 So hello and welcome to this super office super charge webinar. We're going to talk about B2B sales And if the say of B2B sales teams going to survive the future, of course, they will but it's just a matter of how and In which way are they going to develop? So I'm here today with the Brian Anderson from Hadant warm welcome. Nice to be here Yes, so we're going to spend a few minutes here to chitchat about this. Yeah, super exciting topic and Just to be super clear from the beginning this is a pre-recorded session. So the chat function functions You will get the recording after the webinar and that we will also be participating and picking up questions after the webinar. So warm warm welcome and My name is Mattias on the force. I am Working with the super office. I'm responsible for our Danish and Swedish market and there are business there but I have about 20 odd years in sales management building developing sales teams and want to just share and maybe discuss some of the Important topics that we've learned throughout the day and over throughout the years and see where we go from here, but First a few words about yourself. Thank you. And then everyone so my name is Brian And I'm a partner at the company called about consulting So we're a very specialized management consulting only working with B2B Satan marketing My own background is more from marketing actually and then I kind of proved love sales as well and Particularly this time anemic between more heavy long deal cycle sales and also mixed up the e-commerce and all of these other things So yeah, we work with large Danish international companies on how to grow sales With a combination of sales. Cool. And we we came across each other and started talking about this exciting topic and Thought about maybe how about, you know, just recording a session to share some of the knowledge from but I'm consulting and also our Experience from super office. So why is why is B2B sales more complex than before? Yes, I think there's kind of two things happening, right? One thing is of course that if you're a sales guy today, you kind of push it from two sides Right, so all of the easy sales you used to do like the small transactional sales Going a lot of those has actually moved to e-commerce, right? So what we typically call transactional selling? It's just better to do yourself Yeah, and we see that in all industries, right? Whether it's medtech or software or whatever you do more on your own as a buyer And then of course the let's say the more consultative selling is becoming harder But it's actually the complex is becoming more complex. Yeah, because there's more people in the buying group So suddenly there's also finance of purement at IT and illegal So buying groups are growing. So you have to deal with more stakeholders as a salesperson, which is super difficult And then the last bit is of course that the buyer themselves They are smarter than ever because of this small phenomenon called the internet They have course educating themselves more than ever before That's what we see often from our clients that when the sales guy comes into a meeting Often the client actually knows potential prospect knows a lot about the industry the products and so on so yeah Pushed from both sides and the harder than ever to work in sales Yeah, and if we're gonna frame who are we talking to today? We'll talk about B2B sales Yes, we're not talking about transactional sales that is You know through digitally through web automatically. We're talking about more complex consultative sales Yeah, work, maybe a company has a product and a service Sales cycles are a little bit longer a little bit longer than we talk about maybe months and Yeah, as as also said, it's a different kind of value that's being there need to be delivered and perceived from the from the Customs side. Exactly. And I think it was never easy being in sales But it's just getting harder and harder and harder because of these things. Yeah So what what us how do you see what has happened? Within the sales organization how when you look at different different companies we super office We help companies on a daily basis With B2B sales and providing a platform for them to work better. We're not really going to talk about too much about that currently but What do you see from your perspective in organizations today how they develop and let's say yeah Follow them follow the flow with a with a challenge is an opportunity I think if you walk into most sales teams even just five years ago They would look more or less like this that everyone was kind of the same Let's say level of seller and they were typically divided into territories. Yeah, I do east of Denmark You do west of Denmark and I have a company car You have a company car and we ride around right and visit customers And then we hire someone in south of Sweden and then we expand like that and that was kind of the let's say That's how you organize sales, right because of a lot of the interactions were physical to be honest, right? So this kind of territory everyone is the same Sales organization has probably been the most prevalent way of organizing sales And then I think of course kick-started by Kobe But was underway before that was actually people looking at sales in a different way that hey If it is getting more complex, there's more buyers. We need to be more specialized as sellers probably to organize differently And that can be many different ways. It can be could be verticals, right? Let's say we have a hospital expert if we're selling to hospitals versus a I don't know a public sector expert anything where you kind of You put more knowledge into each sales person and make them more specialized and deeper Could be a different way of organizing sales, right? So you go from this let's say a Team of sellers where they're all kind of the same to a team that sells right where different people In the sales team have different roles, but they might be working on the same customer. I think that's the story I think broadly specialization