POWERFUL TECHNOLOGY-BASED TOOLS

The tools to engage and make your conversations more relevant to your buyers are constantly evolving. No longer do you need to have a trunk full of brochures or expensive and time-draining mailings. Today’s tech tools allow you to plan and deliver just what is needed for your buyers.

The tools for managing your entire sales process have streamlined paperwork and reporting. There are dozens of helpful lead-generation, customer management, reporting, and territory management tools now available.

One of the early adopters of technology to equip and monitor his sales team is Rick Wohlner of Precision Laboratories. Rick is in the agricultural chemical business—perhaps not what might come to mind when you think of quickly adopting technology. Yet Rick equipped his team with iPads and iPhones to maximize their impact with customers. Most of Precision’s sales conversations are with small groups, which makes the iPad an ideal tool for their salespeople to demo and share their literature, slide deck, and play-book. Through video, the sellers also bring the corporate experts into each conversation if needed.

Because technology-based sales tools are constantly evolving, whatever I write about today will be old news by the time the book is published. What won’t get old is a fabulous website resource, SmartSellingTools.com (www.smartsellingtools.com), where Nancy Nardin, considered the leading expert on sales productivity tools, provides details of marketing and sales software tools. You will also find up-to-date information and helpful links to other sales tool resources on the www.conversationsthatsell.com website.

My suggestion for utilizing technology is to use the tools your company provides to supplement your efforts. No tool is perfect, so extract what you can from what is available to you. If your company does not provide tools, then determine the tools that solve your main sales activity problems (tracking, data access, follow-up) and put them to work for you.