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Posted by Trish Bertuzzi on Fri, May 16, 2008 @ 10:15 AM
What follows is the first in a series of quarterly interviews we will be conducting with Inside Sales executives.
To qualify, you must be at the Director or Vice President level and manage 6+ reps. If you are interested in being interviewed for future postings, please send an email to Trish Bertuzzi at tbertuzzi@bridgegroupinc.com.
---------------------------------------------------- Featured Executive: Silvana Sears
Director of Inside Sales
FAST Search and Transfer, a Microsoft subsidiary
Silvana, how long have you been with FAST?
2.5 years How long have you been in Inside Sales and what was your background?
I have been in the technology space for over 20 years. All of my experience was gained through real world inside sales implementations at various companies.
- eCredit.com
- Salary.com
- Monster
- TeleSales, Inc.
- Corporate Software
How many people do you manage and what is their charter? I manage 13 Inside Sales Reps. They are responsible for qualifying leads for the field. They uncover and nurture opportunities and when the time is right, and the prospect is well educated, they set up a meeting for their field partner.
To be clear, these are not introductory meetings. We educate and qualify the prospect before we set up a meeting. Before the field is involved the prospect has seen a demo and truly understands our value proposition.
How much of your team’s effort is spent following up on marketing inquiries and how much cold calling?
Like so many other companies, our strategy evolves. We used to spend most of our time on inquiry follow-up but now I would have to say we spend 90% of our time on very targeted outbound cold calling.
Our target contact varies but typically we focus on the Chief Compliance Officer, the Chief Technology Officer or the Vice President of Interactive. Do you have any metrics you can share with us?
Absolutely.
We make 55 calls a day
Connect with 8 – 10 contacts
Have a quarterly team goal of 350 meetings
Of these …
68% make it to pipeline
44% close
What technologies are in place to support your team’s efforts?
CRM: We have used salesforce.com but now we are moving to Microsoft CRM.
Marketing: We use Eloqua as our email marketing platform and most importantly for lead scoring.
Contacts: To research and find contacts we use Jigsaw, Hoovers and OneSource.
What metrics do you capture and how do you use them to measure performance or make business decisions?
- Typical things like dials and connects.
- A certain percentage of their meetings have to enter the pipeline.
- Also, a certain percentage of their activity must come from target accounts.
Closed loop reporting is a challenge. Inside sales uses saleforce.com and the field uses Siebel. Using two systems is not easy as you can imagine.
What percentage of your team makes goal?
80%
How do you motivate your reps?
We have contests where we give away Red Sox tickets or ipods. We also have team retreats. Many of our reps are self motivated. We offer a great compensation plan! Six of my reps are going to Presidents Club this year!
We also offer a great career path. Two of my reps have moved in to field sales positions. Combine all of the above and it adds up to a challenging and motivating sales environment.
What does the hiring landscape look like for you? How are you finding the candidate pool?
The applicant pool is pretty good. I get lots of candidates through referrals, both internal and external. I think our compensation plan combined with our career path has a lot to do with it.
What do you look for in a candidate during the hiring process?
- Someone who is articulate but also possesses excellent writing skills
- Their mind has to be technically wired
- Consultative approach to selling
- 5+ years experience
Even though we don’t close deals, I like to hire someone who has closed before. I think this skill helps them do a better job on the front end of the sales process because they know what has to happen on the back end. I think it contributes to our high conversion and close rate.
If you had one piece of advice to give an inside rep on how to improve their performance what would it be?
Really understand the message and have a great elevator pitch. Make sure you know all about the competition and how to sell against them – many times Inside Sales doesn’t think this is their job but the front end of the sales process is just as important as the backend when it comes to positioning your value and setting the vision of the prospect.
What is your biggest challenge when working with the field, marketing or channel?
Field – Trying to get them to communicate and engage on a regular basis. How was the meeting, what are next steps, what can I do better? Their view can be unrealistic if a great communication vehicle is not in place…you have to be sure they don’t assume that every lead should close without any further education.
Marketing – You have to be careful or they can be out of alignment with sales. For instance, sales wants vertical messaging and marketing goes horizontal. Quite often Inside Sales can get caught in the middle of this situation if the inquiries they are working (which were created by Marketing) do not fit the expectations of the sales organization.
What issues would you be interested in brainstorming with your peers about?
How to ramp new hires more quickly! Even though I did read your posting on this topic, and I agree with you, I would like to talk to other executives about any methodologies or techniques they employ.
