can be used a) to understand which products customers buy most frequently and b) to identify areas in need of improvement or changes.
- Marketing
Using sales data marketing can understand the customer. This information helps marketing to understand what customers want and to be able to create better products and services.
This information can be used a) to understand what the customers like and b) to understand what they do not like.
- Research and Development
Research and Development (R&D) departments use sales data to understand the customer. This information helps R&D to create new products and services that customers will like.
This information can be used a) to understand what customers like and b) to understand what they do not like.
As you can see sales data is used in many different ways.
The goal of sales intelligence is to understand the customer.
This helps us to be able to develop products and services that customers will love by using sales intelligence tools. This customer understanding helps to improve customer loyalty.
This improved customer loyalty helps to improve sales by being able to create more repeat purchases of products.
Improving sales brings benefits for the business and for customers alike.
How do you use sales intelligence in your business?
There are many ways in which sales intelligence can be used by a business.
We have identified a few areas in which sales intelligence can be used for a business.
How can you use sales intelligence in your business?
I hope this article has given you some ideas about what you can do with sales intelligence.