Author: Jay Mitchell



Joel Reed Sees 2 Parts to the Sales Excellence Equation

January 30, 2025
Jay Mitchell

Selling teams that achieve sales excellence translates to organizations that can realize sustainable revenue performance and growth.

We sat down with our expert principal Joel Reed, who brings extensive marketing and sales operation leadership experience, to talk about how B2B selling organizations can lead their teams to sales excellence this year. Read our conversation below.

Q: Our principals have been hearing B2B and private equity leaders fretting over how to achieve “sales excellence” this year. How do you define sales excellence, and why is this an important marker for revenue sustainability and growth?

Sales excellence is about achieving and exceeding revenue goals — month after month, quarter after quarter, and year after year. As a salesperson, sales excellence is all about you achieving your goals and meeting and exceeding your quota. As an executive, you need to think big picture about the entire sales force: Are they all following a consistent process and leveraging the leading practices to help exceed revenue goals? Are the outcomes predictable enough to allow me to invest in pipeline creation ahead of revenue recognition?

Achieving sales excellence comes down to having a consistent execution of the sales process and solid sales techniques:

  • Consistency of process leads to predictability in outcomes. And when you have predictable outcomes, then you can proactively invest in the outreach and realize growth.
  • The best sales techniques lead to a higher rate of success at each stage of the buying and selling cycle. Having a higher rate of success in each stage and building value throughout often leads to higher value in the deals themselves.

With a common process and leading practices, you will realize sustainable performance — and have better buyer satisfaction as well.

Q: Business leaders have been dealing with stagnant macro-economics over the past few years. With the recent election and geo-political dynamics, this year marks another point of significant disruption for the marketplace. What changes pose potential threats to reaching sales excellence and achieving sustainable revenue performance? What about the opportunities those changes create?

This year is going to be very interesting. The overall business environment is going to remain fluid, as it has been for several years. We are going to have trade policy changes. There is market volatility that is going on in many countries. Regulation activity continues to expand. And there is huge technology disruption again, and it is funny, because it seems like over the last 25 years, that is just been constant. All of this creates a lot of challenges for the buyers in defining and executing on their strategies, and it means that the salesperson is going to have to really think about how to navigate, and help prospects navigate, all those changing environments.

Sales professionals need to stay attuned to that macro environment and be extremely knowledgeable of changes in the markets that their clients are competing in — and they must be experts on translating and connecting the dots between what is happening in the market, what is happening in buyers’ businesses, and how your solutions can solve those problems.

It is not going to be a cut-and-paste answer. It is important that salespeople get very comfortable in addressing the changes that are going to be unique to every single business environment that you are in or you are intersecting with. Salespeople also need to be practiced in and ready to articulate confidently answers to buyer questions and objections. This all creates a huge opportunity for the most astute salespeople to differentiate and distinguish themselves by the value they can add throughout the whole engagement process.

Q: How should B2B leaders prepare for these market changes at varying degrees, from the organizational level to supporting their sales teams?

Sales leaders need to take a multi-threaded approach. First, at the most basic level, you need to get your sales teams access to the right research and resources that enable them to be viewed as knowledge resources to your buyers. Second, you need examples and scenarios that best leverage their solutions and services to help the buyers address growth and improve productivity. Third, you must align those sales scenarios to target markets, so that you give your team the best opportunity in every interaction to create value.

Then success comes down to practice. How do you enable that sales team with the knowledge and leading practices to support the buyer’s process? And what are you doing to facilitate their practice to be the best at what they do? Elite sports professionals practice, practice and practice. Salespeople need to practice as well. And like sports professionals they need good coaching.

Leaders unfortunately rarely receive training on coaching. The best sales processes include coaching questions for each stage to ensure process alignment and to reinforce the best sales techniques. The best leaders know how to coach in every interaction with their teams. Investing in the leaders has a multiplier effect on sales performance.

Q: What B2B leaders or organizations come to mind that exemplify leading practices for achieving sales excellence?   

In the past we have had a couple of Mereo clients set up their revenue kickoffs to mimic external trade shows, treating their salespeople as buyers. They set up demo environments to show how the solutions would take care of a buyer’s specific situations and how they can create value for the buyer. They took the time to not just educate by lecturing about the solution but showing the sales team through a hands-on approach.

Other clients have built-in sales technique practice through role-playing in their regional sales training. They run them through actual sales cycles and mock sales cycles, giving them a chance to practice the craft in front of others to get feedback and increase their comfort level. Watching peers perform is often one of the best ways to learn and adopt techniques that improve your own capabilities.

Lastly, we have helped clients check that their sales process is aligned with the buying process, taking a step back and interviewing buyers and the sales team. This process yields so much knowledge about how buyers are actually buying and how you can arm your salespeople (and marketing team) to support them through those buying cycles — as opposed to just trying to push your sales process on the prospect.

Q: You have said in the past that a sales process is no longer enough on its own. Can you unpack that? Why do essential sales skills and behaviors matter just as much?

The sales process is foundational. It drives the consistency that I talked about in the first question, that predictability. But process alone is insufficient for you to meet and exceed your goals.

The techniques the sales team leverages as it executes that process — that is what enables the team to increase the conversion rates and the deal sizes. Does that salesperson understand the buyer’s industry? Do they understand the solutions? Do they understand the solutions and the application of those solutions in specific scenarios within that industry? When salespeople excel at the techniques, they foster confidence in themselves and, in return, in their buyers, helping to accelerate opportunities to close.



