Introduction
For many companies, the sales process can seem like a black hole: what actually happens there? What do salespeople spend their time on? What do they do for each customer? It is a complex system of steps and tasks, and in the worst case, each salesperson has their own method and steps that they follow. This makes it even more difficult to get an overview.
But why do you even need an overview? Why can't each salesperson do as they please as long as they get things sold? Well, because there is a lot of optimization potential in a sales process that is lost as long as you don't know what's actually going on.
To give an example, we at FunnelBud decided to thoroughly review our own sales process. Fortunately, we already have a system with predefined steps that we follow for each customer, but exactly what those steps were, how much time we spend on them, and whether they could be done differently was less clear.
So we first made a list where we wrote down all the steps and then ranked them from most time-consuming to least.
The steps in FunnelBud's sales process
1. Demos - This is definitely the most time-consuming task for our salespeople. It's not just about the meeting itself, but also about the preparations beforehand, reading up on the customer's needs, and tailoring our presentation to each customer based on our pre-research and their needs.
2. Pre-research - When a potential customer contacts us, we always start by doing research to understand who they are, what industry they work in, and whether our solution would be a good fit for them. After the demo meeting, this is what takes up most of our salespeople's time.
3. Understanding customer needs ( e.g., initial calls before demo) - Once we know who they are based on technical data, we call them to better understand what they want to do and what their needs are. Everything is noted and saved so that we can return to it at a later date if necessary.
These conversations are usually fairly short, but it takes time to write everything down, and our notes include a summary based on our pre-research, their needs, and the system we are selling. It is after this step that we know whether our system would suit them or not.
4. Create quotes and summarize after meetings/demos - After a demo meeting, we send out a summary of what we discussed, the recording, and a quote. The vast majority of our quotes are standardized and do not require customization, which saves time.
5. Follow-up - Once the quote has been sent, we follow up regularly to see if they have any further questions or concerns. The email is usually a simple one, but it still requires us to read up before sending it to make sure we meet them where they are based on our last meeting.
6. Convince - Sometimes potential customers are unsure whether FunnelBud is actually the right solution for them. In such cases, we need to continue to understand their needs so that we can answer their questions and address their objections (if we already know that our system would not suit them, we will have mentioned this after the initial contact).
7. Researching customized solutions - In exceptional cases, prospects askabout special solutions or whether X and Y can be done in our system. This requires research and testing to ensure that we can actually offer it. This step is very time-consuming, but it is relatively rare for someone to want a special solution.
8. Support during the trial period - If the company starts a free trial period, they sometimes have many questions after testing the system. In that case, it is important to be there and perhaps do some further research. We let the salespeople take care of this step, and not support, because most questions are about whether the system would suit them, not technical issues.
9. Answer repetitive questions - These are questions that are obvious to us but not to potential customers. Most of these questions are addressed in the demo meeting and in the initial conversations, but sometimes they continue even after that.
Insights after listing the steps and what we decided
The biggest surprise after listing our sales process was how many steps were actually involved for each customer. It's easy to get caught up in the momentum when you've been working as a salesperson for a while, and you don't actually see how much you're doing for each new prospect.
The first thing we did after realizing this was to ensure that each step was truly relevant and important to the sales process. We concluded that they truly are, because the sales process involves so much more than just selling. Selling a product or service in the B2B world is largely about building relationships, gaining trust, and truly understanding the customer's needs. This makes each step an important part of the final sales process.
The next step was to see if we could streamline the process without compromising on quality. For example, we don't want to send out pre-written, fully automated follow-up emails, because it's important that customers feel that we are really there for them and that we refer to real questions or concerns they had.
However, we realized that demo meetings, which are the most time-consuming, could be made more efficient. A demo meeting is partly about showing our system and partly about answering their questions. If we can show the system with a pre-recorded demo that they can access directly on the website, it can both save time for our salespeople and shorten the subsequent meeting where we answer questions.
Conclusion
That's why we decided to test it out. Our website visitors and potential customers will have access to a pre-recorded demo, and if they still have questions after that, they can book a meeting afterwards.
We hope that this will both improve the experience for our potential customers, as they will have access to information directly on the website, and help our sales staff save time so that they can assist more potential customers.
