A New Age

of Selling

Deliver amazing customer experiences

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Technology has turned the sales function upside down. On the When buyers do engage with a salesperson they expect fast one hand, it has made selling more difficult because customers responses that are precisely tailored to their organization’s needs. can often get most of the information they think they need online To respond effectively to these better informed and more and tend to make buying decisions based on what they find. demanding buyers, sales organizations and sales professionals However, if used properly, technology can help sellers adapt by need to change. They need to embrace social media to take simplifying the sales process and making them more efficient and advantage of relationships, and use technology to quickly respond successful than ever before. to buyers. This paper presents ’s vision for sales Information such as product descriptions, customer reviews, organizations to use technology to close more deals with less and competitive comparisons are now widely available on the effort. It provides concrete examples showing how successful sales Web or through social networks. Corporate buyers are using this leaders are transforming the way they sell with their Microsoft information to form opinions and narrow buying choices long solutions. before engaging with vendors.

TODAY’S BUSINESS-TO-BUSINESS BUYER

On the road to purchase for a B2B buyeri

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Salespeople already know what doesn’t work today: cold percent through the buying process before they actually make calling. A telesales representative has a 3 percent chance of contact with the company they are researching.iii In fact, 80 getting a prospect to answer a call. A marketing email has less percent of buyers initiate first contact with their prospective than a three percent response rate.ii Calling on a prospect without supplier, and when they do reach out, they often have an idea of knowing exactly what they need is far too likely to be unsuccessful. the solution they need.iv Customers have typically identified their needs and are actively The idea of losing control over more than half of the sales seeking to find the best solution before ever engaging with process and waiting for prospects to call when they are interested vendors. To gather information they are researching vendor should not make any sales leader happy as they may be missing websites, questioning peers, and initiating and following many opportunities. However, Microsoft has the solutions conversations on social media. required to modernize sales processes to match this new reality. Given all of the information customers can acquire on their own, it should come as no surprise that customers can be 57

SELLING THE MICROSOFT WAY With the right sales productivity solution in place, sales Microsoft provides a streamlined experience with Microsoft organizations can transform the way they sell. The Microsoft sales Dynamics CRM Online and its interoperability with Microsoft productivity solution improves sales capabilities in five main areas: Office 365 and . Salespeople can go to one place for all of social, insights, collaboration, process automation, and mobile, their tasks from viewing sales leads, researching companies, The results of improving these capabilities within a holistic finding social connections, communicating with prospects, solution are the ability to zero in on targets before the reviewing sales insights, and creating sales proposals. This competition, win faster by working as a team to create compelling eliminates all of the application flipping by giving sales reps and differentiated customer interactions, and ultimately sell more. contextual information in a modern user experience.

Sales executives Sales managers Sales professionals

. True business insight and . Tools to plan and manage . Qualified leads visibility against key KPIs . Insights to close more deals . Ability to spot new . Insights to outsmart the faster opportunities competition . Holistic 360-degree view of . Customer-centric sales . Productive sales reps who customers organization win as a team . More time selling, less busy . High conversion and win work rates . Access to CRM anywhere

The Microsoft sales productivity solution meets the needs of the entire sales organizationv

TURN SOCIAL INSIGHTS INTO SALES Your customers are using social networks to learn about you the CRM system it becomes a natural part of the sales process. and your products. Shouldn’t you also use them to gain social CRM delivers the latest market buzz and news along with insights about your customers? You may learn that a prospect is corporate data so that you are always up to date on your dissatisfied with a competitor’s product or customer’s activities. Getting this you may learn that they are dissatisfied information in real time can make the with yours. You may learn that your An e-mail sent by LinkedIn InMail difference between being ahead or customer has recommended your services that leverages a 2nd degree behind your competition. to a contact and get a new lead. Your sales In addition, Social Listening helps team can now have real-time insight into connection — meaning you know salespeople gain early insight into the social activity of your contacts and someone who they know and you issues customers are facing while accounts, and they can engage with their reference that connection in the connecting with the most influential customers on LinkedIn and Twitter voices in the community. It also without ever leaving CRM. InMail — has a whopping 67% provides social buying signals. When With social network data from response rate!vi people send the signal they’re looking LinkedIn and Twitter integrated right into for something, are dissatisfied with

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their current solution, or need more information on a topic, that’s Skype embedded in CRM, salespeople also gain a tremendous an opportunity for a seller to engage. With the Microsoft solution, advantage. With Lync Federation or Lync-Skype Connectivity, the Social Listening capabilities are built-in so they are available to all communications environments between you and your customers users. are connected — meaning presence information, chat, and With Yammer, salespeople can hold conversations with conferencing is always available. Your customers are just a click customers using a dedicated online workspace that keeps away. conversations off of the public Internet. With Microsoft Lync and

