The unprecedented changes we are experiencing as a result of the digital revolution and commoditisation of products, services, quality and even pricing, mean we can no longer manage sales by processes, protocols or numbers alone – selling has become a thinking person’s game.

Sales operations are complex systems that involve many variables making it almost impossible to predict outcomes. Today, with rampant change, that unpredictability has increased in pace and impact.

To have a highly effective sales operation we have to move away from point solutions as a focus. Sales leaders, senior executives and their respective teams all have to take into account the many parts that drive success in sales. They need to evolve into thinking sales organisations, where people are taught how to think, not just what to think.

Trend 1: Sales management will look to drive costs out of sales

In 2014, sales managers are going to come under increasing pressure to drive costs out of sales. While being effective and generating more business will continue as the main focus of selling, cutting cost out of sales and selling at better margins are going to be the two primary challenges, as management looks to squeeze profits in a market that is somewhat stagnant. As a result there are likely to be five major focus areas including: sales managers redefining sales territories; looking for new and more efficient ways to service low-value customers; and a shift away from volume as an indicator of sales success to a combination of volume and value.

Trend 2: Telesales will have to make dramatic changes

With an increase in demands from more sophisticated buyers, telesales operators, who have traditionally focused on selling easy-to-understand commodities, are going to have to increase their knowledge base and learn to sell solutions to buyers who are more knowledgeable and have higher expectations. Telesales-people, long-time users of script-based formula selling, are going to have to improve their skills and develop more effective customer-focused sales skills that enable them to become problem solvers, rather than product pushers. This shake-up means a radical rethink for telesales operations.

Trend 3: Sales excellence managers will find their real role

Smart companies are dispensing with their sales excellence operations and incorporating these back into the sales management function as they now recognise the significant benefits of more centralised sales operations with the formal leadership provided by sales managers. This trend will see sales managers, who are and have always been responsible for sales excellence, face pressure to resume this responsibility and deliver sales excellence. In the process, sales excellence managers will either revert to their original role of sales-training managers or find themselves being deployed elsewhere in the sales operations chain.

Trend 4: Sales-training methodologies are going to change

Sales training is not going to disappear. However, it will change its shape. As the market becomes more complex and competition more virulent, salespeople will need more, not less, training. But they will also have less time to be trained. These two forces will make identifying different training methods the key to success. The trend will see companies reduce the cost of training by seeking a blended e-learning and class room approach, with in-field coaching rounding off the experience.

Trend 5: The move to micro sales segmentation

The complexities of selling in 2014 are going to demand a rethink on the part of sales managers. Relying, as they have in the past, on marketing’s broad-brush approach to segmentation is not going to cut it anymore. Sales are going to be forced to re-assess how to segment markets looking at non-traditional approaches beyond industry, usage and buyer types. In 2014, unless segmentation becomes tighter, almost micro-market focused, the opportunity to address the many individual expectations is likely to be missed and, along with that, any hope of a real competitive advantage.

Trend 6: The low-carbon economy sales opportunities

Despite many governments lagging behind in terms of creating and endorsing low-carbon policies and industries, forward-thinking organisations are taking the lead on creating low/no-carbon businesses and partnering each other. And it’s not just big business – there is a growing number of SMEs (small to medium enterprises) driving change, too. Rather than focusing on the cost of creating a low-carbon economy, the trend is seeing smart companies and communities looking and acting on the abundance of opportunity within new and existing markets, and seeing potential in its many forms.

Trend 7: The normalising of social media in sales

There is a trend for businesses to really ramp up their use of social media and in much more sophisticated ways. Rather than seeing social media as a tack-on to the marketing budget, businesses are now creating their own social media departments working with sales, marketing and other departments to create real-time content that is engaging, relevant and interactive. Prospects and customers have never been closer to businesses – they are just a click away. They can scrutinise companies as much as companies can scrutinise them. Social media is the window into the customers’ world. In 2014, sales organisations are going to tap into these systems and listen and engage their customers more effectively.

Trend 8: A radical shift in sales mindset

There is a trend towards a radical shift in the sales mindset as prophesied by the Cluetrain Manifesto 15 years ago (including the predictions that markets consist of human beings, not demographic sectors; the internet is enabling conversations among human beings; companies that speak in the language of the pitch … are no longer speaking to anyone; and companies can communicate with their markets directly). With consumers in such a powerful position, products are no longer the centrepiece of the sale and value has become more important than price. The time has come for sales teams and everyone in their businesses to work with customers, helping them achieve their goals and, in doing so, achieving their own. The trend among smart companies is moving from competition to collaboration, from “me” to “we”. They are involving everyone across their business to be meaningfully connected in some way to their customers.

Trend 9: Procurement needs to become solutions salespeople too

Trends highlight how the skills, knowledge and mindset of procurement professionals are being expanded to include the capabilities of highly competent solutions sales professionals. The latest white papers, running commentary threads on Linkedin procurement groups across the world, and procurement conferences and education bodies are all pointing towards procurement coming of age as a value creator and provider. No longer can procurement rest its case on “lowest cost”, “cheapest price” or “supply of goods and services”; it must assume responsibility for the creation and delivery of real value beyond a price and general supply.

Trend 10: The legitimisation of sales strategy

Sales strategy will become the discipline for business in 2014 and beyond, as business leaders work out how to move their sales operations from under the shadow of marketing and being purely tactical to becoming a strategic operation that works across the entire value chain delivering meaningful value and real growth. Sales strategy will take a lead position at the boardroom table. Sharp companies in 2014 will realise that selling is everybody’s business and that involving their operations teams and other support functions in customer interactions is a necessity, no longer simply an added value. As more and more people in the value chain become involved in selling and servicing, sales strategy will be required more than ever to guide effective action.

Trend 11: Learning to sell in the Asian Century

With more than a quarter of our exports going to China, we are already more reliant on that country for our prosperity than any comparable economy. We are China’s number one destination for foreign investment and a leading beneficiary of the education aspirations of its growing middle class. Yet many of our salespeople remain deeply ambivalent about the world-changing economic transformation of China and underestimate the need to be better prepared. In 2014, companies will come to recognise the need to develop deeper engagement with their Chinese counterparts – in universities, industries and government. More Australian salespeople will need to study, travel, live and work in China and speak Chinese. If they don’t, their organisations are going to find it harder to grow and almost impossible to compete with the rushing Asian avalanche.

Trend 12: The enlightened sales person

The new year will see a new kind of salesperson emerging. Companies have come to realise they need a new kind of salesperson – especially at the higher levels of business. The days of the flashy, aggressive “pitch master” or schmoozer are fast fading. Even some of the latest offerings in the ideal salesperson arena, including the contrarian sales challenger, will be faddish at best. Customers, particularly in the Australian market (and increasingly worldwide), are looking for a collaborative, more enlightened approach to selling. They are looking to work with sales professionals who bring in-depth knowledge and an understanding of how solutions can be applied, and work with their customers to co-create the ideal solutions.

Source from: Business Review Weekly

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