Posted by Trish Bertuzzi on Mon, Mar 24, 2008 @ 01:17 PM
(This post is the first communication, in what will be an ongoing series of Ask the Experts questions, put to members of LinkedIn's Inside Experts Group - request to join here. Whether you are a member or not, please share your thoughts and experiences by posting comments!)
Seth Gummere, Director of Inside Sales for Eduventures has a 2 part question he would like to pose to Inside Sales practitioners.
Background:
Seth's team is comprised of Inside Sales Reps that are responsible for setting meetings for the field. All face-to-face interaction is driven through this team.
Questions:
- If you have a similar model, what is the ratio of inside rep to outside rep?
- What methods do you use to drive an equal share of meetings for each rep?
Posted by Laurie Page on Thu, Feb 14, 2008 @ 09:21 AM
One of the services I provide for The Bridge Group is to coach Inside Sales reps on effective prospecting and closing techniques. This is the type of work I have been doing for technology companies for over 15 years and I thought I had seen it all...but apparently not!
I am starting to see a trend emerge that scares the heck out of me. That trend is for Inside Reps to use email as opposed to the phone. It makes me crazy knowing that reps have replaced having a conversation with a prospect to using email to communicate!
I understand email is a viable tool, and if used properly, can be an advantage. I do in fact recommend email be used as part of the process. However, I've found it's overused, and in many cases has replaced human interaction.
We must consider the following:
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How do you initiate and drive the sales process via email?
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How do you effectively communicate your value proposition, conduct an in-depth qualification and handle objections via email?
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How do you establish a relationship and develop rapport?
Now don't get me wrong, prospects do respond to email, in some cases, more often than voice mail. Email is a great tool for:
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Helping to identify the correct contact
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Obtain a referral
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Schedule a follow-up conversation
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Confirm the details of a conversation
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Etc..
But it should be part of the process not the whole process! Email should NEVER equate to more than 20% of a rep's activity metric.
Lastly, don't get me going on all of the grammatical and spelling errors I see. Never mind the pure amount of information included... white papers, articles, demos, etc. It's almost like we are assigning the prospect homework!
What happened to providing appropriate information at various stages of the sales process? Nope, let's throw it all out there and see what sticks!
I can hear Inside Reps saying "I get better response rates via email." Yes, you do, but I bet they are mostly rejections and/or leads that are not fully qualified yet are progressed to the next stage. No wonder sales reps complain about the quality of leads they receive!
Now, I have to go make some phone calls. Thanks for listening.
Posted by Trish Bertuzzi on Fri, Dec 28, 2007 @ 08:46 AM
Always a raging debate...cold calling...does it work or is it a waste of time? Well, that all depends on how good you are at it!
Cold calling is a science and not an art form. Lobbing an occasional call out to a prospect with a message that is all about you will never work. Executing a systematic campaign that conveys a sense of urgency and communicates your value proposition in actionable sound bites will get you a 20% response rate. Oh, I can hear the screams now...20%??? Yes, you should be able to connect with your prospect at a rate of 20%. What you do once you make that connection is up to you. We have seen reps that have the ability to launch the sales process in a meaningful way once they have a prospect on the phone and we have also seen reps that are so unprepared they allow the prospect to say "no" before they even get started. What are the key ingredients to successful cold calling?
1. Focus only on those prospects that fit your Ideal Customer Profile (ICP). Take the time to define what your sweet spot looks like and then build a target list of companies that fit those parameters. Don't assume that just because a company is in your database they fit your ICP! 2. Execute a process that includes 4 touches in 10 business days. Call, call, email, call. Don't fall into the trap of becoming an Inside Sales Rep that communicates primarily via email. Yes, I know people respond to you more via email but that is because they can blow you off easier. You can't control the sales process if you don't have the ability to ask relevant questions, handle objections and position yourself against the competition. You don't need a pen pal, you need a qualified prospect. 3. Always leave compelling voice mail messages of less than 90 words. 4. Emails should be text only, contain only 1 link and be as short as possible (for reading on a BlackBerry/PDA/SmartPhone). Also, emails should have no attachments and must contain a call to action.
5. For your final call, let the prospect know it is your final call.Also, bear in mind that just because the prospect does not respond immediately does not mean that your message was not absorbed. If they fit your ICP, put them through this process again in 6 months. Feel free to post any questions you may have. Or, if you have great voice mail messages or emails you would like to share, feel free to post them. We want to learn from each other!
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