Could outsourcing sales benefit your business?

Seven out of 10 sales reps fail to meet their targets, reports Harvard Business Review*. But over here at Leading Edge, our sales reps are smashing their targets by 144%, 179%, even 238%. We’re in the business of creating successful sales teams that will lead businesses to outrageous growth - because if there’s one thing we know, it’s that poor sales performance is completely avoidable.

Here’s how outsourcing your sales function can help grow your business - fast.

Traditionally, Kiwi companies have adopted a ‘do it yourself’ attitude to sales and service. And while that can prove successful for some, many others are realising that selling is more like a fine art. It includes a number of components that come together to create a high-performing team.

Done right, it’s no surprise the outsourced sales model has become a game-changer for businesses. Whether it’s your intention to start afresh or supplement your existing sales operation, outsourcing sales only improves your business.

Grab a coffee and take this page with you for a read.

The eight reasons driving companies to outsource

As a model, outsourcing has been around for some time now. But the service has come a long way - it’s now more innovative and more accessible.

After trialling call centres, offshore customer servicing or seeing sales training fail, many companies want more time to focus on the nuts and bolts. They’re looking to: A) reduce costs and B) gain accountability by outsourcing their sales function. Ultimately they need faster growth of their market share and revenue streams.

Sales experts give you access to tools and insights so you can trial new campaigns, test target markets and push new promotions opening up a world of opportunity and fresh ideas to grow your customer base.

Best of all, this type of partnership gives you back time to focus on your core competencies.

Here are eight of the main reasons why companies are seeing huge benefits:

Growth: 79% of businesses feel outsourcing can help them scale faster, according to a HBR survey. And, another 78% report outsourcing both increases sales and leads volumes.
Reduction the cost of sales: Outsourcing helps trim operation inefficiencies, gain best-in-class sales technology (at a fraction of the cost), cut back on talent costs and minimise overheads, training, recruitment and compliance expenses.
Gains years of experience, instantly: You can short cut the learning process, work with highly trained and motivated talent who have worked across multiple industries. Partnering with Leading Edge, for example, opens you up to 1,755 years of shared experience.
Promotes greater performance: Greater accountability, paid on results and success. The wider company benefits from success as new ideas come in, giving businesses constant innovation.

Saves time: Achieve better results, faster as time is freed up for the company to focus on core competencies.
Maximises collaboration: Marketing and sales typically operate in silos, however, a sales partner works cross-functionally. They’re more agile and driven as they have access to a holistic view and are paid on results.
Accessibility to high-end tech: Having the latest tools and knowledge to use them can be expensive. Outsourcing sales is a cost effective way to take advantage of the best technology as the experts take on all the heavy lifting.
Greater accountability: Outsourced teams are paid on success, so their skin is well and truly in the game. As a result, you get stronger results and continual innovation.

To find out if outsourcing your sales team could result in faster growth for your business, read here.

Is outsourcing sales right for your business?

Outsourced teams have expertise from lead generation to closing sales, gleaning valuable data, customer insights and everything in between. Ultimately you can expect sales thought leadership, increased revenue and scalable growth that will boost your business to the next level.

Outsourcing could be right for your business if:

You’re looking to access expertise, experience and technology instantly.
In-house or external training packages have had little impact.
You’ve reached a plateau with organic growth and now it’s time to scale up.
You’re the owner as well as the BDM and you need a dedicated resource for sales.
You need to put time and focus back on other core functions in the business.
You can see the benefit of shifting accountability for growth and revenue targets.

To see how you could gain years of experience overnight through outsourcing, read here.

See outsourcing in action

We have a motto at Leading Edge: “If we believe in it, we can sell it”.

We don’t discriminate on company size, industry type or product. We take the time getting to know your business and your proposition to ensure we build a mutually beneficial partnership with you.

Ours is a process of understanding your business from the start and then providing bespoke recommendations. Once we kick into selling mode for you, the relationship just keeps evolving as we learn insights, refine your campaigns and stretch your targets!

Don't take our word for it, hear from one of our key customers, Spark, on how the outsourced model works for them.

What’s in it for you?

Say goodbye to the admin, the people management, and having to drive performance.
And say hello to results, revenue and raving fans delivered right to your door each month.

If your sales aren’t where they should be, don’t immediately point the finger the sales team. Look around the edges of your pipeline by locking down your proposition and your marketing – otherwise the job of the salesperson is a very difficult one.

Not ready to chat?
Read our latest quick-fire sales tips with your coffee!

You can’t sell without good marketing.
And you can’t do good marketing without a strong proposition.

Maybe you’re in an industry where word of mouth has built your business to date with little or no active selling. Kudos to you!

But if you’re looking to scale up, you’re going to need good marketing and a strong proposition working hand in hand to be successful.

Look at your marketing efforts and assess:

Are you targeting the right audience? Do you know their demographics, likes, dislikes and challenges?

Are your messages strong and related to a key pain point of your target audience?
Are you standing out? Is the language and delivery of your messages powerful and clear in a crowded online and offline marketplace?
Are you spending enough? You may need to invest just a bit more to get the desired impact.
Why you? If you’re competing with other companies in your space, is it clear why the customer should choose you?

Your sales pipeline should be 90% science and 10% art.

These days, building a pipeline is more of a science than an art. You may have experienced the grind of nagging your sales team to nurture their leads, adhere to ‘Keep In Touch’ strategies and constantly have prospects on a call cycle.

…Enter some awesome functional technology that can remove this pain, while proving a more consistent experience for anyone who enquires with your business.

With a range of ‘automation’ technologies and digital opportunities to get your messages out there, digital platforms can also automate how you nurture your leads and prospects without lifting a finger.

With amazing analytics and data dashboards, make sure you’re taking advantage of the right tech for your business to enable your sales team to get out and convert the leads that automation warms up for them.

A successful sales function can no longer operate in isolation. We get that. We’re also passionate about ensuring your marketing, brand and proposition are up to scratch and we use a bunch of key partners to do so.

With everything lined up, we can then go ahead with confidence to sell the heck out of your products and services.

Have you diluted your sales performance with a lack of focus?

We see a lot of companies - especially startups - trying to add as many products and services to their offering that they can. They can do them all! So why not offer them all?

Because having an impact is about focus. And focus is about sacrifice. Analyse your proposition – whether it be product or service and be honest with yourself about whether you’re driving your resources, money and time into your core offering.

More and more we’re seeing that sustainable brands and products make well-calculated sacrifices and retain focus until they’ve honed in on an ideal sales funnel and healthy conversions in their core space. To tell you the truth, we’ve even had to go through this exercise ourselves at a few times along our journey! We had to be sure we weren’t diluting our offering with extra flair that wasn’t true to our core competencies.

It’s easy to get excited about the shiny new stuff. But shiny new stuff should be reserved for magpies unless you’re 100% certain it’s adding value to your core offering and complementing what you currently stand for in the minds of your customers and prospects.

Consider the above if you’re finding that your sales team aren’t achieving what they should, or you feel like your business offering just isn’t resonating strongly enough anymore with your target market.

Ready to get a team like us on your side? I’d love to hear from you. Make a time with me for a coffee and let’s chat.

Emma Leslie, Head of Sales and Service