and away from this traveling territory salesman That's like that's probably the the biggest change that's happening. Yeah, so it's more If you put together a team, it's more like you really need to look at the capabilities the attitude the The personal characteristics of each individual and how they serve the purpose of actually selling. Yeah, and I'm actually curious how you guys work with that because You know, we tend to bucket sales into yeah, here's the salesperson and everyone has this mental idea of yeah that lone wolf, you know Very charismatic going out closing deals But at least in my experience That's not how most salespeople actually are they can be many different types of salespeople How do you kind of put that team together? Yeah, if you look at super office and I think we represent we have a product. We have services We are working with mature companies that are fairly process driven and so forth So we the way we work kind of represent also our target audience in many ways and for us teaming Selling is a team sport. Absolutely. And the What we see today is that it's becoming if we're looking at new customer sales It's it's a lot more around Marketing collaboration with sales. So sales need to be a team player an orchestrator in many ways But also really really understand The buying cycle of order the buying behavior. I would say and the logic behind that from our target audience Today 60 70% of the buying cycle of the time Actually takes place when we are not interacting physically. We're in real life with our with our prospects and customers. So Our team needs to work more digitally be more adherent and observant and understanding the value that we drive During that, let's say first period Yeah, and once the sales team to get engaged from a presales perspective from a seller perspective Consultants are also part of that They really need to pick up where where let's say in the same With the same messaging and position positioning that has been taking place during the first 60 60% of the time That I think is the challenge. Yeah. So that they are actually aligned with Basic example, what is happening in marketing? We're going out and telling a certain story about our product the market, whatever You know, when we go to a prospect meeting, we need to be able to speak to those things, right? Because that might actually be what the prospect has seen, right? I have a great example of that from one of our customers who they sell to hospitals Right and in the past They used to go to hospital and they had an hour meeting and coffee Presentation and slides and so on now they go and they have 10 minutes, right because the buyer Has done all the research already. They know the different products They kind of know pricing and they kind of know distributions They know all of the things already because they've seen it You know the channels and that means sales. They need to really I should say be a part of that team where okay They can be slot on here, but there needs to be another team that does all the other work before it Yeah, you cannot build a sales team of only slot on so That's that's for maybe would be fun. Interesting at least Now but the one thing that actually struck me when because we're talking about touch points We're talking about the variable touch points and everybody or many work also with let's say digital marketing How do you let's say build value throughout the Let's say the buyer's journey And those touch points are of high quality today in many ways meaning that we have valid content That is really relevant for a target audience So I was I was in the car to this to our meeting here today and I thought about Maybe you know everybody this kind of explains how old I am but John Carlson the former CEO was Scandinavian airlines Yeah, yeah, he wrote a book that was called Reeve Bermidina tear down the pyramids maybe a Strange title, but one thing that made him successful with linear flue You know also sas was that he looked at what are all the touch? How do we deliver maximum value in all the touch points that a traveler traveling with an essay with sas Do meaning check-in baggage handling? You know boarding on the plane etc. So Because he was really focusing on that customer interaction and that kind of you know the The handover from the various steps. I think that's super important with b2b sales today That everybody that that kind of brings back to the team aspect that everybody's aware of What's the game plan? What's your role? What's the message? What's the value and who are we talking to and with and what actually is required to to be relevant and That I think is one of the biggest Developments and changes in the digital world around b2b sales today and I think kind of Exactly that when I when we look at kind of research of what are buyers doing, you know, clearly they're now spending less in this time actually meeting Where suppliers, which is tough, right? And that's the big mindset change. I think where the sas story there I think it really ties into What we're trying to achieve because in the past. Yeah, you had that one hour That was maybe most of the sales journey covered in one meeting Now we have a lot of small interactions. Like you said, you're checking in your baggage You're watching a webinar. You're doing things online. You're on linkedin. You're connecting etc So I think having that buyer journey mindset Is a really strong starting point, right? Like instead of saying, okay, what are we trying to sell to people? How can we help people buy throughout that buyer journey? Which might be very long and it is going to include a sales meeting But might only be at the very end. Yeah If we talk about I was thinking about the Toolings are there any let's say tools that are different today than before we talked about we talked in the digital world Yeah, exactly from your perspective. What are the tools that you see, you know Enhance what we talked about just I think in general. I think what is incredible with sales today is that You know, so I