Chief Sales Officer

As sales leaders plan for 2021, leaning into data and insights will be key to success. Vice President and Research Director Mike Pregler explains why and dives into other action items for sales leaders in this week’s episode.

Against a backdrop of continued uncertainty, B2B sales leaders must forge a clear path forward. Learn what success in the year ahead will require.

Looking ahead to 2021, sales leaders mush shift from adapting to the “new normal” to proactively planning for the recovery and their “next normal.”

Amid unprecedented uncertainty lies vast opportunity for B2B leaders. Monica Behncke, Vice President, SiriusDecisions Research, explains in her introduction to Forrester’s SiriusDecisions 2021 Planning Assumptions.

• The Forrester SiriusDecisions Summit EMEA virtual event will be held October 6–7
• This year’s event is an integrated and immersive virtual experience that brings together live presentations, discussion, and analyst meetups
• We preview some of the sales-related topics that will be covered at the 2020 Summit EMEA sessions

Summit plenary sessions will include actionable insights about changing B2B buying habits and practical advice about how to create resilient sales plans to navigate turbulent times. Sales-specific track sessions will outline how to build a best-in-class outbound prospecting organization, how to select and implement a sales methodology, and how to adopt dynamic selling. technology

• The new work-from-home norm has challenged us to create an innovative virtual APAC Summit in Singapore this September
• For the first time at our the event, we will have a series of track sessions dedicated to the priorities of sales leadership in addition to the usual track sessions aligned to the priorities of marketing leaders
• We have four Program of the Year winners, showcasing transformative marketing initiatives through a series of fireside chats with our SiriusDecisions analysts

• The Channel Sales Leader’s Challenge aims to promote awareness of the issues channel sales leaders face in 2020
• Channel partners present a complicating factor — execution in indirect sales is mostly influence vs. mostly control for direct sales
• The channel comp paradox frustrates channel sales leaders and is impossible to capture as a data point

A fundamental approach to solving sales productivity challenges is to understand where reps invest their most precious asset — their time — and to address sales rep efficiency. Understanding why reps are spending time on non-productive tasks, and then freeing up that time so they can spend more time selling is a data-driven approach.

• Businesses whose teleservices reps are working from home are having to evolve how they engage with prospects
• Teleservices teams should use remote working time  to experiment with new approaches, connect buying groups in target accounts, improve product and tool knowledge, and polish their external appearance
• While marketing teams are adjusting programs and outreach plans, teleservices teams are focusing on documenting best practices, processes, and plans for next steps

• Devoting effort to revamping the go-to-market playbook and transforming the buyer’s journey might initially seem like a strange choice in a time of tightened budgets
• At this year’s Summit, Phil Harrell explained why now is actually the perfect time to create a new and improved buyer’s journey
• Keep an eye on the LTV/CAC ratio to increase efficiency and create a buyer’s journey that accommodates the preferences of today’s buyers

• Sales leaders maniacally seek to increase core selling time
  
• Organizations must feed sellers real opportunities, not leads
  
• Size your teleprospecting group adequately and set realistic expectations about output

• Despite compelling evidence that tight sales and marketing alignment drives superior business results, executives struggle to drive alignment between their functions
• 
  Sales executives can drive alignment by updating outdated stereotypes about the other functions
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  Establishing pipeline and revenue contribution targets for marketing is critical; without agreement on goals, all alignment efforts are doomed to failure

• Channel sales leaders must sharpen their business acumen and align their actions with the company’s strategy to gain internal support
• Today’s buyers and solutions are changing, making it imperative to increase the rigor around recruitment and determine whether current partners are the right ones
• Channel sales leaders must become trusted advisors to other company leaders — e.g. by providing peers with the data and insights they need to succeed

• Many emerging-growth organizations are using inside sales as a fast and agile way to accelerate revenue growth
• Mature organizations are using inside sales as a cost-efficient way to continue and expand revenue growth
• A sales leader should follow five essential steps to stand up the inside sales function

• Digital transformation compels sales leaders to benchmark the structure and efficiency of their organizations
  
• Cost-efficient revenue growth requires continual optimization of organizational investment across all sales roles
  
• As organizations grow and mature, sales leaders increase their percentage of inside and indirect channel reps relative to their percentage of direct field reps

• A year ago, SiriusDecisions’ Jeff Lash presented “’Twas the Night Before Product Launch: A SiriusDecisions Holiday Poem”
• Peter Ostrow continues the tradition with “’Twas the Night Before Year-End,” with an homage to sales enablement
• Best wishes from our pipeline to yours!

• B2B buyers are demanding a new and improved customer experience that enables them to quickly realize value from the solutions they purchase
• Sales leaders must look beyond closing the initial deal and focus on customer retention, growth and advocacy to grow revenue
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  Sales structures must enable customer-facing teams to deliver a compelling customer experience, and customer success should be viewed as a strategic growth engine

• Channel partner success is a product of preparation, planning and execution
• Ongoing monitoring and adjustment of the plan is a strategic imperative
• Nothing is more satisfying than accomplishing a mutual goal together