SELL AS A TEAM In most cases, salespeople can no longer operate individually. organizational knowledge of the entire company from any Since buyers expect solutions to bridge sales, operations, and location. Conversations can be organized by contact, account, or service, salespeople depend on the other filters so you get the information entire organization for their success. you need from the right people at the Sales organizations need the right right time. collaboration and communication tools “It’s all about integration. Dynamics By taking advantage of Yammer to stay connected with the rest of the CRM caps the stack, but behind the feeds embedded in business. These tools must be mobile scenes we make sure that Yammer CRM, Trek Bicycle teams share ideas, and should be integrated into the CRM collaborate on projects, and make system. Microsoft has integrated drives the conversations within the decisions more quickly. “Things are essential capabilities into CRM including business; we use SharePoint to drive getting done because everyone had a Lync and Skype, Yammer, and Microsoft our knowledge-management new kind of awareness of what was SharePoint to enable the sales going on in the group,” says Steve professional to work with a team from systems; we use Lync to surface the Novoselac, Business Intelligence and within the CRM application. presence of our colleagues — Office .NET Development Manager, Trek Lync and Skype provide a powerful 365 is the backbone of our office Bicycle Corporation.viii and simple way to interact with Managing documents and managing colleagues, partners, and contacts. infrastructure.” information is a big part of selling, and Salespeople can quickly find subject — Paul Marriott-Clarke, Commercial Director rather than forcing teams to use a matter experts or decision-makers and Metro Bankvii different document management bring them into meetings to answer solution, SharePoint also works directly questions and get deals closed. Users see within CRM, ensuring that any team presence icons within CRM and can initiate an interaction with just member working on a sales document, such as a presentation, one click. proposal, or RFP, will be able to utilize the powerful co-authoring Team members can also use Yammer to stay connected from and version control capabilities. within CRM. Yammer enables salespeople to tap into the

TRANSFORM SALES PROCESSES Ideally salespeople would have easy-to-use tools that provide professionals. Because the solution tells you what to do next, the content relevant to where they are in the sales cycle. A well- ramp-up time is fast and training costs are low. defined process can help. Process flows CRM also integrates seamlessly with drive best practices and consistency other Microsoft workloads, like Outlook. across the organization while allowing it "We expect to roll out standard This gives salespeople a one-stop-shop to remain agile and deliver a great for their calendars, email and other tools, customer experience. processes and workflows through helping transform the sales process. However, traditional CRM business Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online "Many of the criteria identified by our processes, such as opportunity and make them available to teams led us logically to Microsoft management, often used workflows that Dynamics CRM. One crucial factor was were cumbersome and difficult to everyone.” the integration with the Microsoft Office understand. Therefore, they required a — David Peterson suite and Outlook in particular. People lot of user training and were not widely Enterprise Collaboration Manager did not want to have to manage two adopted. Microsoft Dynamics CRM Trek Bicycle Corporationix separate calendars, and they wanted to Online provides intuitive, visual process be able to store their emails in the CRM guidance using an outcome driven user — features already incorporated within interface to help ensure rapid, wide-spread adoption by sales

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Dynamics CRM,” says Isabelle Dufex, Head of Institutional Client and-click process. This allows sales organizations to be agile and Relations, Société Générale Corporate & Investment Banking.x responsive. If a trend is identified and the organization wants to CRM includes business process templates with industry- react quickly, the business process could be changed almost specific best practices. These process flows can then be instantly to reflect the newly desired steps or outcomes. customized or new processes can be created using a simple point-

SEE YOUR SALES DATA IN AN ENTIRELY NEW WAY To really get a feel for the health of the business, managers Online], so we can estimate our success of winning new business need to be able to turn data into insights and then use these and its financial impact on our operations," says Jason Taylor, CIO, insights to make better, faster SAGE Automation.xi decisions. Microsoft solutions Sales managers can interact help sales managers focus on with the charts and reports to the right information by pinpoint just the insights they providing powerful dashboards are looking for to determine the with real-time visualizations. next right action. For more Organizations can set up complex analysis, data can be territories, teams, and price lists easily exported into Excel and for optimal organizational analyzed using Power BI for efficiency and streamlined offer Office 365. management within CRM. It “The insight we’re now able also provides built-in sales to gather [from Microsoft reports to conduct advanced Dynamics CRM Online] is Visual tools make it easy to view and report on business analytics without IT. helping us identify changing “We know the revenue we market trends and spot new need to generate at any one time [with Microsoft Dynamics CRM opportunities,” says James Fleming, Group IT Director, Victrex.xii