Make 2025 The Year of Sales Excellence

January 9, 2025
Jay Mitchell

This year our selling tools and data are more advanced than ever before. Our buyers are growing savvier and more value-hungry, expecting sophisticated customization and personalization in seller interactions. And, after a couple of years of stagnant macro economics, market indicators are for a more promising commerce flow emerging.

Every business leader wants their selling team to achieve sales excellence. Yet it is folly to think salespeople can meet and exceed their quotas without the right leadership, revenue enablement and coaching support.

If you want to make 2025 the year of sales excellence — and why would you not? — support your sales force with these three efforts.

SALES EXCELLENCE STARTS AT THE TOP

The chief revenue officer (CRO) is tasked with managing an organization’s revenue operations and leading the sales force to great heights. Yet, for as important and impactful a CRO can be in an organization, these leaders currently have the shortest tenures, averaging about 25 months. Turnover grew by more than 50% from 2022 to 2023 according to research from SBI Insights. This constant churn disrupts continuity and weakens overall sales leadership. How can a selling organization achieve sales excellence when one of their key leadership roles is in disarray?

The majority of CRO failings — missed revenue targets, quotas, revenue team turnover and more — we witness at Mereo result from misalignment. Many CROs come into their roles with a plan and approach that does not sync with the business. They are tactical versus strategic. They just focus on sales rather than the entire revenue engine, which needs to include marketing and product as well as account management teams responsible for revenue retention / expansion.

In order for CROs to support sales excellence from top-down, alignment is in order. Take the extra time in the first 100 days to develop a plan and an approach that fits with the organization and that helps the entire revenue engine run as effectively as possible.

SALES EXCELLENCE IS ONLY POSSIBLE WITH THE RIGHT REVENUE ENABLEMENT

In today’s evolving sales environment, the highest-performing salespeople will be experts on their buyer — and they will use that expertise to craft the most compelling value proposition as possible to shepherd compelling sales conversations with buyers. Fortunately, with more-sophisticated data sources, such as 6sense, Apollo and ZoomInfo, sales teams have more accessible buyer data at their fingertips than ever before.

This rapid access to buyer data empowers sellers to deliver personalized and tailored value propositions that resonate with each specific buyer’s needs. Failing to leverage these tools is not only a missed opportunity but gives competitors an edge. You can be sure they are using every resource available to win every sales conversation to earn the business, so you should too.

Armed with buyer insights, you can tailor value propositions based on situational dynamics, unique use cases and pain points specific to the buying organization and key decision-makers — connecting the dots to compelling, differentiated solutions. Build your winning sales proposition now.

SALES EXCELLENCE DEMANDS CONSISTENT SALES COACHING

Front-line sales managers today are stretched thinner than ever before. A decade or two ago, their primary role was hands-on coaching — joining “ride-alongs,” conducting account reviews and helping their teams rehearse sales calls. Fast forward to today, sales managers are often expected to focus more on reporting on team performance using the tools within their sales stack, like CRMs, which does not necessarily improve performance but rather enhancing forecasting and pipeline management — in theory.

Yet the most effective and time-tested way to improve sales performance and help achieve sales excellence remains in active sales coaching — running alongside sales professionals, participating in pursuits and carving-out space for meaningful coaching on best practices.

As a sales leader, you must find a balance between time spent coaching versus forecasting. Gong or Chorus, can help enable you and your fellow sales leaders to leverage AI-driven insights for more systematic coaching, rather than relying solely on instinct or anecdotal evidence. By combining the power of AI with traditional coaching practices, sales managers can bridge the gap between reporting and leading their teams to sales excellence.

SALES EXCELLENCE HELPS YOU WIN AN UNFAIR SHARE™ OF THE MARKET

Sales excellence does not happen in a vacuum or due to one salesperson being a genius or selling savant. Sales excellence can be achieved with strategic, concerted efforts and enablement from leadership.

Win an unfair share™ this year and achieve sustainable revenue performance. Give your sales force an extra boost with these 10 Revenue Accelerator training guides.

ENABLE SALES EXCELLENCE

Book a call with one of our revenue experts to discuss the heights you want to take your selling teams in 2025.



Driving Sales Excellence During Mergers & Acquisitions: A Playbook for PE Leaders

December 12, 2024
Jay Mitchell

In the high-stakes world of mergers and acquisitions (M&As), private equity firms often juggle the complexities of aligning diverse goals, integrating teams and merging corporate cultures — all while working to keep the revenue engine humming. The margin for error is razor-thin, and sales teams are typically on the frontlines, tasked with delivering results amid the turbulence.

And recent conversations with private equity leaders have illuminated key challenges many face in achieving sales excellence during these transitions. From Chief Revenue Officer (CRO) turnover to declining sales rep performance, pricing pressures, and disappointing win rates, the hurdles are both numerous and nuanced.

In this piece, we will cover what portfolio companies are struggling with most — and provide some time-tested paths toward maximizing sales performance and meeting growth objectives.

4 KEY CHALLENGES FACING SALES TEAMS DURING M&As

  1. CRO Turnover and Misalignment

    The role of a CRO is critical, especially in the assimilation following a merger or acquisition. Yet, many firms experience frequent CRO churn, which disrupts continuity and weakens sales leadership. Another recurring issue is a mismatch between a CRO’s skillset and the unique demands of the new organization. Too often, the problem they are tasked with solving does not align with their strengths or past experience, leaving a gap in strategic leadership of commercial operations.

