Judging by the constant stream of job postings in the Inside Sales Experts LinkedIn group, the market for Inside Sales talent in Europe is hot.

Recruiting a German-Speaking Inside Sales Specialist in (Reading, UK)
Looking for Dutch-Speaking Business Development Agents for an IT Co. (Barcelona, Spain)
Hiring Multilingual Inside Sales Reps Based in Dublin (Ireland)

Through numerous conversations with clients, we've been hearing anecdotal feedback about the challenges US & Canadian companies are facing when building inside teams targeting the European market: the more active role of resellers, hiring for sales/language skills, list & data sources, acceptance of phone & web selling, etc.

It’s 2012 and high time to revisit 9 predictions that Laurie Page and I made early in 2011. I thought it might be interesting to see how well we did.

We’ll be scoring our predictions like a 9-hole round using this point system:

1. No longer will the Inside Sales Rep be a “jack of all trades”. Roles will be clearly defined and measured based on specific desired outcomes.

   Segmentation/specialization is still a hot topic. We are seeing some hesitance on the part of smaller organizations to specialize but, for those that have adopted the strategy, specialization often leads to dramatically increased productivity.
   Score: Birdie

2. Data will become an integral component for predicting the likelihood of Inside Sales success. No longer will companies buy data from one vendor but rather they will create a network of data providers to deliver to them the specific information in their target markets.

   I actually think this problem got worse last year. People will invest in everything but data. If you got something wrong 30% every time you tried it, wouldn’t you look for a better way? Well, at least 30% of your database is bad and your sales and marketing teams have to work with it … not good!
   Score: Snowman

Many thanks to Peter Shankman for inspiring this post (see his Things I’d Like to See Happen in 2012). Here's a list of things I’m wishing 2012 will deliver.

1. May 2012 be the year we embrace social media for sharing - not endless self-promotion. I’m bored with hearing how busy and wonderful we all are. Aren’t we boring ourselves too? We can learn so much more from what didn’t go perfectly and how we adapted, improvised & overcame.
2. May 2012 be the year that Inside Sales Reps embrace the fact that they are “the new black” and show us what they can really do. Dazzle us – you have the skills, the knowledge and the support!!
3. May 2012 be the year of the least amount of public information about any of the Kardashians. (Copied verbatim from Peter’s list – because it’s my wish too.)
4. May 2012 be the year I figure out how to keep my business partner, Laurie Page, off a plane. If I don’t she is going to kill me…I know she is. Goodbye cruel world.
5. May 2012 be the year that Executives realize that to get the most out of your sales team you need to invest in them. That means training, tools, technology … and, oh yeah, you might want to pay attention to them once in awhile. (PS – forecast reviews don’t count. That’s torture – not mentoring.)

Recruiting, motivating & retaining great Reps is a critical component of any Inside Sales strategy. One thing that has largely been absent in the process is feedback from the Reps themselves.

With that in mind, I am very excited to announce the launch of a new research project with our good friends at Vorsight:
Inside Sales Motivation Research Survey.

We are asking Inside Reps (& reps only) to share 3-minutes on a web survey about what motivates them professionally and how their current role is stacking up. In exchange, participants will be entered into a drawing where one winner will receive an Apple iPad2 and another a Kindle Fire. For the full who, what, where & how please see this.

 
This is a guest post from Matt Heinz, President of Heinz Marketing a Seattle based marketing agency focused on sales acceleration. I saw this piece he had written on how to use Twitter asked if we could share it. I hope you find it interesting and useful.  Enjoy!

PS – I’ll save you some time… if your buyers are not on Twitter (and many of them are not) you can sally forth and do meaningful work or read on for future reference.  

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Twitter will never be confused with a direct response channel, but it’s still a proven and measurable tool for finding and engaging more prospects. Below are five specific tips to start finding more opportunities via Twitter. 

1. Follow your prospects

Create private lists of your prospects in Twitter, and follow them via segmented columns in HootSuite, Tweetdeck or some other tool. If you want to stay more “stealth” until you're ready to reach out and engage, you can add prospects to a Twitter list without actually following them but either way, knowing what your prospects are thinking and saying will help you: get to know them better, learn quickly what their priorities are and give you plenty of opportunities to engage at the beginning of their buying cycle.

"There's something happening here." That was the thought that went through my head when I learned that three folks I respect tremendously (Paul Roetzer, David Meerman Scott & Mitch Joel) are all reading the same book:

Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson.

My second thought was back to a piece of advice from Trish’s new ebook Sales Onboarding: the express route from hire-to-revenue.

So heading over to Amazon, I was blown away to see the Jobs book at #2 in the Top 100 Books (not just business books – all books).

I’d argue that if your perfect buyer cares deeply about:

• Products
• Marketing
• Innovation
• Entrepreneurship
  -or-
• Leadership

 
I recently participated in a conversation over at Focus.com: How can you create a culture where your employees feel comfortable creating content? The idea being, that the creation of content is now an organizational responsibility as opposed to just being Marketing’s.

At one point in the dialogue, I was sick of hearing what all the pundits think (myself included) so I threw down the glove and asked a Sales Exec to chime in. Well, Alex Shootman the Chief Revenue Officer of Eloqua did. His excellent response follows:

18 short months ago I was presenting to a room full of 200 or so Inside Sales Executives at the AA-ISP Leadership Summit.  I asked them the following:

The more I thought about it, the more unfair my final question seemed to me.

Your Reps are spending significant time, effort & energy trying to speak with prospects live.

When the great miracle happens and a prospect tries to call your Sales Line, are you making it easy for them? Are you sure?

Many companies have a department they’re not even aware of – Sales Prevention. It’s comprised of delightfully polite, yet ultimately rage-inducing auto attendant that prevent Prospects from reaching your Sales Reps.

The good news is that there’s a way to downsize the Sales Prevention Department. Here’s how:

• Dial the phone numbers listed on your website, booth, cut sheets, etc.
  Make sure you call the main line and the sales line (if they’re separate). This will help you understand the prospect’s experience.
  How quickly is the phone answered, if at all? If you have an auto attendant, is the Sales option 1^st, 2^nd,  6^th? Is the prospect forced to listen to a commercial before you provide them with routing options?