The "New Normal" of sales: What has changed and how to adapt to this new way of working

The "New Normal" of sales: What has changed and how to adapt to this new way of working


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It has become evident that “business as usual” will not be resumed anytime soon. Until recently, the changes brought on by Covid-19 were thought to be a temporary adjustment — something we'd have to put up with for a few months before returning to commuting, offices, and face-to-face meetings. However, as businesses accept the fact that the current state of affairs may be the new normal, they must change their focus away from band-aid solutions and toward a new approach to organizational planning. It's time to adapt your sales organization for the environment we live in now for any company that relies on direct sales to generate money.

Here are four strategies for selling more effectively during the pandemic – and afterward.

Make sales the focal point of your plan. Have you changed the way your sales team goes to the market to accommodate new priorities? Most organizational strategy models either neglect or simply address the sales function in passing, instead of focusing on markets, goods and capabilities, initiatives, and so on.

In a good economy, this may have worked well enough, but in a tight market, look to your sales function to win business. Sales connect all of your offerings to the market, and sales are where strategy is put into action.

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Give sales the tools it needs to succeed by defining your ideal client profile, outlining the particular reasons customers will select you over the competition, and being clear on the challenges that will most likely influence customer decisions. For the most part, the epidemic has meant that there is less business to be won. Yet, as a means of increasing revenue, margin, or market share, this allows reconsidering not only what you're selling, but also how you're selling it.

Use sales to uncover and address new client requirements. Even if the economy has tightened as a result of the pandemic, there are still new prospects. Covid-19 has influenced people's lifestyles, resulting in new markets and sales opportunities. E-commerce sales, for example, have soared across the economies during the pandemic, with reports reporting rises of over 600 percent over previous years. Buying products or services online isn't just a one-time purchase for most of these clients; it's the start of a new lifestyle that introduces even more product lines to the market.

What additional consumer requirements can your company meet? This is an opportunity to learn about the challenges that are driving or limiting the use of your products, decide what other problems you might be able to assist customers with, and develop a strategy to capitalize on and adjust your offers. As everyone adjusts to long-term Covid-related realities, applying those insights can be a game-changer, not just for boosting revenue, but also for influencing strategic growth decisions on new product and service combinations, the optimization of your production process, and much more.

Increase the quality of the sales experience. Many firms adapted to the Covid-19 dilemma by transferring sales encounters to videoconference or phone. However, the longer-term potential is to reimagine how to use these platforms to improve, rather than just maintain, the sales experience – creating value and distinction with prospects and clients to make the entire process more engaging. Consider new ways to assist clients in recognizing difficulties and identifying opportunities they hadn't explored before. With video and phone, involving "Subject Matter Experts," installation or customer service workers, and other departments sooner in the sales process to provide deeper expertise and better insight is easier than ever. Involving company leaders with customers to fix problems and create higher-level relationships and executive sponsorship is also easy with videoconferencing.

In the Covid-19 world, it's time to examine how your sales experience may give value to potential clients as a significant component of your strategy. Create a sales experience that allows buyers to learn about the virus's difficulties and potential.

The shift to remote employment and virtual contacts may yield unanticipated time and resource savings, allowing you to boost proactive client engagement and build a whole new sales and customer experience.

While social distancing, don't forget to take advantage of the physical environment. As a result of Covid-19, your sales team will surely grow more digitally knowledgeable, and we'll continue to learn about new tools that will help us interact online. However, with some effort and forethought, you may make great use of the physical world during your virtual meetings.

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Final Takeway

Dealing with the effects of Covid-19 is still a struggle, but it might open up unexpected chances to improve the sales process with prospects and customers. Your sales strategy, sales experience, and customer contacts can emerge from the epidemic stronger than ever with smart revisions, planning, and a little innovation.

  • Written by Admin, 04 August 2021

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