  2. Sales Rep Attainment

    Achieving sales quotas has become a tall order. A leading private equity firm found that between 2021–2023 only 37.5% of their sellers achieved 90% or more of their quota targets. While some reps thrive in an M&A environment, many struggle, pulling overall team performance down. Private equity leaders must identify the most effective investments for uplifting underperformers or else reallocate resources elsewhere.

  3. Pricing Pressure vs. Pricing Power

    Price increases have averaged about 8% according to BLS to upwards 12–13% (according to same PE firm) over the last three years, but this trend is leveling out. Companies have been able to “justify” price increases under the inflation economic conditions that have engulfed the U.S. economy. As pricing power wanes, firms can no longer rely on pricing adjustments to mask revenue shortfalls. Instead, the focus must shift to demonstrating and delivering clear, differentiated value.

  4. Win Rate Volatility

    Win rates often serve as a barometer of sales health. In many sectors, win rates are slowing, raising questions about pipeline quality, lead qualification processes and sales team effectiveness. Are there fewer at-bats? Or are teams failing to close at the same rate? Sales leaders should assess the true quality of their leads and how well their sales force is prepared to take them on before they can begin to address these issues.

A PROVEN PATH TO SALES EXCELLENCE

Amid these challenges, Mereo LLC offers a blueprint for achieving sales excellence during M&As. The solution lies in two critical focus areas:

  1. Strategy and Due Diligence Support

Successful integration begins with a solid foundation of strategic alignment:

  • Joint Value Proposition: Develop a compelling and unified value proposition that speaks to buyer needs and differentiates your offering.
  • Competitive Positioning: Identify and articulate your differentiated edge in the marketplace.
  • Solution Message Alignment: Ensure all teams are on the same page with a clear, resonant message for buyers.

  1. Sales and Marketing Assimilation

Unifying sales and marketing efforts post-merger or -acquisition is essential to driving synergies and results:

  • Rationalized Sales Process/Methodology: Standardize approaches to selling and buyer engagement.
  • Sales and Customer Success Enablement: Equip teams with the tools, training, and insights they need to perform.
  • Cross-Sell Plays: Leverage the combined portfolio to unlock new revenue opportunities.
  • Joint Buyer Profile / Personas and Buyer Journey: Map out the buyer’s path to purchase with insights from both organizations.
  • Marketing Campaigns: Launch initiatives that energize the combined brand and drive demand.

EQUIP YOUR TEAMS WITH TOOLS FOR SALES EXCELLENCE IN THE YEAR AHEAD

Private equity leaders must view sales force support as a strategic investment, not a checkbox item. Sustainable revenue growth is the most effective lever for value creation. By addressing the core challenges with tailored strategies and enabling teams with unified processes and tools, portfolio companies can accelerate performance and drive growth — even during M&A transitions.

🤝 At Mereo, we specialize in helping sales teams thrive during M&As through proven frameworks and tools. Book a 30-minute call to talk through the issues your portfolio companies are facing.

👉 Looking for tools to equip your sales teams with to achieve sales excellence in the year ahead? Look to the Mereo Revenue Accelerators guide, covering the 10 essential sales skills every salesperson needs to master for success.

Your sales teams are capable of extraordinary results — but they need the right guidance and support. Partner with Mereo to navigate your next M&A with confidence and deliver unparalleled value to your portfolio.



Can a Source of Urgency Be More Valuable Than a Sense of Urgency?

October 24, 2024
Jay Mitchell

Let’s face it — today’s buyers are often buried under competing priorities, internal resistance and constant demands. They may know they need to act on a deal but are weighed down by uncertainty. This can cause delays in deals, costing your business time and opportunities, and threatening to hold your buyers back. It is your sales force’s job to help them overcome this deal paralysis.

How? Today’s buyers often fail to see their pain points as critical enough to act swiftly. They may know risks exist in their status quo — but without a seller guiding them to see the full scope of their exposure, they may delay action indefinitely.

Instead of passively searching for buyers with a “sense of urgency,” sellers need to become the source of urgency. You are not just solving pain points — you are revealing them. Here is how to make it work in practice.

HELP YOUR SALESPEOPLE EMBRACE THE ROLE OF CHALLENGER — WITHOUT BECOMING “PUNKS”

Many B2B leaders are familiar with the “Challenger” sales model, which emphasizes challenging the buyer’s status quo to drive action. But for some, the word “challenger” conjures up images of an overly aggressive or confrontational salesperson, something no one wants to be. However, becoming a source of urgency does not mean becoming a “punk” or a pushy salesperson. Instead, it means asking the tough questions and bringing to light the realities that can compel your buyer to consider what is truly at stake and what they could gain from addressing their issues.

When your salespeople are persistent, when they poke at the buyer’s complacency, they may feel like they are being too assertive. But when done right, they can take on the role of a trusted advisor who is genuinely helping the buyer by bringing hidden risks to light.

Whether they verbalize it or not, buyers often wrestle with fears like, “Can I handle this project right now?” or “What will happen if I take this risk?”

Your salesperson’s No. 1 job is to help them see that not taking action is the bigger risk.

