It's no secret that the events of the last few years have changed sales conversations forever. Video calls have replaced the majority of in-person sales conversations. And sales presentations and collateral are now almost entirely digital, not paper.
But does a shift to mostly digital, Zoom/Webex/Teams-hosted sales conversations mean your sales team is still effective? In some cases, not necessarily.
As with most other facets of our lives since early 2020, some sellers have had a rocky road to virtual sales. But there are ways for your sales team to be successful in virtual interactions with buyers. Keep reading to find out how.
Sales Teams: Welcome to the New and Better Way to Sell
So we know we need to train sales up on fully digital selling. But how?
Enter the digital sales room.
A digital sales room is a microsite that sellers use to collaborate with prospects and customers. It combines sales enablement tools with self-service buyer enablement tools. Think of a digital sales room as your virtual meeting room to engage with buyers—just more visually, more interactively, more engagingly, more immersively—AND more effectively.
The key to a digital sales room is that it’s customized. Each buyer and buying group gets their own personalized digital sales room. All of the resources, buyer comments, and other interactions in their site become a record of engagement over the lifecycle of the deal.
Still not convinced? Here are the top three ways a digital sales room will drive buyer engagement and more sales:
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Digital Sales Rooms Keep Buyers in the Moment
One of the disadvantages of selling over a video call is that it puts buyers to sleep. A small talking head in the corner of a screen is not the best way to engage a buyer. It’s difficult to see emotion, body language, and interact. Couple that with an endless stream of static PowerPoint slides and you’ll get: 😴.
If you want to master virtual selling, you must engage the buyers and make a solid impression. You must give your buyers something to see and click on that adds value to their buying journey and delivers somewhere to leave their comments in real-time. Your buyers need a way to send messages to other meeting participants, and somewhere to interact with you and your content.
Digital sales rooms offer this functionality because they are built for today’s virtual sales meetings. They enable the two-way communication style used in face-to-face meetings, as opposed to the one-way communication style used in so many video sales meetings. And, best of all: you get to see what your buyers interact with, or when they share the assets—so, you get great buyer intent. -
Empower Your Buyers
We know this may sound strange, but your sellers need to let go of trying to control the sale and “get on the same side of the table” as the buyers. Your buyers prefer to investigate your products and services on their own terms. Given the choice between booking a meeting with a seller and visiting a microsite that’s customized for their company, their unique challenges, their stage in the buyer journey, and their use case, many buyers will choose the latter every time. Your buyer’s digital sales room gives your sellers the opportunity to build a productive consultative relationship with the buyers. This is the “new normal” and it works.
Gartner predicts that 80% of all B2B sales interactions will take place on a digital channel by 2025. Why? Because buyers want more autonomy in the buying process. A digital sales room helps you rethink buyer enablement. You build a perpetual demand cycle that combines virtual sales conversations with the digitally driven self-service experience that buyers are demanding. -
Digital Sales Rooms Make You Smarter
Digital sales rooms collect data on seller and buyer actions and engagement.- Marketers and sales leaders can see which content sellers are sharing with buyers.
- Sales see the content buyers are viewing, sharing with others, and plenty more.
The result? You conduct better sales conversations, you meet the needs of your buyers sooner and more effectively, and you make the buying journey more collaborative and more enjoyable for your buyers—and your sellers.
Let's Chat Digital Sales Rooms
Regardless of current events, virtual selling is here to stay.
But virtual selling, to be effective, must be memorable, engaging and focused on the needs of buyers. And Modus, a simplified sales enablement platform, can help you get there. Click here to learn more about how a digital sales room can help you engage buyers and drive more sales for you. (And yes, this conversation will be held using our digital sales tips outlined above!)
