The Challenges of Virtual Sales

Sales organizations are currently facing a number of challenges: taking care of their organization and employees, keeping the business running, supporting the changing needs of customers, and remotely managing sales teams working from home are just a few of them.

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From traditional to virtual.

Although we’re used to face-to-face sales, salespeople will still need to learn about and become familiar with online sales. To incorporate virtual sales into your sales process, it’s essential to provide (remote) teams with the right technology to make the transition from traditional to virtual sales. What challenges should be taken into account during this transition? We’d be happy to discuss them with you.

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1. Keep communicating with your customer.

The global COVID-19 crisis is causing rapidly changing circumstances and has led many companies to shift to remote work. We operate on a decentralized basis and have found that priorities can change quickly. This is hardly surprising, of course; everyone has to adapt to new working and living conditions.

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We’re seeing that customers are increasingly researching products and brands online before contacting potential sellers. Customers also decide when to engage in the purchasing process—namely, when it’s convenient for them. To retain and nurture customer relationships, it’s important to understand the changing purchasing process and support customers throughout it. How do you communicate with customers in times of change?

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• Every customer is different and has specific preferences. It’s your job to communicate through the right channels, in the way and at the time the customer prefers.
• Take advantage of real-time collaboration tools so you can work effectively and efficiently with colleagues and clients remotely.
• Make sure you take advantage of every opportunity! For example, use an advanced order management system and track all activities—such as emails and contact information—in a CRM. That way, everyone has an up-to-date and complete overview.

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2. Strengthen your sales team!

Sales organizations are also being forced to change the way they work: shifting from collaborating in an office environment to working remotely from home. As a result, sales managers have less visibility into their customers, which makes it more difficult to optimize forecasts and pipelines. As a manager, how do you ensure your team stays healthy while also guiding your salespeople in closing deals?

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• The use of automation can help build valuable relationships through data-driven insights. Salespeople can assess customers’ readiness to buy, enabling them to approach customers at the right time and in the right way.
• By recording the sales team’s current activities in a CRM, everyone has access to the right information. This makes it easier to make sound decisions regarding customers, accurately predict when pending deals will close, and reduces the time needed to log calls and notes. This leaves you with more time to focus on your relationship with your customers.
• Ensure strong and effective collaboration within the company and with partners. This way, you can support one another in this changing situation.

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3. Choose a sales tool.

As an organization, you need to review your sales processes. Now that sales teams are working from home, it’s important that they operate more effectively and provide better feedback. Unfortunately, the transition to this new way of working isn’t straightforward. Access to the right technology alone is not enough. Salespeople must do everything they can to continue providing customers with the best service. Customers need to know—and feel—that they are still the top priority, even in times like these. How do you ensure that your sales team can fully support your customers?

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• A 360-degree view of the customer provides salespeople with valuable insights, enabling them to reach out to and assist customers at the right time.
• Data-driven insights enable effective lead prioritization and forecasting, resulting in effective and efficient sales. Salespeople can increase their productivity by automating repetitive or data-driven tasks, such as data entry.
• Because the sales team works from home, it’s more difficult to keep them informed about internal communications or new product and promotional updates. With TMC Media’s sales tool, salespeople can easily stay up to date on the latest sales campaigns, promotions, and new solutions.

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