In this age of highly competitive markets, we have to be very smart and decisive in employing any and all means that can optimize our company’s sales: by creating an edge – and keeping it – amidst all competitors out there. Luckily, modern technology is here to provide us with the much-needed help in the form of sales productivity tools, all within our grasp.
Measuring Sales Productivity
There are two basic factors to look into when it comes to measuring sales productivity: Efficiency and Effectiveness. While some may say they are basically the same thing, there are certain distinctions which makes them important indicators of productivity.
Efficiency is the timeliness of doing the work, in such a way that time is not wasted, or if it cannot be avoided, then mitigated at the very least. In being efficient, all members of the team become more productive.
Effectiveness is the proper utilization of available resources. Being effective means being prudent in the use of resources, and maximizing it for use to its full potential. Proper allocation of resources means that all the needs of the company are looked after.
These factors greatly affect the sales productivity of a company. In order to fully maximize them, there are various productivity tools one can avail of. By doing so, one can maximize the tool’s potential which can bring about the best result for the company’s sales.
Significance of Sales Productivity Tools
Having a superb team is, ideally, all that it takes to make the sales of the company hit off the ground and become successful. Nowadays, however, the demands of the customers become more and more arduous and challenging, even for the best of the team members. This is where sales productivity tools come in – to be able to address whatever it is that our customers need in the fastest way possible, in the most efficient manner. According to Formstack’s 2022 State of Digital Maturity report, 51% of workers spend at least two hours per day on repetitive tasks, reducing workers’ efficiency. Sales productivity tools are made to address this by streamlining tasks that are often repetitive and attention-heavy, freeing some time off of the team members for them to focus on other tasks that require their attention.
In the global context, the productivity management system market size was valued at USD 47.3 billion in 2021, and is expected to expand at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 13.8% from 2022 to 2030, according to Grand View Research’s report. As can be gleaned from the report, the area of productivity management is seen to be expanding still in the years to come.
Let’s take a look at these productivity tools and see how they can help achieve workplace efficiency in the company.
1. Customer Relationship Management
Customer relationship management (CRM) is an avenue to manage the interaction that a company conducts with its clients and customers. CRM platforms show important customer data that can help the different departments of a company in formulating the best strategies to have better customer interactions and sales.
Here are some examples of sales productivity tools for customer relationship management:
Salesforce Sales Cloud
How it helps
This tool tracks any and all things related to sales in your company, such as calls, emails, meetings, and even pipelines.
What we love about it
This tool provides a centralized platform with regards to sales-related activities. It likewise encourages meaningful team collaborations regardless of where they are located in the globe.
Zendesk Sell
How it helps
Zendesk’s premium is the pipeline platform where team members can easily track leads and other sales activities. It even employs email reminders to be able to follow up possible leads.
What we love about it
The tool employs a simple interface, which makes it easy to navigate for users. Having to read data can be daunting, and this simple interface helps make the data digestible and easy to understand.
Pipedrive
How it helps
Pipedrive is especially useful for tracking sales activities, most especially the sales pipeline.
What we love about it
The tool provides a ready-template that one can easily customize based on the needs of the project. One can also set calendar notifications and schedules to easily keep track of the progress and the pipelines that need follow through.
2. Payment Processing
Payment processing tools aid businesses in the safe processing of payments of customers. Providing a secure platform to customers can help generate more confidence in the company which, in turn, can translate into more sales for the company. Here are some examples of sales productivity tools for payment processing:
Keap
How it helps
This tool helps in the online processing of the payments to be made by the customers of their respective invoices.
What we love about it
Keap, aside from providing means to process the payment of customers, can also be used to send reminders for payments to customers with outstanding balances.
Thryv
How it helps
This platform utilizes a tool that the customer can use for a secure mobile payment. Aside from this, Thryv gives the opportunity for the company and the users to schedule meetings without a huff with its scheduler feature.
What we love about it
Thryv is especially small business-friendly. It is great to know that tools such as this are made available even to the scale of small businesses to help them take a leap and go side by side with other businesses.
3. Sales Force Automation
Sales force automation tools help in automating often repetitive and scheduled tasks on periodic intervals. These tools also help in report generation and sales forecasting. Here are some examples of sales productivity tools for sales for automation:
Salesmate
How it helps
Salesmate is a tool that helps in building and maintaining connections and communications between the company and the customers. This features a shared inbox that can be seen by all the members of the sales team for easy monitoring.
What we love about it
Salesmate employs an email tool for personalized messages to customers. This way, the individual needs of the customers were considered and taken care of in every email that was sent.
Infoflo
How it helps
Infoflo’s premium is its tools focusing on the sales pipeline. It even has the features of project management and data sharing for easy collaboration of the sales team members.
What we love about it
This tool offers integration with other platforms such as Outlook and Gmail for better productivity.
Quickbase
How it helps
Quickbase’s trust is to remove clerical and administrative errors that can be easily remedied by automation.
What we love about it
One of its integrated tools, Quickbook, allows the integration of data from other Google-based platforms.
Final Thoughts
These tools are already out there and available for use to anyone who needs it. There is no one best sales productivity tool – this heavily depends on the needs of the company and what aspect it seeks to further enhance. Employing these sales productivity tools can be a big help in terms of enhancing the company’s sales, but ultimately, this should be properly combined with the team members’ efforts to see optimum results. (Related: Remote Sales: 18 Best Practices to Improve Your Strategy)