Inside Professional Selling . . .

“ . . . the only difference between our inside and outside sales reps are that one uses a car, the other uses a phone . . . “

Aside from the relatively obvious observation within this mildly compelling, moderately hip statement, the list of similarities between these two types of sales professionals is fairly short. The longer list of differences includes performance competencies, incentive compensation, recruiting and training strategies, process design, technology utilization, selling solutions as opposed to products, segmentation (especially where an outside sales force exists in parallel), functional collaboration, sales operations -- the list goes on and on. The goal to simply apply the same attributes of a field sales organization to a team that doesn’t leave the office is a cool aspiration but not really much of a strategy.

A study by Dr. James Oldroyd at SKK University found that over the next three years, inside sales jobs will grow at a rate that is 15 times higher than traditional outside sales (7.5% versus 0.5% per year). That equates to roughly 800,000 new sales jobs - all inside. Underscoring this trend, we’re seeing professional associations emerge in this space (such as the American Association of Inside Sales Professionals), along with credentialed training and accreditation. Growth in this industry has also translated into a very busy practice area for ESG, which blends the experience of our team members who have achieved extensive transformation results in customer service, sales force and support optimization, and CRM.

The success profile for an inside selling professional is different from their field sales counterpart – it’s a combination of solution selling, customer service, and mastery of technology across myriad social contact channels. As Generation Y & Z move into the workforce as buyers and sellers, the reality is that they have grown up in large part with all of these rapidly changing social channels and mobile computing technology. In the future, it’s going to be less about process and more about discretion and decision making when advocating on behalf of a customer. This emerging workforce won’t have it any other way, on either the buy or the sell side.

Inside sales frequently gets confused with telemarketing (don’t we all have a telemarketer story we like to tell?). Traditional telemarketing is a scripted, single call that is typically about pitching a small-ticket item to a consumer (B2C). Professional inside sales is much more involved, and requires multiple contacts through a variety of channels to both develop new clients and penetrate existing ones – and the trend is exploding in the small and medium business (SMB) space, particularly in business-to-business selling environments.

Companies pursue an inside sales strategy for different reasons - cost reduction, channel and segment differentiation, deepening customer relationships, account penetration, control, creating a unique customer experience, and so on. But it’s dramatically more complicated than one sales professional showing up for an appointment and the other placing a phone call.

Executed well, the cost for a professional inside selling organization can be as much as four to five times less than its counterpart field sales organization. Costs aside, the improved effectiveness is the holy grail for the macro selling organization. A well-designed touchpoint and contact strategy that can be executed and measured across large numbers of prospects and customers can far outweigh anything a field sales organization can do - especially within the SMB portion of the spectrum.

As rich data builds up about individual customer needs (not those of a company) through a well-organized command of channels (direct mail, email, customer service, transaction systems, telephone, chat, Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, text messaging, and video), the ability to leverage that data over time can be huge. The well-trained inside sales professional is at the center of the loyalty proposition based on their specific knowledge of the customer contact as an individual, and is deeply equipped to understand their needs, their history, and opportunities to provide solutions – and ultimately, more sales.

We’re certainly not advocating nor predicting the end of field selling organizations - in fact, they are more valuable than ever. But as a company’s costliest selling and service resource, deploying them properly in a ‘hunting’ capacity and in concert with a highly-effective inside team becomes an exciting recipe for improved competitiveness and market dominance.

Our practitioners at ESG have designed, developed, and implemented some of the largest and most effective B2B inside selling and support operations in the world. Our expertise in design and planning, process engineering, technology configuration and deployment, competency and curriculum development, labor and market analytics, site selection, center design, recruiting, and program management dramatically differentiate us from the theorists and the big consulting firms. Our clients retain us because, as they say, we’ve “been there and done that”, over and over again.

Contact us today to schedule a strategic briefing on this rapidly developing space and new practice at ESG, and let our proven, real-world experience get to work on making your selling strategy as powerful and effective as it can be.