Which sales materials have been most helpful?
This is probably pretty standard for most companies, but these sales materials have been the most used:
- One pagers / data sheets (product overviews, use cases, etc.)
- Pitch decks that reps can customize and/or leverage 'templated slides' for easy 'drag and drop' presentation building when prepping for a meeting
- Quick hit videos -- these are usually short product demo or use case clips they can share
Beyond the well known ones above, we've seen reps finding a ton of value in higher value things like tools, such as calculators. A lot of our best 'lead gen tools' or 'consulting tools' were originally created as spreadsheets, but eventually we invested in building these as proper web-apps that look good.
Certain sales materials have proven to be consistently helpful in driving successful sales outcomes. Here are some effective sales materials that have shown their value:
Sales Playbooks: Comprehensive guides that provide sales reps with messaging, positioning, objection handling, and value propositions for different scenarios.
Case Studies: Real-world examples showcasing how your product or solution has solved challenges for similar customers, adding credibility and relatability.
Product Demo Videos: Visual demonstrations of your product in action, highlighting key features and benefits. These could be interactive or glossy and pre-recorded.
Competitive Battlecards: Concise summaries comparing your product with competitors, aiding reps in handling objections and highlighting differentiators.
ROI Calculators: Tools that help quantify the potential return on investment for customers using your product.
Customer Testimonials: First-hand accounts from satisfied customers that build trust and provide social proof.
This depends on the needs of the sales team that I am working with. But no matter the type of content, what makes it useful for sales is how it can fit into their preferred ways of working.
For example, let's say that you want to train the team on updated messaging. You probably have an in-depth messaging guide that tells the broad narrative of your product (problem, solution, and value). You might think that you can just train the sales team on this new story, and leave behind the doc as reference material. What is more impactful is if you can take the content of that messaging doc, and present it in a way that works for sales. So instead you might create a "pitch guide" that helps sales understand how to map personas to use cases, organizes pain points accordingly, and gives guidance on not just the value of your solution but more specifically what features to show in a demo, or what questions to ask in discovery to evaluate that pain.
The more you can tailor content to the experiences the sales team is having in the field, the more valuable your reps will find it.
The essentials - and SDR deck, a first call deck, a standard intro demo, competitive intel and customer stories. Outside of those standards, our sales team really values our customer facing roadmap. And outside of standard 'big logo' customers testimonials - the more specfic industry / segmented testimonials we can provde - the better.
Hello,
Its important to understand your sales cycle from Leads, Discovery, Demo, Negotiations, Close to Customer Success - what in the cyle is causing your deal velocity to slow down and why.
Are there more elements of Education required? Are you spelling the functional value of the products correctly, or is it the value of doing business with your company - not clear.
Dig a little more - and the answer will be right there :)
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