come from a marketing background and about, you know, 10 15 years in marketing We started to get really tech and tool obsessed, right? And every market here today spends time in serum analytics linkedin ad platforms It might have You know five to 10 technology platforms that help them do that work And that's great, right? And I think the same thing is happening in sales now, right that I think again, if you went back five to 10 years A lot of selling was still done in a very analog way At some point you had to maybe enter some information in serum, but you didn't use it to become more effective It was kind of a reporting type thing. My manager tells me to put opportunities in serum I do it. Yeah, right where I think the big thing that's happening to sales today is that Thinking about how can technology make me more efficient? So I can sell more effectively to more people at the same time So, of course, that's serum, right? But it's also using things like, you know, outreach platforms Linkedin is a more massive massive driver for any B2B seller, right? Both in terms of classic outreach, but also in terms of how can I make a position for myself? How can I not be positioned as a salesperson? But as someone who's knowledgeable in my industry who's an expert that you can ask things, right? I'm not just trying to sell you And you know some pencils and cups. I'm actually trying to help you achieve your goal. Yeah, so I think For me, those are kind of the two things. One is how do I make my back end more efficient? Like how do I spend less time building in Yeah, you're doing a bunch of manual work. How can I make that more efficient so I can spend more time Selling and when I'm doing selling, how do I kind of transition from I'm doing one to one selling? Like calling someone or emailing someone to sometimes also doing one to many I have to actually expand my reach to more people at the same time And yeah, of course, uh, you're right in the middle of this. So yeah curious to hear a little bit about how How does that actually play out in the real world? When you're implementing that in the real world, just look at the way we Just look at way as I said, we are a good reference to our target audience as well We see that if you're gonna if you're gonna support the whole journey meaning uh For a for a company that wants to reach out and sell to other businesses If you have a product and a service aftermarket service, you really need to have a A full 360 degree review on On the clients with the data meaning that you need to Know what kind of interactions do you have with them? What have you sold to them? What have you done all the activities and everything that goes on In order to provide a good customer experience Because at the end of the day you need to As a sales rep you need you need to you need to understand what is going on within your clients Today, even even if they are your existing customer or if you are to become customer You need to have more information. So we see that information integration and gathering that in a In in a platform of some sort CRM and Being able to utilize that in the processes that you're working with is is key and Processes are also another thing. It could be sometimes connected with negativity, but To be honest, if we're working today with let's say distributed sales teams, maybe geographically And in a very on-the-fly way that we do today Strong process support for your key processes when it comes to serving and selling to your clients is important So for us, I think the It's the combination of all the surrounding tools around social social platforms and whatnot With the let's say the strong process support with the with a strong data platform as well in and around customer data I think that's That's really really important. We saw that in the pandemic the companies that didn't really have a strong hold on that Didn't succeed as good as others. So being having a strong digital platform For your client data and the way you work and serve them. They came out better than the others So and we see that now in the aftermath that there's a strong digitalization movement Within those that I think many people woke up at the time and said, well, we really need to we need to be stronger in that area And how do you guys think about adoption because I think that's one of The things of course, we also help sometimes companies with that. Hey, we have all these great ideas about customer data platforms and at some point it relies on a human being maybe someone in sales Connecting the dots between what's happening on the product I need to do some data entry still myself even though we're doing it better And I need to work with these tools in a better way and a lot of sales people are on a let's say a learning journey Right to make this happen. So maybe an interesting question like this whole area of adoption What's kind of your experience on working with companies on on that? I think adoption from a usability perspective, you mean or Using the tools right being able to actually, you know, we have this great CRM. We have this great tools at hand Let's use them, right? I think the ease of use is extremely important today We've learned a lot from what has happened in the mobile industry Meaning that people today tend to buy business applications in the way they buy A samsung or an iphone, you know, they want that same user experience. It should be easy to A new platform and a tool should not make life more cumbersome And we see that from our perspective when we talk to companies that It's really a high demand on let's say the user experience that should be very intuitive And whatnot because that's that's where the bar is today and we have also Younger generations coming along and their demands are even higher. So But I think the from a technology perspective The capabilities are there. It's just it's just a matter of, you know, making sure that we We really drive that digital arena within our company as well and Ensure that we have people enable people to be to be, you