Sales Enablement

As the reality of a current and future world where B2B buying and selling largely takes place in remote and digital formats sets in, sellers must evolve their skill sets, sales leaders must reimagine their go-to-market strategies, and sales enablement providers must increase the value they deliver to their customers. The pace of COVID-induced trends […]

The events of 2020 exposed both weaknesses and opportunities for wealth management firms. In 2021, forward-thinking firms will not only meet these challenges, but will move beyond them.

Many sales leaders employ, tolerate, and enable high-maintenance sellers, because such reps yield a final product we value. But is this sustainable?

In Forrester’s recently published report, “The Forrester Wave™: Sales Content Solutions, Q3 2020,” we evaluated the nine most significant ones — Accent Technologies, Bigtincan, ClearSlide (a division of Corel), Highspot, Mediafly, MindMatrix, Pitcher, Seismic, and Showpad — against 40 criteria. After researching, analyzing, and scoring each vendor’s current offering, strategy, and market presence, we identified […]

As sellers face a prolonged remote selling environment, slower decision cycles, and myriad other challenges, sales enablement technology vendors are stepping in to help.

Most B2B organizations invest significant effort in customer feedback via customer advisory boards, but many fail to consider the same kind of insight from their internal sales team. Sales advisory councils represent a valuable opportunity for organizations to collect vital sales feedback on major strategic initiatives and identify any broad sales issues that must be addressed. Forrester’s own council is a textbook definition of how high-performing sales teams leverage a sales advisory council.

Sales enablement and marketing professionals interested in the current and future state of the sales enablement function should take this survey and be the first to receive results.

• B2B revenue enablement demands an understanding of the specific combination of personas, competencies, assets, and communications inherent to every buyer and customer journey
• As Forrester SiriusDecisions defines it, revenue enablement is a discipline that seeks to bring the skills, knowledge, assets, and process expertise to all customer-facing roles
• Our research shows that organizations with advanced capabilities around revenue enablement are more likely to outperform others still employing more siloed approaches toward optimizing their customers’ experience

• Pivoting to new messaging and content is a top priority in B2B at this time of global crisis
• To support shifting needs, cross-functional B2B teams must be flexible and nimble
• Content leaders and their teams are well positioned to provide strategy and resources to support the new normal

• COVID-19’s full impact is far from known, but its reach is unprecedented
• B2B interactions have been affected severely by the crisis, leaving sales professionals uncertain about how to proceed
• We offer a discussion on how to tell whether it’s too soon to sell

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

• Content must be treated as data to deliver on the increasing expectations of B2B buyers
• A modular approach to content is key to an organization’s ability to capture and classify valuable insights
• Marketers must be able to respond to customers in real time with content that motivates the next-best action

• Aging or antiquated tech stacks lead to inefficiencies, including manual or under-automated sales processes
• SiriusDecisions 2019 Technology Exchange focuses on data and technology for sales, marketing, customer success, revenue operations and revenue enablement
• Sales engagement platforms provide sales reps with superpowers by increasing their productivity and effectiveness, shortening sales cycles and boosting revenue

In this video, I introduce my latest report, “Building The Business Case For A Modern Sales Enablement Toolset.” This research features a customizable financial analysis of the ROI of sales enablement technologies, co-created with Total Economic Impact™ consultant Dean Davison. For more on the topic, Forrester clients can view my research here.

• B2B content marketers often struggle with the complexities of pulling together strategically effective plans
  
• Programs demand better audience focus with content personalization, but technology, process and regulatory challenges lurk
  
• On the occasion of Halloween, here are a few tricks to help unlock the secrets to better content planning

• Though sales enablement is making progress via competency-driven support for sales reps, other customer-facing personas receive less formal enablement
• B2B organizations vary widely in their approaches to enabling customer-facing associates, which can significantly affect the consistency of outcomes, scalability and measurement of impact
• In his Summit Europe 2019 session, Peter Ostrow shared how organizations can optimize their revenue engine by using the SiriusDecisions Revenue Enablement Framework

• Organizations frequently think of marketing, sales, service and renewal cycles as independent sets of customer interactions
• Customers are more likely to purchase and renew when their experience is consistent across all interactions with an organization
• Sales enablement is making strong headway via competency-driven support, but other customer-facing personas should receive similar enablement

• Revenue ops and sales ops leaders should make understanding the latest sales technology innovation part of their jobs
• Six key activities determine what technology can be leveraged for opportunity management
• Technology solutions can improve opportunity management by automating sales activities and informing, advising and predicting outcomes at various points in the sales cycle

We first published research on social selling in 2016, and B2B sellers continue to flock to various networks to interact with their customers and prospects. Social provides the opportunity for authentic connections, mutually beneficial professional relationships, and positive business outcomes for both buyers and sellers. But sellers’ inconsistent and boorish behaviors and a lack of […]