CREATE URGENCY IN EVERY STAGE OF THE SALES PROCESS

  • Prospecting: During prospecting, your goal is not simply to qualify leads who already feel an urgent need. Instead, you should help prospects identify what is at stake if they do not take action. Ask probing questions that uncover risks or challenges they may not fully realize. Instead of waiting for the buyer to recognize their need, you proactively show them what they could be missing.
  • Discovery: Discovery is a pivotal stage where you begin to dig deeper into the buyer’s situation — this is the quest of discovery. Here, you are not just learning about their business; you are uncovering hidden issues. Buyers may say they are doing fine, but through thoughtful, curious questioning, you can help them see potential business problems they have ignored. This is where you apply the concept of “status quo busting.” By revealing the dangers of inaction, you create an internal tension that compels them to move forward.
  • Proposal: When presenting your solution, do not just focus on features and benefits. Instead, tie your solution directly to the urgent problems you uncovered during discovery. Highlight the cost of doing nothing — whether that is missed opportunities, increased risk or falling behind the competition. Sellers who understand how to align their value propositions with their buyers’ pain points can accelerate decision-making.
  • Negotiation: Even at the negotiation table, you can create urgency. By reminding the buyer of the risks they face without your solution, you position your offering as the only viable path forward. Negotiation is not about price alone; it is about helping the buyer see that delaying action will cost them far more in the long run.

CONVEYING URGENCY AUTHENTICALLY WITH SEEK TO SERVE™

Today’s broader market climate would not be characterized as a hot market, where buyers are scrambling to solve clear and present dangers. And often is the case as the marketplace ebbs and flows. But in these quieter times, your salespeople’s roles are even more critical.

Instead of hoping they find the sense of urgency themselves, empower your salespeople to be the ones to show them why acting now is essential — be the source of urgency for buyers. This is not about manipulating the buyer; it is about genuinely helping them by revealing the cost of their inaction.

Being a source of urgency takes the highest caliber of sales skills. Elevate your team’s selling prowess with these 10 most-important individual performance drivers.

 

Accelerate Your Revenue

 



Top 3 Sales Skills for a Successful 2025

October 17, 2024
Jay Mitchell

This past year, B2B organizations have faced a challenging market, with a number of economic pressures and an overwhelming trend of deal paralysis. Looking ahead to 2025, there is cautious optimism that some of these challenges will lessen.

As a sales or revenue leader, you must empower your salespeople with the right skills and tools they need to serve buyers in the current climate — and for the future ahead. In the face of the known and unknowns 2025 has in store, you need to give your sales team the competitive advantage to win.

In this article, I share three sales skills your professionals should boost to ensure your organization thrives in 2025.

SALES SKILLS YOUR TEAM NEEDS

(1) Prospecting Prowess

Your sellers have to capture buyer attention in an increasingly saturated marketplace — all the while building a foundation of value and trust to help buyers see your solution as No. 1. Marketing plays a key role in the buying journey, but your salespeople can make or break a buyer once they are qualified.

To nurture prospects, salespeople must add value to all buyer interactions, even if no deal is on the near-term horizon. Salespeople must hone in on the buyer’s status quo and any obstacles keeping them from achieving their goals. Expert salespeople are knowledgeable about the market and can offer game-changing insights to buyers. To bolster your prospecting prowess, you must equip your teams to engage with potential prospects effectively and impactfully.

(2) Aptitude for Discovery

Helping buyers solve their most-pressing business problems is where salespeople bring value that resonates with the buyer and for which they are willing to pay. Without a comprehensive view of the buyer’s current situation and desired goals, developing a differentiated strategy aligned with the buyer’s pains is impossible. No problems to solve, no value to deliver, no sale. But when a buyer can effectively perform discovery that reveals and amplifies the buyer’s challenges, that is not just value-oriented selling — it is the epitome of selling.

To achieve this, salespeople should do initial leg-work to learn all they can on a qualified, target buyer. This keeps them from wasting time during buyer meetings by asking them questions that can be answered on their website. Then, they must engage buyers with strategic questions and meaningful conversations.

(3) Artificial Intelligence (AI) Literacy for Scale

As AI becomes increasingly popular in the workplace, some professionals may feel uneasy and uncertain about their future roles. While some fear AI will replace sales professionals, it will never replace great sellers. Instead of deciding how to replace your experts with AI, determine how you can partner the two.

Help your sales force learn how to leverage AI to scale their own capabilities. For example, instead of sales professionals spending two to three days researching a buyer account, they can use AI to streamline their process. As a result, the seller will have more time to do more-valuable tasks, like prospecting (see above). AI might not come naturally to every sales professional, though. Invest some time in helping your team know how best to use AI tools to make more-efficient work of their tasks.

BOOST REVENUE PERFORMANCE WITH THE REVENUE ACCELERATORS SERIES

Relying solely on your sales process for your organization’s revenue performance will hinder your success. As the buying journey becomes more complex, your salespeople need to bolster their skills to effectively compete in this competitive landscape.

With the Revenue Accelerators Series, you get access to 10 critical sales skill guides for each stage of the sales process to help your salespeople win an unfair share™ of the market.

 

Access the Complete Revenue Accelerators Series

 



A Revenue Kickoff without Activation Is Hope

October 10, 2024
Jay Mitchell

As we are in the thick of revenue kickoff planning season, I keep seeing a lack of foresight for follow-through. That is a real threat to your success in the coming year. Let me explain.

A revenue kickoff program provides the foundation for transferring knowledge and uplifting behaviors and competencies. Yet, once your revenue kickoff comes and goes, whispers from leaders begin to grow around the organization wondering: Did the kickoff make any difference? Was all that time and money investment worth it?

One single event is not going to move the bar much for your organization and not sustainably over the long run. Rather, the revenue kickoff — emphasis on kickoff — is the start of change, momentum toward future goals. Leaders must intentionally plan for how to activate the RKO program into actual practice.

THE ARC OF ACTIVATION

As your planning committee works out the details of the upcoming revenue kickoff, remember to make a plan for activating your teams. The following are core approaches to any activation plan.

