A recent article by sainted business consultants McKinsey pointed towards a shift change in the way organisations are approaching customer engagement through different sales teams.  Entitled “The end of the road warrior”, it highlights a baton change between the traditional roles of field and inside sales teams.

The article picks up, amongst other things, an interesting point on how a blended sales approach is beginning to be seen as the “new” sales model.

In many organisations today we see a two tier approach to sales with the traditional field sales teams servicing the high end, complex sales pipeline and the inside sales teams focusing on the lower value commodity type sales.

But this model is increasingly being deconstructed in favour of a more fluid approach to engaging potential customers. Certainly as organisations have looked to whatever means possible to attract new customers during the recent dry period a more flexible approach has become evident.

This approach brings with it benefits and potential hurdles alike. Firstly the major benefit is the ability to engage your potential new customers in a way they are most comfortable with. Instead of foisting them into a particular route because of the product/service or potential revenue they will generate it looks like sales teams are simply listening to their buyers and allowing them to gain the information they need through the route they believe is most appropriate.

This can only be a positive step – we here at Sales Engine have talked a lot about how the sales process should be buyer led and not sales led. As long your sales team are sophisticated enough to be able to deal with this then it is an immensely positive way to go.

But the main hurdle we see here is the murky old world of who owns the sale, and ultimately who’s claiming the commission!

You may not want to dirty yourself with this conversation but ultimately if a new way of selling is going to get you more customers and more revenue then it has to be good for your business and it has to be good for your sales teams in the long run. The organisations that will thrive will be the ones that can adapt fastest and best to these times and therefore grab a march in their market.

What is for sure is that the sales world has and is changing. Tough times do that to you and just as Marketing has been changed beyond all recognition in the last 5 years by social media, so too sales needs to adapt to a new world.

Tags: Bid Support, sales, Sales Engine, Sales Presentations

This entry was posted on Monday, May 17th, 2010 at 10:28 am and is filed under Bid Support, Sales Engine, Sales coaching. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.