Is there a correlation between digital transformation and revenue growth for sales organisations? And how is the adoption of technology influencing a company’s sales strategy?
A detailed research commissioned by Microsoft, which targeted 50 sales leaders across 13 industries, ranked customer engagement the main driving force behind sales versus tactical drivers like automation and productivity.
The study found out that organisations prioritise digital transformation to enhance customer engagement and, as a result, generate more sales and business growth.
Furthermore, advanced technology adopters enjoyed a 50% increase in revenue growth compared to the early adopters and non-adopters.
Most notably, innovative sales teams are taking advantage of data analysis and prescriptive insights that inform customer trends and help create tailored customer experiences.
Most sales organizations are adopting technology to some degree to drive customer engagement. This degree of adoption determines the way companies interact with customers and their place on the digital transformation curve.
SKEPTICS: Technology versus Relationships
Skeptics do not associate technology with relationship growth. In fact, they may be ardent supporters of the face-to-face social interactions as opposed to digital interactions.
Sales teams in this early stage of technology adoption will most probably rely on introductory mobile tools to connect with their customers on-the-go via email, call, text, and, to some extent, social media.
FOLLOWERS: Reluctant to New Technologies
Followers are reluctant to adopt new technologies. However, they do understand the benefits of digital transformative tools that allow for deeper customer engagements, but often they hesitate to follow through due to a lack of investment and management support.
Such organisations may go beyond mobile interaction and use integrated technologies like customer relationship management (CRM) tools to increase productivity and assist sales teams in closing deals.
STRIVERS: Open to Digital Transformation
Strivers have reached the point where they prioritise digital transformation as an organisational strategy to boost revenue growth and customer satisfaction.
They are open to the adoption of new technologies as long as these are proven to drive results but lack innovation and experimentation.
Such organisations will empower their sales teams with CRM and collaborative tools and solutions to enhance productivity, streamline operations, automate sales processes and increase customer touchpoints.
DRIVERS: True Enablers of Digital Transformation
Drivers experiment with advanced technologies and constantly innovate in the way they approach customer interaction to drive sales and gain competitive advantage.
Their hands-on approach to technology and willingness to innovate and experiment translates into a deeper involvement in data analysis and prescriptive customer insights.
Driver sales teams will use advanced data insights to deliver tailor-made customer experiences and constantly improve the way they interact with customers.
Sales organisations in this stage will use advanced CRM tools and systems to engage customers, improve day-to-day operations, automate sales, and, more importantly, drive business intelligence to understand and serve customers better.
Overall, advanced digital transformation tools can complement existing sales processes and drive further customer engagement and sales growth in your organisation.
Where do you see your organisation on the digital transformation curve?
