Your buyers are self-educating themselves about your products and services
According to research by the Corporate Executive Board, nearly 60% of the sales process happens before a buyer will even contact your sales rep. If a buyer does contact your sales rep, they are more educated about your products and services and are farther along in the sales process than they have been previously, making the sales conversation more about product validation than selling value.
That means that in today’s partner channel, sales reps have to work much harder to compete at a later stage in the sales process. The amount of information and resources available to buyers has expanded with the digital revolution, giving them the ability to easily search and learn about solutions to their problems from wherever they have access to the internet. It has turned a value and solution driven sales conversation into a negotiation on price.
You need to infuse value back into your sales conversations
The premise of your business as a channel partner relies upon your ability to add value to vendor products and services, and all customer interactions should validate this. The interaction between a self-educated customer and a sales rep needs to enable an engaging and value-driven sale, not simply a financial transaction. The trouble is sales reps are often ill equipped to have that type of conversation. Especially when they need to teach the customer something about their business that they did not already know. This requires new ways of thinking about the customer problem and their idea of a solution. Learn more about that in our Using the Challenger Sale article.
Same old technology same old outcome
Today laptops are commonplace and many reps have fallen into the trap of always delivering their pitch with a presentation using Microsoft PowerPoint, SlideShare or Prezi from this trusted device along with the obligatory hard copies of marketing collateral. With everyone doing the same type of pitch, it is critical for your sales reps to differentiate themselves and demonstrate their expertise using technology that showcases your business’s wow-factor. In today’s tech-savvy market, the rise of mobile technology enables interactivity, sharing, updating and tracking. If your sales reps are not equipped with mobile resources, you will soon lose your competitive edge.
Enhance the sales conversation with the right technology
Whilst mobile technology hasn’t completely replaced the laptop, at least for now, it can easily replace a briefcase or trunk full of marketing collateral. A mobile device, like a smart tablet, can now be a sales platform from which to fold in your content. Being able to access content to share and review during sales conversation in an intuitive way, rather than searching for content on hard drives and folder structures, means that the sales process is more fluid and personal to the customer and helps to keep the discussion about solving their problems rather than jumping straight to a cost negotiation
A revolution of sales agility and mobility: introducing Xerox SMARTpad
We’ve been working closely with our channel sales reps to develop sales enablement tools that take advantage of the latest mobile technology and earlier this year we quietly launched what we call Xerox SMARTpad.
Xerox SMARTpad is a mobile sales enhancer; an app packed with exponentially valuable interactive content that has created a completely new way to for the sales rep and prospect to interact.
Downloadable via the Apple iTunes and Google Play stores it is supercharging the way Xerox mobilizes sales floors and field reps with the ability to find, position, and share content with prospects and customers.
Let’s be clear: Xerox SMARTpad is not a mobile content library, it is a fully interactive platform that walks sales reps and prospects through an educational and engaging experience. We’ve redesigned and repurposed product and services content such as interactive videos so that they can be touched, swiped and shared within the application. Sales reps are best when they are in front of a customer, wherever that may be, so mobility is built in – the Xerox SMARTpad can be accessed anywhere – at any time.
Being able to share the content the sales rep has been discussing with the prospect at a touch of a share button, drives immediacy to the sales process. This is sales mobilization, and those who have piloted the platform are seeing the immediate benefits.
What Xerox Channel Partner sales reps are saying about SMARTpad:
“Xerox really stays on top of giving reps in the field the tools they need! Today a customer wanted to look at the product line of B&W A4 MFP’s. It only took me a few clicks to get there on my IPad within SMARTpad!! I was able to bring up the ‘office product line’ brochure quickly and easily with no cell signal! No delays and kept on the selling path! That looks great in a customer eyes!!”
“The Xerox SMARTpad is probably the single best sales tool Xerox have released to the channel. Very impressed with it and the updates they keep making.”
Adding value for business and sales leaders
Making life easier and making sales conversations more engaging is effective – and impactful on its own. However, the tool also provides valuable insights for business intelligence and for leadership to make clear, confident decisions. Three major benefits are:
- Consistency in messaging; where complex technical information needs to be clearly articulated, a short video can give the same, clear message every time.
- CRM integration enables the ability to record activities directly to accounts and contact levels.
- Individual account sharing and usage tracking means that you can see how information is used.
Join the mobile sales revolution today
Do not assume that because this is an emerging technology you can put off deploying it until you are further down the road. In our competitive channel, you need to lead with innovation and differentiate yourselves with such value-enhancing technology today – or risk losing sales to your smarter competitor.
If you are a principal, marketing leader or sales professional – take the lead on this initiative. The Xerox SMARTpad technology is already helping channel partners differentiate themselves in a fiercely competitive channel environment. The best part is the Xerox SMARTpad application is free to Xerox channel partners – welcome to the mobile sales revolution!
Xerox channel partners can sign into the Xerox SMARTCentre to learn how to configure and use the SMARTpad app
- Get the Xerox SMARTpad app from Apple iTunes
- Get the Xerox SMARTpad app from the Google Play store
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