Accountability

Once everyone leaves the sales kickoff fueled up to go after the vision ahead for your organization, to serve the buyer — it is up to you, the leader, to make sure that same fire behind the eyes is glowing come June, come October. You need to follow-up and ensure your team absorbed and is applying key concepts and messaging. Learn the approach of the Chief Reminding Officer for more.

Reinforcement

Is the sales kickoff your only time you get your sales team together? Or do you have a cadence of sales meetings?

Many gather their sales teams, at least regionally, for quarterly or mid-year meetings that spans half a day to a day to ask questions like:

  • What are you doing to meet our overall objectives?
  • How did you perform this last quarter?
  • Have the concepts you learned in the sales kickoff stuck?

Coaching

Along these same lines, learning is never one and done. It is a continuous journey – a lifetime for the most successful professionals. Seek-out opportunities for sales exercises and role-plays, for training discussions and practice sessions on one-on-ones or ride-alongs.

The onus of coaching does not fall on you alone as the chief revenue officer, but it should be provided by the organization. Empower your leadership team, and especially the front-line managers. Coach them to coach and take tasks off their plate that free them to invest more in the individuals on their team.

WHAT ELSE IS YOUR REVENUE KICKOFF PLAN MISSING?

Our revenue experts at Mereo have crafted The Ultimate Revenue Kickoff Playbook to help your planning committee hone in on and stay focused on what matters most in planning a program that will lead your organization to sustainable revenue performance.

 

PLAN AN IMPACTFUL RKO



3 Revenue Kickoff Trends to Follow in 2025 (and 3 to Ignore)

September 26, 2024
Jay Mitchell

As we gaze ahead to 2025, revenue leaders are looking to launch 2025 after facing steady headwinds for the last two years. The tension is palpable as ramping revenue rapidly often is predicated on more “boots on the ground,” but CEOs, CFOs and boards / investors are keen on growing revenue through a more efficient approach — where AI is viewed as the “secret weapon.”

What’s a revenue executive to do? And what role can revenue kickoff play?

New approaches, tools and processes for revenue kickoffs have been gaining popularity in this past year. And we at Mereo want to help guide you to three revenue kickoff trends that we believe will support your best kickoff program yet — and three things to go ahead and ignore.

KICKOFF TREND 1: REVENUE IS KING

The shift from sales-only kickoffs to revenue kickoffs started in 2023 and the “concrete is drying,” as the saying goes, on this go-to-market transformation for most leading selling organizations. More chief revenue officers are overseeing the full customer lifecycle — a cyclical process replacing the linear sales operations of days past. Selling no longer concerns salespeople alone. With the full customer lifecycle, organizations need marketers, pre-sale teams and customer success teams as informed, enabled and activated as their top sales professionals.

If you have not already, be prepared to expand your annual kickoff program’s guest list, and plan for wider-reaching content and more-focused breakout sessions for your different segments.

BUT IGNORE THIS:

Revenue growth as the only measurement of success for training is a slippery slope. Growth may be the primary measurement but not the only one. Profitability, customer acquisition cost (CAC), sales cycle velocity, win-rate, lifetime customer value and plenty more all contribute to revenue performance. Growth is absolutely critical, but be careful about making it the sole metric you consider.

KICKOFF TREND 2: AI PLAYS A ROLE IN SCALING

Artificial intelligence has infiltrated most selling organizations this past year and should be addressed at your next revenue kickoff. AI is not magic but it can help your organization scale. Encourage your teams to use AI for what it is meant to be: a tool in their toolbox. Integrate these tools into processes and operations that make sense. Streamline account research. Be smart about tactical prospecting. Reduce the overall cost of sale. But do not forget the power of the human element as you integrate AI into your organization. And after tapping into this tool, keep critical thinking as part of your processes to achieve successful value selling and sustainable revenue performance.

BUT IGNORE THIS:

Many continue shouting about the demise of the sales professional as AI hits organizations’ servers. AI should never replace salespeople — maybe certain activities but not the people. AI can help your organization work more efficiently so that you do not need as many sales experts on the team anymore, but the salesperson always has and always will be a vital part to the sales process.

KICKOFF TREND 3: THEORY WITHOUT ACTIVATION IS JUST HOPE

Most revenue kickoff programs focus on educating their workforce. They then pivot to enabling their teams with the right skills and tools. But for any knowledge-transfer and behavior-change to actually stick and make an impact on your revenue performance, your leadership needs to activate the professionals.

As Paul Stansik of Parker Gale Capital once shared with us: “For a sales kickoff to be successful, you have to sign up for the work that comes after. If training is not reinforced, it is not actually training — it is just intellectual tourism. It’s an expensive TED Talk.”

A kickoff activation plan gives leadership a guidepost for performance: Did your kickoff messages land? Were new skills acquired? Are the new solutions’ value being grasped and conveyed to buyers? When you create an activation plan, you also have a framework for holding your team accountable and reinforcing your revenue kickoff program throughout the year.

BUT IGNORE THIS:

Role-plays are often balked at by professionals, especially sellers: “We already do this,” “Role-plays aren’t real,” “This is a waste of time.” Do not fall victim to the chatter. Role-plays are essential to training and even more so for activation. Practice, practice and then practice some more. In professional sports, the previous season’s champions do not skip training camp. They do not get a pass because they won it all last year. If they are the right people, the standard has now been set and they are going to try to outdo last year’s performance. That necessitates practicing. Role-plays are practice for revenue teams.

