Trailblazing vision B2B customer engagement

Arthur Miller's 1949 play Death of a Salesman explores what happens when a salesman fails to accept the changes happening within himself and the society around him. When Arthur Miller penned Death of a Salesman no-one could have imagined just how pressured and complex the world of B2B sales would become – and how technology would change everything! B2B companies today struggle to build an operating model putting the customer at the heart of the business and mapping optimal, dynamic, intelligent customer journeys. Many companies are fighting against obsolete, fragmented technology, hugely competitive markets, ever-increasing customer expectations, social media and multi-channel outreach. This is coupled with a relentless drive to engage customers faster, deliver solutions faster and close deals faster, is leading to a fundamental shift in the world of B2B sales, marketing & customer success over the last decade.

Many companies try incremental change without the end vision of customer utopia - this is a recipe for major IT setbacks, internal ‘turf wars’, customer attrition, sales and marketing mis-alignment and CEO frustration. In short, B2B ‘sales & marketing’ is becoming increasingly chaotic making the need for clarity of strategy and tactical execution ever more important.

So, what does the next decade hold for B2B sales, marketing and customer engagement? 

Look to the future – The Augmented Seller

Come 2030, it’s easy to paint a picture of a robotic dystopia, where sellers will be replaced, dehumanising the nature of customer engagement. But will it really play out that way? I don’t think so. But B2B sellers today must realise that the best performance will be achieved through collaboration between human knowledge, big data, behavioural insights and repeatable machine logic. Technology will not fully automate the seller’s role; it will however automate certain skills and processes – the augmented seller. I spoke to this future at an event hosted by Artesian who are leading the way.

Yes, sales jobs will be redefined, and mundane activity undertaken flawlessly by intelligent customer engagement systems, but the biggest threat faced by B2B sellers over the next decade will be a failure to embrace the benefits technology can bring and embedding them within the complete customer lifecycle.

Five Catalysts for Change

Living in the future, I believe there are five key things that will shape the future of B2B sellers over the next decade:

1.      Simplicity from complexity

Thanks to advances in technology and the convergence of big data, AI, and machine learning sellers will no longer grapple with manual processes or be dogged by poor intelligence and insight from disparate (un)structured data sources delivered from proprietary systems and legacy technology. Indeed, the convergence of these technologies will become mainstream and B2B sellers will be furnished with accurate, reliable customer insights extracted and analysed from a vast wealth of sources, customised to their needs. This brings me nicely on to point two…

2.      Customer obsession

B2B sales success in 2030 will be underpinned by customer obsession. This is more than another buzzword – it is the essence of the Culture of top performing companies. It will become part of the seller’s DNA, and the epicentre of the role of sales, marketing and customer success with Sales at the vanguard. Customer obsession will become embedded deeply from the beginning to the end of every relationship – defining use cases, engagement touch points, processes and behaviours to share mutual value with customers – it will be a living, breathing relationship. Thinking with the future in mind, sellers today must start with the customer and build out from there – how to grow revenues via new customers, how to drive long term value from existing customers and how to turn customers into raving fans. Your customers are your biggest advocates and if you anticipate their expectations and deal with them authentically, they will create a Movement for your company. You could argue that Apple enjoyed this in the early days of the iPhone, as did HubSpot in the B2B space – educating their buyer on a new way of doing things, not just selling software.

3.      Sales is Science.

B2B Sales used to be an art form, however the evolution of sales as a science has already happened. As we move through the decade ahead, the pace of that evolution will pick up as sellers realise that gut instinct, hindsight, serendipity, luck, bluebirds and ambiguity have to take a back seat in the customer interactions of tomorrow.

Data is currency and therefore sales as a science is a necessity. This will not serve to dehumanise but instead upskill the human aspect of sales. With machines crunching data, finding prospects in target markets, uncovering opportunities, deciding how a customer should be onboarded, identifying risks and taking on administrative tasks the seller is free to focus on the uniquely human skills such as creativity, empathy and relationship building, but with deeper level of understanding, better prediction of outcomes and so on. Companies like Cloudapps lead the way providing unparalleled forecasting accuracy.

Organisations today must invest in the science of understanding their customers, and the future of their sales teams by adapting to changes, investing in technology and developing data-driven sales behaviours – the science of B2B sales. What does this mean for the Chief Revenue Officer – they can be confident of over 99+% forecast predictability – a platform of confidence, investment and growth.

4.      The Magical Convergence of technology solving real problems for sellers

Where the biggest transformation will come is where the convergence of multi-channel technologies such as AI, machine learning, data analytics and predictive algorithms answer real and immediate needs for sellers.

This will go much further than simply automating manual or repetitive processes for sellers. Technologies will advance to assist sellers at all stages of the customer journey for optimised success. Whether it be providing a pre-formatted pool of qualified leads, nurturing leads with automated hyper-personalised content, acting as a virtual assistant to answer queries or equipping sellers with accurate, actionable and up-to-the second relevant customer insights that put them in a prime position to close a deal. Seller and machine working together flawlessly and complementing each other.

5.      Social on Steroids

We already live in an age where one bad viral review can burn down an entire relationship. Social media puts an ever increasing onus on sellers to create and deliver great customer experiences. Brands are built and amplified on social media.

Over the next ten years social media platforms combined with traditional channels will become even more critical to sales success. Offering up opportunities to truly hear the voice of the customer – their expectations, preferences, comments and discussions, as well as accelerate sales cycles by amplifying their own voice and brand. My advice to sellers today is that they must catch on quickly to the fact that business metrics only tell a small part of the customer story. Start investing in technologies such as SoSell from Account Based Marketing (ABM) experts Agent3, that make use of social and the vast quantity of unstructured data out there to truly understand the customer perspective. To win, you are likely to be a recognised Thought Leader on social media using innovative tools…

The dawn of a new decade of opportunity

We are at the dawn of disruption and B2B sellers today must start thinking and behaving with the future in mind.

I wrote this blog to start the conversation. I would love to hear your views - what do you think the role of the B2B seller will look like in 2030? What will be the biggest disruptors in B2B sales, marketing and customer engagement over the next decade? What do you think organisations and sales teams need to do now to prepare and stay ahead of the field by 2030? What’s the biggest enemy of the future vision?

You can shape the 2030 vision and create your growth company of the future.