YOUR SALES OFFICE — WHEREVER, WHENEVER Customers are more demanding than ever. Competition is When salespeople update activities, contacts, and increasing. It’s no longer acceptable to let things wait until you get opportunities on the go, they and their team get real-time insight back to the office. Because of these challenges, CRM applications and increase productivity while away from the office. Posting a on mobile devices are now indispensable selling tools. question to Yammer during a meeting can result in an instant With CRM, sales professionals response and customer and executives stay productive resolution. All this also helps and agile wherever they are. They organizations stay current on the can get real-time information on sales activities of their people. the mobile phone or tablet of “Microsoft Dynamics CRM their choice through a user Online allows us to manage, interface that remains consistent monitor, and support our sales across devices. teams remotely. When we “[Microsoft Dynamics CRM switched to the new system, it Online] allows me as chief boosted the number of calls executive, when I'm out in the made by the sales team because Mobile access drives sales successxiii field visiting clients, to get a the system is integrated and easy sense of the overall relationship with the client. That's something to use,” says Nick Cassidy, Managing Director, Core Cost I couldn't do before," says Bob Gogel, CEO, Integreon.xiv Management.xv By receiving watch list notifications on their phone, With a Microsoft sales productivity solution, salespeople gain salespeople know what’s happening, right as it happens. They can the support of their data and their entire team while they are on see the question their prospect posted on LinkedIn as they are the road. Key insights aren’t lost, questions are answered traveling to the meeting so they know the primary concern that immediately, and data is entered accurately. needs to be addressed.

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CONCLUSION

Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online and Office 365 deliver an . Data visualization to make it easy to understand the state intuitive, process-driven user experience that guides salespeople of the business and each account through the tasks and information they need to stay focused on . Mobile access so salespeople always have to their tools closing deals. Microsoft has been a leader in productivity and and teams through a consistent, familiar user interface collaboration for decades and CRM brings that innovation With these capabilities in place sales organizations can zero in, together to enable salespeople to work with their teams online or win faster, and sell more. off, across the office or around the world. With Microsoft Outlook, Lync, Skype, SharePoint, and Yammer all part of the CRM For more information experience, the people and information you need are only a click Microsoft is committed to helping organizations transform so away. sales professionals sell more effectively and sales managers With a Microsoft solution, sales reps are no longer flipping manage more intelligently. For more information on Microsoft’s from application to application to perform all of their sales sales productivity solutions contact your Microsoft sales activities. All of their important information is presented representative or visit http://www.microsoft.com/dynamics/crm contextually in a simple user experience. . The solution described in this white paper includes: . Integrated engagement with social tools including social . Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online listening capabilities . Microsoft Office 365 E3 SKU (includes Lync Online, . Collaboration capabilities to speed responses and avoid SharePoint Online, Exchange Online, Power BI for Office overlapping efforts 365, Yammer Enterprise, and Office 365 ProPlus) . Process automation to ensure salespeople are focused on selling and using best practices

ix SOURCES http://www.microsoft.com/casestudies/Case_Study_Detail.aspx? CaseStudyID=710000004000 i Sales Performance International, “Buyer 2.0 and Solution x http://www.microsoft.com/casestudies/Dynamics- Selling”, 2013 http://www.spisales.com/Sales-Process-and-Buyer- CRM/SOCIETE-GENERALE/Soci-t-G-n-rale-Corporate-u0026- 2.0/ Investment-Banking-takes-control-of-customer-relationships- ii Microsoft, “The Dynamic Sales Team”, 2013, using-Microsoft-CRM-solution/710000002814 http://crmpublish.blob.core.windows.net/docs/Whitepaper_TheD xi http://www.microsoft.com/casestudies/Microsoft-Dynamics- ynamicSalesTeam_20121107_web.pdf CRM-2011/Sage-Automation/Dynamics-CRM-Online-helps- iii CEB, “The New High Performer Playbook”, Arlington, VA, 2012, engineering-firm-enhance-sales-visibility-and- http://www.executiveboard.com/exbd/sales- planning/710000003244 service/challenger/new-decision-timeline/index.page xiihttp://www.microsoft.com/casestudies/Case_Study_Detail.aspx? iv Sales Performance International, “Buyer 2.0 and Solution CaseStudyID=710000004163 Selling”, 2013 http://www.spisales.com/Sales-Process-and-Buyer- xiii Microsoft, “CRM in the World of Buyer 2.0”, Microsoft, 2013 2.0/ xiv http://www.microsoft.com/casestudies/Microsoft-Dynamics- v Microsoft, “The Dynamic Sales Team”, 2013 CRM-Online/Integreon/Microsoft-Dynamics-CRM-drives- vi Microsoft, “The Dynamic Sales Team”, 2013 productivity-for-professional-services-company/710000001671 vii http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/dynamics/metrobank.aspx xv http://www.microsoft.com/casestudies/Microsoft-Dynamics- viiihttp://www.microsoft.com/casestudies/Case_Study_Detail.aspx? CRM-Online/Core-Cost-Management/Telecoms-Consultancy- CaseStudyID=710000004000 Improves-Sales-Performance-with-Integrated- Solution/710000002589

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