No one wants to talk about a recession because it sounds painful. Many also believe we can talk ourselves into a recession by wringing our hands over the possibility of one.
Successful businesses, though, are realistic. Right now, the tea leaves are rather ominous in what they reveal to those paying close attention. A recent article in VentureBeat, penned by Mindtickle’s CRO, Jeff Santalices, speaks on this subject from the sales professional’s point of view.
Rising interest rates, four-decade-high inflation, and a slowing economy continue to fuel fears of an impending recession. Many businesses suffer significantly during a recession, as demand for products and services drops and uncertainty about the future of the economy spikes.
While turnover is a worry across departments, it can be even more prevalent in a sales organization. Finding and hiring new reps is expensive and time-consuming. It’s the last thing a sales leader wants to deal with in the perfect storm created by a recession and a strong labor market. To avoid it, they must consider different ways to retain their sales talent.
Keeping talent today is a more vexing problem than ever. Despite dreary economic forecasts, many job openings exist across many disciplines, including sales. Santalices offers four ways to help retain sales team members so a business can avoid the high cost of replacing them. They include:
- Reinforce sales knowledge through personalized training programs and feedback processes.
- Emphasize training in empathy and handling objections.
- Maintain closer connections between sales and customer success to retain customers.
- Train your trainers.
Read the article to see how Jeff hashes out these ideas. He has some great thoughts.
Through the lens of document communication
Here at Airdeck, we think about these things as well. However, our angle is a bit different because everything we see in sales, and business in general, is through the lens of communication. In particular, your business documents.
Training, maintaining contact and coordination with sales and customer success teams, and keeping trainers up to speed on the latest and greatest in your industry all involve communication. In business, and especially sales, one of the primary forms of communication are documents.
From pitch decks to sales sheets, to proposals to contracts, and so much more, documents drive how a business functions. Good communication through documentation creates integrity in messaging and communicates clearly to prospects through all stages of the sale. It also gives sellers confidence that they are meeting customer expectations. This leads to sales that ultimately result in better personal and professional outcomes.
But, let’s face it. Most documents, like PDFs of case studies or whitepapers, are routinely attached to emails and then sent off to ‘do their job.’ Sadly, it is rare that these documents hit their mark. Potential customers receive tons of attachments and have the equivalent of ad blindness but with your essential documents. The electronic ‘circular file’ (or wastebasket for you old school types) is full of ‘communication’ that gets sent or forwarded and consigned to business oblivion.
So, what can you do to break this weary old habit and look different to those that could genuinely benefit from your product and service? It’s simple.
Elevate your documents
Make your documents come alive. Make them tell stories. Breathe new life into the most important stories about your offerings that are currently ignored.
Effective communication through documents is what we do for thousands of users of AirDeck. Flat, worn-out PowerPoint presentations, PDFs, and all sorts of other file types come to life with the addition of video, audio, visual directions, surveys, and detailed activity tracking.
Sales teams get excited when they see how they can communicate in a new and refreshing way that helps them win more business. Salespeople get a second wind when they know they have an actual advantage over their competitors. Not in regards to product, but in connection and communicating with the people they are selling to.
What are you going to do in your sales efforts? Are you going to look like everyone else so your talent can find another place to practice their craft? Are you going to do what you have done to ride out the storm and hope you come out well on the other side? Remember, hope is not a strategy.
Gain a competitive advantage
So prepare to help your sales teams outperform your competition in a challenging market. Being aggressive and different will help everyone move forward despite the naysayers. Someone has to survive and thrive on the other side of whatever lies ahead, so why not you?
Request a demo today. We’ll show you with your materials how you can look different, communicate more clearly, and stand out as a winner even when times are tough.
