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Most B2B sales include distinct buyer tasks, including recognizing a problem, evaluating and comparing available solutions, and selecting a supplier. They can also include anywhere from six to ten decision-makers. In short, it’s a complex process where traditional sales and marketing strategies are becoming obsolete, and sales reps are facing the challenges posed by digitally dominant buying behaviors.

Grabbing a prospect’s attention and keeping it long enough to secure their interest is often the most challenging part of a sale. But once you make that connection, the rest of the sales process can flow smoothly, as most people want to do business with someone they feel understands them.

Chatbots are most often associated with customer support, but they’re also an excellent tool for boosting B2B sales. With chatbots as part of your sales and account-based marketing strategies, you can engage customers with intelligent, context-relevant communications while offering basic query resolution. They’re also great for collecting leads and accomplishing many front-desk tasks with ease.

“No matter what you do, don’t pass leads directly to the sales team.” — Jon Miller, Marketo Data from a MarketingSherpa report indicates that over 61% of B2B marketers pass all leads directly to their sales team, of which only 27%, on average, are qualified. Lead generation is complicated. According to a survey from HubSpot, about 61% of marketers have reported generating leads as one of their biggest marketing challenges.

As any good salesperson can tell you, it’s impossible to help your client unless you know what they want. If you skip the buyer’s needs assessment, you run the risk of making assumptions about the buyer’s needs and offering a solution that misses the mark. So, after greeting a new prospect, assessing their needs should be your priority.

In years past, when companies have considered either onboarding business development reps (BDRs) or hiring a third-party provider of a professional business development team, they’ve made certain assumptions: • BDRs traditionally were viewed as entry-level roles that often led to sales. • Business development teams typically were not recognized as professionals in their own right, let alone the lynchpin to growing a business. That, however, has changed.

We’ve noted how COVID-19 has changed the way we do business. In the case of face-to-face sales calls, the changes that have occurred are largely permanent. For example, a McKinsey survey in November 2020 found that more than 75% of B2B buyers prefer virtual sales calls.

Since James Oldroyd's 2007 Lead Response Management Study, we've known that speed counts. The difference between a sales rep successfully connecting or not with a lead can come down to minutes. Oldroyd reported that reps who responded within five minutes were 100 times more likely to be successful.

Seven years ago, Forrester predicted that by 2020, a million B2B salespeople in the United States would lose their jobs to digital, self-service e-commerce. Today, two years since the COVID-19 pandemic forced a shift in sales activities—fewer face-to-face meetings, less travel and greater reliance on digital resources and virtual meetings—you may be exploring your B2B sales options. For example, customer-centric websites that include chatbots, calculators and rich content are helping B2B buyers to research and purchase without the help of sales reps.

People sometimes question whether B2B telemarketing and tele-sales are effective in today’s business environment. Yes, I am pleased to report that teleservices are still workhorses you can count on within your sales and marketing arsenal. In fact, they may be more important in 2022 than ever before.