PLANNING: A KICKOFF TREND THAT WILL NEVER GO OUT OF STYLE

Every kickoff program demands months of preparation to realize success. It is never too early to start. Our revenue experts at Mereo have crafted The Ultimate Revenue Kickoff Playbook to help your planning committee hone in on and stay focused on what matters most in planning a program that will lead your organization to sustainable revenue performance.

 

START PLANNING FOR SUCCESS



Domain Expertise Is the New Selling Must-Have

September 19, 2024
Jay Mitchell

Decades ago, salespeople could get away with being an expert on their solution and engaging buyers with how that solution will solve broad pains. But in today’s world of sophisticated selling, buyers expect a more-customized, engaging approach.

Recent industry data supports this shift too. A report from Sales and Marketing Management found that 67% of sales reps are not on track to meet their quota, while 84% missed their quotas in 2023. And SaaS Metrics Benchmark Report found that salespeople are losing about 75% of qualified leads. Wow. None of that is acceptable in any scenario.

Successful revenue training and enablement demands a deeper approach in domain expertise. That is not domain awareness or knowledge — but actual, genuine expertise. In the rest of this article, I will share what revenue leaders must equip sales professionals with to elevate their domain expertise to a level today’s B2B buyers demand.

GIVE YOUR SALES TEAMS AN EXPERT-LEVEL TRAINING

An ideal client profile is paramount in today’s selling environment. But buyer insights need to go deeper for true domain expertise. Your selling team should think more about buyer insights as taking a regular dynamic pulse rather than reviewing a static report.

To engage buyers as experts and trusted advisors, support regular funnels of the following insights to your selling teams:

  • Deep industry insights: Your salespeople should have an intimate understanding of the industry in which your buyers operate. They should understand the challenges and opportunities, and even better they should have more insights of what lies on the horizon to come. Buyers will take note of the salespeople who bring more to the table than they already know. In fact, buyers want their salespeople to deliver new insights and ideas.
  • Timely market pulse: Once your sellers have an understanding of your buyer’s broad industry, they need to have a focused know-how to the market — think trends, leading practices and regulations. Market research should be commonplace among your team. By following the ebbs and flows in the markets, your salespeople will be better positioned to serve your buyers with relevant and timely advice and guidance that could prove invaluable to the buyers’ decision-making and business outcomes by keeping them one step ahead of the game — and your organization many steps ahead of the competition.
  • The buyers’ unique experiences: It is one thing to understand broad buyer pains. It is another to be able to approach a buyer with an intimate level of insight into their day-to-day drudgeries and struggles. Through use cases and buyer stories, you can help your salespeople truly understand the harmful status quos your buyer puts up with and what that looks like in practice. With that deep knowledge, sellers can approach buyers in a way that helps them feel not just understood but actually seen. To take it a step further, help your salespeople adopt the buyer’s industry jargon and nuanced business language. Meet them where they are to be able to help take them to new and more-rewarding places. Empathy and language sync go a long way to connecting with your buyers emotionally and mentally.

ENABLE YOUR SALES TEAMS TO SHARE THEIR DOMAIN EXPERTISE WITH CUSTOMIZATION

Domain expertise can translate into a number of buyer engagements and approaches. In fact, with deeper domain expertise, your salespeople are better-empowered to customize the experience that serves a particular buyer best. The following are a few ways to enable buyers to best see those engagements through:

  • Customized solutions: Buyers want the value they need, not the entire kitchen sink your solution may offer. With a greater level of buyer expertise, your salespeople will be able to offer custom solutions that serve those needs, while also keeping an eye out for opportunities for cross- or up-selling where there is opportunity to add more value.
  • Higher value proposition: While your salespeople should be working from a consistent baseline value proposition, with their domain expertise, you should allow them the freedom to customize that value proposition to enhance the specificity and level of value for a particular buyer in your messaging.
  • More-relatable use cases: Use cases not only provide your salespeople deep insights to a buyer’s specific situation — they can help a buyer better understand their pains and envision how they could adopt and succeed with your solution in their organization. Have a variety of use cases available, but more-so allow a level of customization that helps salespeople highlight what will be most relevant and compelling to a specific buyer.

KEEP YOUR TEAM GROUNDED IN SEEK TO SERVE, NOT TO SELL®

When you practice a high level of domain expertise, you are practicing a form of Seek to Serve, Not to Sell® — an approach focused on delivering maximum value along the “moments of truth” in your buyer’s journey. This approach stands out in today’s selling environment and positions your sales force as trusted experts that buyers will turn to over the long-run for guidance and support. That in turn translates to sustainable revenue performance.

Download The Complete Sales Organization Guide to Seek to Serve, Not to Sell to empower your team to win an unfair share of the market™.

SEEK TO SERVE

Want to talk specifics about how to build a revenue training and enablement program that elevates domain expertise? Let’s get something on the calendar.



BARRY WITONSKY WANTS YOU TO FOCUS ON THE FUTURE TO MAXIMIZE GROWTH

August 29, 2024
Jay Mitchell

Revenue operations (RevOps) is becoming more recognized in organizations, but what does RevOps entail? What does 2025 bring for RevOps leaders?

We at Mereo sat down with RevOps expert and Mereo principal Barry Witonsky to learn more about RevOps’ outlook and what leaders can do to spearhead growth for their organization. Take a peek into Barry’s 10 years of experience with RevOps clients and see what he has to say below.

RevOps is a growing discipline within many B2B organizations that seems not to have one clear definition. How do you define RevOps?

