How to use AI to sell? Introducing the AI-driven sales process

Oh, AI. Think back ten years ago, and you wouldn’t think that Artificial Intelligence would be so integrated into almost everything we do. Not just tracking our Netflix preferences and Uber locations, but also how we buy things: I can tell Amazon’s Alexa just to order it for me, and the next thing you know, there is a package waiting for me the next day. AI has truly made it possible for machines to learn from experience and perform human-like tasks.

Studies have estimated that by 2030, 70 percent of businesses are likely to have adopted some form of AI technology within their business processes or factory setting. Makes sense, since AI helps with productivity and prioritization.

This practice is becoming more standard in sales too. In 2018, 21 percent of sales teams were using artificial intelligence. Why, you ask? Artificial intelligence is helping companies boost lead volume, close rate, and overall sales performance. That’s because this technology can automate and augment much of the sales process. As a result, salespeople are free to focus on what matters: revenue. Wouldn’t you want this too?

There are multiple ways AI can be used for sales opportunities.

Firstly, salespeople can use it to manage performance by identifying upselling and cross-selling opportunities, and simple tasks such as scheduling meetings. This is helpful for them because eliminating the not-so-proactive and repetitive tasks is important in making salespeople more efficient. AI assistants can also pull through prospective and existing customer data from internal files against key criteria or specified names.

Second, because of the predictive abilities of AI, salespeople can forecast sales and then manage customers based on personalized information. This saves time and can help them focus on the customers and hence, build more authentic relationships. On top of this, AI allows salespeople to focus their attention to read behavioral analytics and understand customer profiling.

Third, we know that analyzing big data can provide us with important insights into customer behavior that help us identify sales leads. This is part of prospecting: for example, the AI algorithm can provide an interaction history based on contacts and social media activities. These steps can improve customer retention and optimization.

That’s all cool, but how does this translate to the actual steps I need to take to sell?

In this blog series, we will be focusing on how B2B companies can utilize AI for their sales process. The process is based on the seven steps of selling or as known as the sales funnel. You may know the traditional framework for the seven steps of selling:

The traditional seven steps in selling framework — yep, it’s a long long process.

Prospecting: The first step is to find potential customers, evaluate prospects’ propensity to buy, and then qualify the leads.

1. Pre-approach: This is where the salesperson is doing his or her homework by researching more about the prospective buyer and providing personalized content related to a prospect’s interests. This is a tactic known as lead nurturing.
2. Approach: During this step, the salesperson builds relationships with sellers aiming to establish rapport and build trust with potential buyers. In addition, the salesperson gains more insight into whether and how a lead could benefit from his or her offering.
3. Presentation: This step is about showcasing the best of the company’s services and/or products by providing a prototype.
4. Overcoming objections: Clients may have concerns about the product or service, and this is the time for the salesperson to overcome any doubts that the lead may have.
5. Closing: Potential clients may raise questions about the selling company, delivery method, competition, or the price, product, or service itself.
6. Follow-up: The final step involves two different components: filling the current order and following up after the order is completed.

The problem with this manual and long selling process is that it’s incredibly time-consuming and tedious at every step, from prospecting to closing. Your time is valuable. What to do?

Added AI value to the traditional steps of selling. Find out how AI accelerates the process in our later articles.

Adding AI to the process can provide convenient solutions for salespeople. AI makes the sales process faster and smoother (and don’t worry, I’ll show you how in this blog series). Another big difference between the traditional and the AI-powered sales process is that steps 2 and 3 as well as steps 5 and 6 are merged. This is because the marketing and sales functions of B2B firms have become highly integrated.

In the upcoming weeks, I will be going through the AI-powered sales process more in detail to help you understand how AI can be used to improve and increase sales.

The next blog post focuses on Prospecting. If you don’t want to miss out on this topic, please subscribe to our newsletter if you want to get notified about the next article.

Originally published at https://medium.com on November 21, 2022.