How Marketing Technology & Sales Technology Work in Tandem to Maximize Revenue

There is no doubt that technology is altering the way revenue-generating teams tackle their markets. Since 2012 or so, Marketing and Sales technology has been carefully tested in hopes of unlocking revenue-growth potential. The results have been extraordinary as Salespeople and Marketers enjoy greater visibility into what works and what doesn’t, thus accelerating learnings and strategy.

The issue today, however, is that organizations are overwhelmed with an endless stream of solutions that promise to empower and innovate their Sales and Marketing teams. This makes for stressful decision-making processes when evaluating technology partners.

In years past, the proverbial $64,000 question is which Marketing or Sales technology is best suited for your organization. Nowadays, the better question is which combination of technology is best suited for your organization? The pursuit to find a concert of sophisticated solutions that complement each other, as well as your people, is worth more than gold.

What’s Next for Marketing Technology and Sales Technology?

In today’s landscape, the search for efficiency is never-ending and is ultimately what connects our teams to technology. Inevitably, organizations will demand that these tools fit seamlessly together into their tech stack to derive maximum value. Marketing guru Scott Brinker has predicted that the Second Golden Age of Martech will be characterized by three trends:

1. Technology ecosystems will transition from competition between all-in-one or best-of-breed solutions to open platforms inviting third-party apps. This will further drive the need for robust integrations between technologies.
2. The offerings of SaaS and professional services firms will blend as both focus on integrating technology and maximizing its utility.
3. Organizations will be forced to digitally transform as the need for customization continues to grow.

These trends are already emerging and recognizable in many organizations. People are realizing the benefit of adopting multiple tools to drive towards a common goal.

Sales, for example, is largely considered to be a numbers game in which a percentage of leads will result in conversions. The more leads, the more conversions, as the thinking goes. But what happens when Salespeople cannot keep up with the number of leads being generated? Sales representatives can only engage with so many prospective customers before their capacity is maxed out.

Thankfully, with recent technological advancements in intelligent automation, Sales representatives can reach an exponentially greater number of prospects without sacrificing a personal touch.

Yes, some will argue that business is conducted between people, not technology. And that’s true. This is why it’s crucial for organizations to adopt technologies that automate redundant work so that Salespeople can focus on establishing trust, building relationships and closing deals.

How Organizations Are Embracing Tandem Marketing Solutions

One example of how to do this is with sales engagement tools, such as Outreach or SalesLoft, working alongside Conversica’s Intelligent Virtual Assistants.

Outreach and SalesLoft are great for outbound selling, as they help manage a Sales rep’s workflow and are designed to accommodate content-heavy messages. These tools allow for Salespeople to warm up a large list of prospects by utilizing content provided by their Marketing and Sales enablement teams.

On the other hand, Conversica is designed to automate lead qualification on a large scale and performs best when there is already some sort of connection between the lead and the organization (e.g. content consumption, demo request, virtual event attendance). The Intelligent Virtual Assistant autonomously identifies hot leads and handraisers, who are then passed to Salespeople for a meeting. This combination of technology and business professionals is a highly effective strategy for inbound and outbound sales.

Of course, many organizations take their digital transformation even further by using Conversica in tandem with Outreach or SalesLoft. They use Conversica to filter leads who would like more information, and then add them to an Outreach or SalesLoft campaign where the Sales rep can work them until a meeting is scheduled.

Another strategy is leveraging Conversica to message leads after they have gone through one of these campaigns without engagement. The messaging delivered by the IVA is designed to acknowledge a rep’s previous attempts, so this is often used to make the connection between these tools and Conversica. The same could be done with an Outreach or SalesLoft campaign customized to acknowledge the Conversica Sales AI Assistant.

These are just some examples of how organizations can embrace technology to augment their revenue-generating teams. There is an abundance of Sales and Marketing technology already out there, and this industry will continue to grow along with the need for more efficient revenue attainment.

Sales and Marketing teams are no longer limited by their people-power. using a combination of tools, organizations can guide customers through the buying process on a vitally large scale. This allows people to do what they do best – have meaningful conversations with leads, prospects and customers.

Sales leaders often train their people to, “keep it simple.” In this case, equipping your teams with the most impactful combination of technology is the best way to keep things simple. When it comes to building a tech stack for revenue growth, less is not more.

For more information on how organizations are augmenting their revenue-generating teams with Intelligent Virtual Assistants, check out our customer stories.