RevOps includes several aspects, including marketing and sales performance, such as tools, data flows, sales data, territory design and more. It’s important to understand the scope of this role and prioritize tasks. Additionally, day-to-day reporting is crucial for leaders to monitor business performance. So, RevOps leaders have much to do.

It’s thinking through where to focus, where are the opportunities for more strategy, more planning — so leaders are not stuck handling the day-to-day stuff, but they can think about the future and help build towards a future. It’s about achieving goals.

RevOps leaders are always looking for ways to grow the organization, but this is typically easier said than done. What advice do you have for RevOps leaders looking to transform their revenue growth plans for 2025 and beyond? What innovative ways can they achieve this goal?

Barry: As they have a revenue plan, it is important to understand the metrics that lead up to their current revenue, such as the size of the market, the best source(s) for generating a lead and conversion rates.

Various firms will have different ways of measuring, but understanding those metrics is what is important. If they have that as a good starting point, they can then project out how to meet their goals, whether it’s for the given year, future years or both. From there, they can use a roadmap to gauge their performance against those things. And going forward, they continually look for ways to improve.

Mereo always encourages our audience to pursue sustainable revenue performance to thrive in good times and stay afloat during tough times. How is having an incremental revenue plan important to a B2B organization’s journey in achieving sustainable revenue performance?

Creating a forecast is more of a bottom-up approach that ties to those goals. By measuring how they’re performing to maintain the growth they need, they will at least have to maintain those current performance metrics. There are naturally going to be ups and downs. Not everything will grow in a straight line, but if they’re tracking well against that plan, they can understand when they’re off and what to do about getting better.

They can take corrective measures and changes by being aware of where they are against that plan if it’s related to growth, such as new training, refined messaging, adapting the techniques of the salespeople, adding salespeople, adding CDRs etc., to continually monitor where they are and how to correct it better.

Whether RevOps leaders plan one or five years ahead depends on their organization’s situation. But if RevOps leaders are not preparing for the future, what do they risk for their organization’s long-term success?

They’re risking the long-term success. The reality of the role is that you could certainly get caught up in the day-to-day fire drills and not spend as much time on the future as you should, so that is something to be aware of so that leaders can be thinking about what is in the future.

For example, if there are new products, salespeople, or geographies, all of those take time, and it takes time to realize the benefits. So, they have to backtrack and think about what they need to accomplish today so that in six months to a year they will reach those goals. It’s rising above the day-to-day issues and daily reports or board meetings or issues that come up, as well as short-term things that can take up a lot of time.

But you have to be mindful of spending time thinking about and planning for the future and then working on those things today that may not benefit you for some time to come.

Another important aspect of revenue growth plans is staying on track. How would you recommend RevOps leaders track their progress as they try to achieve their revenue growth plans? What metrics and KPIs are they monitoring?

RevOps leaders are typically given a number for growth over a set period. They have to break that into where the revenues and growth will come from. Normally, this is done through four to six routes, such as new logos and existing customers. From there, they think about the funnel. Once they determine what results they need from the funnel, they can think about how many opportunities that translates to based on the win rate. From opportunities, how many leads does that translate? How many contacts do they need to talk to get all that to happen?

This is based on the classic waterfall approach. Depending on the specific business, though, product-led growth may be the right strategy that changes what should be measured in a drastic way. If that is the case, different metrics than a waterfall-based approach is needed.

Once those questions are answered, they have a complete picture of where the revenue will come from and what it will take to get there. Then, they can start measuring and figuring out what needs to be done to meet their goals.

Amid market uncertainties and internal disruptions, it can be difficult for RevOps leaders to predict accurately how their growth plan will pan out. What potential challenges should these experts know as they work on their plan? Do you foresee any challenges or threats for 2025 specifically?

We typically start working with a company when they’ve been successful — but now they’re not growing. Or they are growing but are being asked to grow even faster, and they’re not quite sure how to do that.

Typical things to look out for would be stalling, not keeping up with competitors and the market economics. Project the trends and see if they have an issue and whether they can execute new products. This typically happens when best-in-class processes, GTM strategies, etc. are not in place. If this is the case, it can seem overwhelming to figure out where to start, but there is a way through this we can help with at Mereo.

I think there’s general optimism about 2025. Interest rates are currently higher, but there is a belief that they may start to come down, which could benefit organizations and help them better move forward. Also, there is pent up need for growth so companies are becoming smarter and more efficient.

Preparation is one of the many keys to a successful operation, but there is a difference between planning and taking action. So, what is the difference between creating a growth plan and developing actionable steps to achieving said plan? How do you help your clients with this question?

It’s one thing to have workshop sessions or to run a spreadsheet to create the plan. You can run the numbers all day, but then there is the, “Now we have to go out and execute it.”

When companies are converting from the board-level-approved plan to how to break that down, that is where we help them. They have to understand and determine their current metrics and KPIs tied to how that plan can be achieved.

We then look at whether the company has those four to six routes I mentioned earlier and which accounts will give them the growth they are aiming for with those routes. Then we help them figure out which teams they should be talking with more, where to reallocate resources, whether the market size is big enough and whether their teams are aligned. As a whole, we help companies align with these aspects to achieve their goals.

AI is becoming more common inside and outside the workplace, and many organizations are using it to gather data more efficiently. Are you seeing many leaders using AI to target key client accounts for growth? How are they using AI to do this?

