By Shaun Han
Sales organizations are changing rapidly ? because they have to. Deals are more competitive. More information is available, but complexity threatens your ability to use it.
Today?s successful sales professionals need a complete sales automation solution that gives sales and operations teams the tools they need to close the gaps without surprises, compromises, or hidden costs.
This means a complete and integrated solution designed to enhance the customer experience (CX) at every customer touchpoint including sales, service, marketing, commerce, and social channels.
At the core of the customer experience, sales managers need tools to drive smarter sales, including modern mobility, anytime access (even when offline), sales dashboards, sales performance management, and seamless integration with the productivity tools that reps live in.
We all know that business tools need to be easy and accessible ? in the airport, at a customer site, in a hotel ? or else your reps won?t use them.
Oracle Sales Cloud is designed to drive user adoption and help your sales force be more productive by providing ?access-anywhere? mobility. Intuitive smart phone and tablet apps make completing tasks a natural extension of selling, and seamless integration to Microsoft Outlook provides users with access to all their CRM information, even when they?re offline meaning you can manage appointments, connect with customers and team members, review performance, and update your forecasts?all on the go.
Tools need to empower reps and help them do their job faster, and a large part of that these days is in-context coaching, collateral and social collaboration. This means having tools at every touchpoint, including web, mobile, and Microsoft Outlook?to focus sales efforts and streamline team collaboration, giving your reps have what they need to perform.
Also, because sales reps sell more when they take ownership of their pipeline being able to launch and manage their own sales campaigns is crucial to their success. With this, reps can quickly leverage marketing email templates (for consistency and efficiency) and stay on top of campaign results like open and click-through rates.
As a manager who needs to hit sales targets, you need answers to the big questions now ? questions like ?How are we really doing against forecast?? and ?Where might a deal slip and why?? At this pace ? especially with larger and more complex sales teams ? waiting two days for a report to be run or managing by gut and feel isn?t an option. You need the tools to improve information relevance, accuracy, and reaction time.
In this day and age, decisions can?t always wait until you get back to the office and need to be made on-the-go, so mobile dashboards can provide managers with insight into their forecast, pipeline, opportunities, and team performance enabling modern sales managers to manage more effectively.
Today it?s more important than ever to know what your customers and prospects want ? and then be able to deliver it in a sales cycle. In a time when customers call the shots, making the sale and winning repeat business means sales has to be on its game and selling smarter, but we now know that any interaction with your business ? marketing campaigns, service requests, online buying, Tweets, or comments on Facebook ? can influence a sales cycle.
Sales managers require the most complete customer experience solution and CX from Oracle means an integrated experience for customers spanning sales, marketing, service, commerce, social and more. It?s a strategy that enables leading companies to differentiate, anticipate requests, and deliver excellent customer experiences that fill the pipeline and drive ROI.
The author is the vice president for applications in the Asean region at Oracle Corporation
