This week I had the pleasure of attending the AA-ISP Leadership Summit. Roughly 400 inside sales execs from a diverse group of industries were in attendance.
What an awesome learning experience. I thought I'd share some of the quotes, data points & perspectives that really stuck out for me.
When prospects blink
On average it takes a prospect 2.7 seconds to decide whether to read your email or delete it. If you think the subject line isn’t important, think again! Via Jill Konrath (@jillkonrath) BTW, Jill did an outstanding (and entertaining) job as keynote. If you looking for a speaker, certainly check her out.
Job descriptions have come of age
Rather than just being a recruiting tool, they should also be used to set expectations for reps. Categorize tasks/activities and assign them a percentage of the reps time. Also tell them very clearly what metrics will be used to measure them against those tasks. Via Steve Richard (@srichardv)
Sales intelligence
An analogy from Ralf VonSosen (@rvonsosen) of InsideView on the difference between sales data and sales intelligence: “More hay on the haystack doesn’t help you move the needle."
Wagging the dog
During his presentation, Kraig Kleeman (@kraig_kleeman) had a great line, “Pipeline cures all ills.” How true! Forecast is the tail end of the dog. Are we doing ourselves a disservice by having a majority focus on a minority of deals? Definitely something to think about.
Expectations > Rules
I sat in on Lori Richardson’s (@scoremoresales) break-out session. A point was made contrasting how Sales Reps respond to “expectations” as opposed to “rules.” Semantics, but it makes sense. As people, we are geared to meet expectations and resent rules.
Prioritizing leads (for people not machines)
Want a quick way for your team to prioritize their daily tasks in Salesforce.com? Why not ditch all the HIGH, LOW, A1, C2 code-speak? Simply use the task subject field- e.g. “close this deal” or “contact went dark.” Simple and brilliant! Got 50 tasks? Sort and focus where you need to.
Tools = time
Josiane Feigon (@josianefeigon) led a breakout on Inside Sales tools. A point was made that it’s interesting (or concerning) that we’ll spend $100K+ a year on a rep, but then cringe at spending another $300 a month to give them the tools to boost productivity.
Nancy Nardin (@sellingtools) made the point that there are 215 selling days in a year. If you can give your team back another hour a day, you just picked up another month of selling. Wow!
If you are an Inside Sales professional, you need to get your butt to this conference next year! Hope to see you there.
PS – if you attended and have more info to share, please head on down to the comments.