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As a business owner or sales manager, you know that the success of your team depends on a variety of factors, including their ability to communicate effectively, respond to customer needs, and close deals. But without the right tools in place, your sales team can struggle to meet their goals and achieve their full potential. That’s where sales enablement comes in.
Sales enablement is the process of equipping your sales team with the tools, resources, and information they need to sell more effectively.
By streamlining your sales processes and empowering your team with the right tools, you can boost their productivity, improve their results, and ultimately grow your business.
We’ve helped many companies implement sales enablement programs and adopt tools that improve closing rates, reduce the time sales reps had to spend with prospects, and increase the overall number of new deals closed — so we certainly have a lot to say on this topic.
In this article, we’ll take a closer look at the best sales enablement tools for 2023, so you can give your sales team the support they need to succeed.
The best sales enablement tools:
Why Content is the Best Sales Tool
While tools, platforms, and software can be useful for tracking and measuring sales enablement, they’re not enough on their own. The truth is content is the backbone of any successful sales enablement strategy. Without the right content, your sales team will struggle to connect with prospects and move them through the sales funnel.
Sales reps should be using a process known as “Assignment Selling” during the sales lifecycle in order to shorten the sales cycle and increase close rates.
Assignment Selling is when we assign “homework” to our prospects in the form of educational blog articles or videos anytime during the sales cycle.
When marketing produces the right content for sales teams, Assignment Selling becomes exceedingly impactful on your bottom line.
There’re a few different types of sales enablement content you should produce:
- Blog articles
- Videos
- Product pages
- Case studies
But how should you go about producing this content?
As first codified by Marcus Sheridan in his book They Ask, You Answer, demonstrated by hundreds of businesses and proven by Google there are five specific topics that consumers ask questions around online when they are making a buying decision.
You should start by creating content around these five topics. Let’s look at this:
- Cost & Pricing: content answering buyer’s questions about cost or pricing of your service/product
- Problems: content revealing potential problems that may arise with your service/product or problems that buyers may be currently facing
- Comparisons and versus: content comparing two or more alternatives
- Best of lists: content about the best of something. For example, if you sell web design services, you might create a piece of content around “Best Web Design Tools in 2023”.
- Reviews: case studies, customer testimonials, and reviews of alternative products or services.
When you create content around these five topics, you should aim to provide comprehensive and transparent information. If you do this, you’ll be giving your sales reps exactly what they need to close deals faster and more often.
But before you go and get your marketing team to start creating sales enablement content, it’s vital that your marketing and sales teams are aligned, and that content direction is being headed by both marketing and sales leaders.
By working together, the sales team can inform marketing on what questions buyers are asking, so that marketing can produce content that actually resonates with prospects.
The best way to achieve this level of collaboration and synchronicity is to form a Revenue Team, which is simply a combined team of marketing and sales that has the single objective of increasing revenue.
There is no sales tool out there that trumps having the right content produced and then used in the Assignment Selling process. So, before you jump on any of the tools below, make sure you’ve got this right first. Here’s some tips on how to do get started with this:
- How to form a Revenue Team
- How to start using Assignment Selling
- How to produce blog articles that generate sales
Now, let’s delve into the best sales enablement tools in 2023.
HubSpot Sales Pro
HubSpot Sales Pro is one of if not the most powerful CRM on the market at the moment. The only other CRM that can really compare at this point in time is Salesforce. If you want to see which is right for you, check out our Salesforce vs HubSpot blog article.
HubSpot Sales Pro is designed to help you streamline your sales processes, automate tasks, and gain insights into your sales pipeline. One of the key benefits of HubSpot Sales Pro is its integration with other HubSpot tools, such as the CRM and marketing automation platform. This means that you can easily track leads throughout the entire sales process, from initial contact to close, and ensure that your teams are on the same page. On top of this, having everything in one place gives you a tremendous amount of information on your prospects.