know, digital in the way they operate and work From a sales perspective, then if we talk about We talk about trust one thing that I came to think about Brian when you talked about, you know, what is the value of being and Trust is something which is very important in sales as well when you when a sales rep steps into a room with a with a prospect or with a company Trust is something that we see at least is It's important. It's a really important factor that people buy from people today, even though we're so digital People at the end of the day buy from people and they buy from people that they trust And it's in order to build trust In a fairly short amount of time where the first part of the time is also digital It's a little bit. It could be a little bit complex what kind of What should we tell companies when it comes to uh, how should they Just enable or empower their teams when it comes to Just to building trust to build trust and enforce that that part of the equation Yeah, I guess two perspectives for me is like one all of the great material That's already been written on like how to be a trusted advisor in the trust equation and so on like if you're into that That's all of stuff Methodology and thinking it's still relevant like it's still super relevant to build empathy and to show Experience all of these things are still relevant I think the two things that I think are new for me is One it's sometimes possible now to do that scale and of course that's where social selling and putting yourself out there becomes A really meaningful thing because hey, you're actually engaging with people before you meet them physically And that means they've seen you they know you they know your mannerisms and so on they kind of know a little bit about who you are So bringing yourself online I think is one of those things that enable trust because I've seen you before I know kind of how you work And um, so I think that's that's a big thing and then the second thing about trust that at least I'm thinking a lot about now is it's also How much the buyer knows But because that for me also generates a lot of trust that I know that you're not a complete stranger to this industry You know the industry you might actually know more than me in many many areas and like the most It was something we discussed recently as for example openly discussing competitors Is one of my favorite things like when you step into that meeting I know that you know this industry So you know who are the competitors in this space and you're trying to learn from me Right, what are the actual differences between these competitors? And that's where I being a bit vulnerable and acknowledging is lots of players And I know them too and you know them Let's together work on what are the actual differences what's relevant for your company Whereas I think that's where in the in the past sometimes you could be a little bit protective, right? And for me, that's something that kills trust right when when when seller doesn't acknowledge that the buyer Knows a lot right so respecting the buyer and goes a long way to building that trust. Yeah, and I think the it's kind of That you that you just mentioned that scenario because we I had a conversation with a client the other day and Uh, it was just that we could We talked about the the difficulties in and around CRM is a CRM is a difficult area being a buyer within the CRM area today is it's not easy There's there's a lot of vendors there and we you really need to pick out who Who does fit me as a client and for us as a vendor? We need to be super clear on Who are we, you know, and who are we not exactly specifically and that that shines through Super clear and I think it's it's really important that we have the Uh, I would say the the courage to go into that conversation because really we we do not If we look at super office, we we stand for long long lasting customer relationships and the customers stay with super office for a long time and For us, it's important to have the the skills and also the the courage to have that conversation right up front Yeah, because also the prospects and the customers demand that Yeah Anything else we could talk about here Sales and marketing collaboration. You said Brian that you came from marketing Yeah, and one of the things that we drive heavily within super office today is how do we at the sales team and the marketing Both from a central perspective, but also from a field marketing perspective to you know interlock Yeah, it's a great topic, right and again coming from marketing, you know, you kind of go through this phase of Being a little bit mad at sales, right? Oh, why don't these guys fill in CRM? Why don't they do what I say and so on so forth and then at some point you kind of You know internalize that hey, they're not actually bad people, right? We're just different people looking at the same topic in a different way So are we we tend to say like there's a there's kind of three things that are needed for that strong marketing and sales collaboration That are relevant for any relationship actually, right? And there's a little bit of marriage counseling here as well, right? And then the first one is that empathy right then as a marketer I understand That you are great at some things that I am not right and that just common empathy of saying Yeah, we kind of we're trying to achieve the same thing But we're great at different things and really understanding that and I think many marketers to be honest have been kind of stuck in a Sales are stupid honestly type of thinking and super unfortunate and maybe the same vice versa So strong empathy is one thing, right? And then of course there's the second part which is that then Okay, we need to have a common vision and strategy and that's of course sometimes where Uh, you know, there can be a little bit of misalignment, right between what is the sales department trying to do in terms of short term Closing customers and so on where sometimes marketing is on a different path, right? Looking at different