We specifically have developed and are employing an AI tool that can analyze over 500 data points. That helps establish a better profile of good accounts. In the same way, it leverages that ability to look at that information to determine the best prospects that meet that profile. So that’s how we’re leveraging it, and not only is it better quality, but it’s quicker to arrive at that analysis from it.

With the right tools, RevOps leaders can leverage AI to know how their frontline teams are talking to customers and identify areas for improvement. Furthermore, when teams keep their CRM data up to date, they can use tools to help them better predict when a deal can close, what the team can do to keep it moving and offer recommendations for coaching.

The right AI tools can also boost productivity among teams. There should be a culture or environment where people can try new things, share them if they work, and be okay if they don’t. They should be encouraged to keep trying and pushing because so many capabilities are emerging, and everyone should be thinking about how they can leverage them to improve their jobs.

Make RevOps Easier by Closing More Deals

Deals are only a small part of RevOps, but they still significantly impact your organization’s operations. To confidently enter your deals and increase win rates, download a copy of the Derailing the Deal eBook.

Close More Deals



New Discovery Call Insights Stack Up Against Sales Decks

August 15, 2024
Jay Mitchell

Let’s eavesdrop on a recent phone call between a sales manager and her prized sales professional.

  • Sales manager: “We have a new qualified lead that I am assigning to you. Go meet with them and do an overview for them about how we can help them.”
  • Sales professional: “Great. Thank you. Excited to run through the overview with them.”
  • Sales manager: “Love it. The meeting is this Thursday, and you can use the refreshed slide deck with new solution details.”

Fast forward to the 30-minute meeting with the buyer. After brief introductions, the sales professional opens up the laptop and shares 42 slides with the buyer over the next 27 minutes, including how differentiated the solution is from other offerings in the marketplace and a detailed monologue on the solution features.

Sadly, the sales professional did exactly what the sales manager advised them to do. Meanwhile, the buyer tuned out after about four to five minutes and day-dreamed about the joys of peace and tranquility on a deserted island. Okay, a little hyperbole there, but if we are honest with ourselves and one another, that scenario is truer than we care to admit.

While our solution may be the perfect fit for the buyer and their use case, our task in the sales cycle is to help them understand their needs, pains and desires more clearly. In doing so, we position ourselves in a more favorable station where the buyer is more keenly aware of their problem (and, more importantly, implications of not addressing that problem and doing so especially right now), while we are able to contextually articulate the unique value proposition of our solution for the buyer.

YOUR SALES DECKS ARE DISENGAGING BUYERS

Sales decks have become the norm in engaging prospects on these first calls, but industry research and insights from the last few years are giving your salespeople’s decks a thumbs-down — no matter how well-designed or well-delivered.

Let me break down the insights.

Gong Labs, a data research team from the revenue intelligence platform provider Gong, noticed a correlation between using slides on discovery calls and a decreased success rate in sales cycles.

Their data showed that:

  • Seller questions dropped by 21%
  • Seller monologue went 25% longer
  • Sellers talked 15% more than the prospects

The thing is, slide decks can become a crutch for your salespeople — a rote pitch that salespeople should resist. Slides looming large on the screen can take over conversation, transforming the first call into a presentation your buyer is likely not ready for – a monologue if you will versus the dialogue the best salespeople covet.

DO NOT THROW OUT YOUR SALES DECKS — ADJUST THEM TO SEEK TO SERVE™

Slide decks can be the bane of your sales pursuits, or you can re-package them to spark a deeper conversation with your buyer(s). The reality is your buyer wants to hear about you some, too. In fact, their willingness to take the meeting was predicated on you providing a solution overview for them: “I would be willing to meet with your sales professional if they can share an overview of how your solution could help us, including a ‘ballpark price’ for the solution.”

That is not an unusual request. So, answer that question in your initial introduction and remarks with a simple Power Pitch that includes:

  • A generic pain (or tailored as best you can based on what has been uncovered during qualification discussions)
  • A high-level summary of your solution (think 8-10 words max)
  • The gain your solution provides (especially highlighting likely outcomes in scenarios similar to your buyer’s)
  • Relevant proof (again, ideally the value a peer has garnered from your solution)

If done well, you can articulate that information in a minute or so max, using picture-heavy slides to visually portray what you are verbalizing. And in the midst of that “solution snapshot,” weave in a discovery question or two that prompts the buyer to share their situation — to get them talking about their current state, what is working and what is not, as well as their ideal future state. Be inquisitive and let that curiosity energize the conversation as you genuinely demonstrate to the buyer that they matter and to serve them you need to learn more about them.

A leading practice for prompting this is to include some insights or statistics slides in your deck that convey industry benchmarks about performance. These set up natural questions like: “So how do you stack up against your peers?”

Lastly, include client value stories at the end of your deck, examples of your clients (peers of your buyer are the best) who have gone on the journey with you already and who are willing to share their testimony. These client value stories serve to both calm your buyer (“Someone else like me has done it”) as well as create a sense of jealousy (“We are going to lag our peers if we do not move on this now”). Between the questions and the client value stories, you are making a compelling case for why status quo is not even an option for your buyer.

ENABLE YOUR SALESPEOPLE TO SUCCEED

All in, you are looking at two to three slides in your deck, or maybe six to eight tops if you have more client value stories. Remember, the purpose of the meeting is not to “pitch” your wares but rather to ask questions that prompt your buyer on a self-reflective journey, while you guide and shape that journey based on your personal experiences with peer clients. Help your salespeople resist the itch to pitch with a Revenue Accelerator enablement guide. Download the how-to today.

 

RESIST THE ITCH TO PITCH