Warning: Soap-box style rant to follow!
I’ve noticed three interesting trends in the B2B sales world recently.
#1 Sales roles are being further and further segmented, with higher degrees of specialisation and a spaghetti soup of acronyms to describe each function, from BDR, to SDR, to ISE, to GAM … the list goes on.
#2 What’s interesting is the buyers we interview for our Win/Loss Reviews are getting increasingly frustrated due to poor buying experiences, generic RFP’s and proposals, vanilla demo’s and a lack of any real value during their buying cycles. Much of the feedback we receive from these buyers falls squarely in the bucket of poor sales execution.
#3 The 3rd trend we’re seeing is a surge in interest from B2B sales companies in base level sales training. Not the fancy stuff, this is the bread-and-butter sales skills: How to qualify well, run an end-to-end sales cycle, negotiate without discounting, build trust and rapport etc.
As specialisation, automation, AI, machine learning and a million more tools and technologies are developed, are we losing the basic skills of professional selling? If so, where does the responsibility lie to master these basic skills?
With the employer?
With the sales professional?
With the industry?
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