verticals or trying to achieve different things and so on That's gotta be there, right? And again, if we were in a relationship, it would be where do we live? How many kids do we have where do we go on holiday? So those type of things even though we're different we need to agree And then the last thing that we always speak to is joint initiatives And again, if we're relationships, like we gotta do things together Because we won't like each other and it's the same thing it says marketing Let's find some of those initiatives where we work together We're active together. We do things in joint way. We do joint planning joint target setting all of those things So it's so crucial and as you said as we started it's never been more important now Where marketing owns let's say a bigger portion of that I think also the Understand where we're come from because sales organizations B2B sales organization typically are a little bit near-sighted of short term Whereas marketing in many ways, you know, you have A long game kind of agenda in terms of awareness and and branding and let's say positioning whereas Sales organization might want to say we need leads In a very short term and you find that balance within with activities on the short term and the long term I think it's important to understand that Also, I think the that you have a common view on the positioning and the messaging This is something that we work a lot with and something that companies should I think work With on a more or less on an annual basis or whatnot at least on a periodical basis in terms of positioning for who For who you're who for who do you really mean a lot? And how do you message that? How do you reach out to them and understand communicate with that with that group of Prospect and customers and that we have a common view within sales and marketing and across the board in the company That these these are our target audience because segmentations of the To understand let's say your target audience is one of the first starting points when it comes to Let's say establish that collaboration. So Some word of advice then if we're going to conclude we talked a little bit here about Various topics within b2b sales and how you build the teams, but we're just going to sum it up somewhat A few words of advice for our listeners here on the webinar. Absolutely. So I guess, you know, we talked a little bit about, okay Why is it important now? That's because yeah, so those are challenged Buyers are getting smarter attorneys have become longer more informed. That's it. So that's kind of the why are we here, right? And then I think okay, what can we actually do? Let's start at the end right strong marketing as a clever collaboration for me is one of them Right, that is a lever to get better results out of fun enough both teams actually And then I think from a sales, let's say organization Perspective then our discussion around thinking as a sales team and not as a team of sellers I think that's a major mind shift change of yeah, we can't all be slathons. Somebody has to play support somebody has to Score the goals and somebody has to keep goals from going in. So I think that Would be the second thing for me, right? Really strongly interrogating. How do I organize structure? Compensate set goals for sales that enable it to be a team and not 10 lone wolves all chasing their own business And then I think the third thing is also leaning into let's say modern sales and marketing whether that's tools, right? Or whether that's uh, let's say social selling all of these abilities that Digital channels and so on give us so that all the things that's happening out there of buyer self educating That has to be a strength And not a threat, right? It has to be a strength that buyers are self educating. That's fantastic Then I can get in front of them before we have our meeting. So when we have our meeting, they already know me That's great, right? So I think leaning into what's happening there as an opportunity and as a strength I think yeah, I think there would be those three things talk my mind. Yeah Very good comments and I just want to round off with uh, if we're just going to talk about sales and sales individuals To me being a value driver, you know Striving to be a value driver in your domain if that is a vertical or if that is a sub domain of a vertical or if that is Wherever that now might be Really need to take ownership of how do you become a value driver within that domain? That is hard, but it requires a large degree of interest You really need to be concerned about the well-being of your clients and prospects. I think that's if you're not You need to get you need to get your arms around that because that I think that's what the expectation level is out there and This is about change You know the what is changing outside the window here is it's the world is in constant change And it has never the pace has never been as slow as it is today. So it will only go faster Scary enough, but you need to feel comfort also in the in change within this. So how you work how you acquire personnel into your to your sales teams how you develop them And how you coach them in order to work as a team player Because selling is a team sport is something that really is Something you need to work with on a daily basis from an individual perspective from a management perspective and from a corporate perspective so In order to be successful out there because it's super exciting what is going on right now, but and it's Yeah, all the capabilities are out there. So it's Fun time to be working within B2B sales So answering the first question then Will the B2B sales time to survive the future? I say yes, absolutely If you pick up some of the points that me and Brian have talked about today, maybe absolutely Yeah, never been a better time to be a seller if you're good at So Brian, thanks a lot for stopping by and to have this conversation and Audience feel free to Post your questions in the chat now. So we'll be happy to answer them. Thanks. Thank you