For example, when you use HubSpot Sales Pro with the HubSpot Marketing Hub, you should be able to:
- Know where they came from and how they found you
- Be aware of exactly what pieces of content they have consumed from you (such as blog articles, videos, social media posts and ads)
- Be aware of the level of engagement any single prospect is having with your content through having visibility around metrics such as bounce rate. This helps you differentiate between prospects, allowing you to spend more of your precious time on engaging those who are more likely to buy
- Know what emails your sales team has sent to prospects and who sent those emails
- Know what event invitations have been sent to prospects
- Have clarity on how each prospect is interacting with these things (for example, are they opening the email, are they clicking links in the email, and so on)
- Know whether or not your sales team is trying to make contact with the prospect, what method of communication they’re using, whether contact has been made, and how often
- Know exactly what we did when we communicated with prospects. For example, did we call them, and if so, what did we call them about? What was said, and how did the call go?
- See when a prospect moves from being a prospect to being a customer
Having this level of data around each prospect can help sales reps spend more time on the right prospects and less time on bad-fit prospects, ultimately saving the company more money as they spend time on revenue generating activities.
Another key feature of HubSpot Sales Pro is its ability to automate tasks such as lead follow-up and lead nurturing. This can save your team time and energy, allowing them to focus on high-value tasks such as building relationships with customers and closing deals. By removing the need for sales reps to focus on these admin tasks, you give them the power to generate more revenue in the limited time that they have.
Overall, if you’re looking for a robust sales enablement tool that can help you streamline your sales processes and improve your team’s productivity, HubSpot Sales Pro is your best bet.
Loom or Vidyard
Sales reps using video have a 25% higher close rate and a 62% higher engagement rate (Vidyard).
This is one of my personal favourites on the list! When it comes to sales enablement, video is becoming an increasingly popular format for delivering content to prospects. This is where Loom or Vidyard comes in – these are both video messaging tools that make it easy to create and share videos with prospects.
We happen to use Loom but Vidyard is just effective – it’s really just about preference. One of the key benefits of Loom is it’s ease of use. With just a few clicks, sales reps can record a personalised video message for a prospect, highlighting key features or address specific pain points. This type of personalised messaging can help to build trust and rapport with prospects.
Loom offers a variety of features that make it a versatile sales enablement tool. For example, sales reps can use Loom to create product demos, training videos, or add value to the prospect in other ways. The platform also includes analytics and reporting tools, so you can track how your videos are performing and make data-driven decisions about your sales strategy.
On top of this, it integrates with other sales enablement tools, such as CRM systems and sales engagement platforms. This means that you can easily incorporate Loom videos into your existing sales processes and workflows without too much trouble.
Overall, if you’re looking for a versatile, user-friendly sales enablement tool that leverages the power of video, Loom (or Vidyard) is the way to go.
Sales Training & Coaching
If you want to get better at something, you need to dedicate time to training your craft, and what better way to do that than to have a coach?
While content and technology are essential components of sales enablement, you shouldn’t overlook the importance of sales training and coaching.
Just like athletes invest in coaches, business owners should also do the same. If you want your sales rep to be the best at what they do, you need someone to help you see blind spots – to see the path ahead and stop you from veering off.
But first you need to ask yourself:
- Do I want to be coached?
- Am I willing to be vulnerable?
- Do I want to do the work?
If you’re thinking about hiring a coach, we offer Sales Training & Coaching at RedPandas as part of our ‘They Ask, You Answer’ business and marketing framework, which helps businesses drive traffic, generate leads, and close more deals.
Drift
Drift is basically a conversational marketing platform that can be used to improve sales enablement. In other words, you can use it to have personalised conversations with prospects at different stages of the sales cycle.
Some of the key benefits of using Drift for sales enablement include:
- Real-time conversations: With Drift, your sales team can engage with prospects in real-time, providing them with the support and information they need at every stage of the buying process.
- AI-powered chatbots: Drift’s AI-powered chatbots can help to qualify leads, answer common questions, and even schedule meetings with sales reps. This can help to streamline the sales process and make it more efficient.
- Personalization: Drift allows you to personalise your conversations with prospects based on their interests, preferences, and behaviour. This can help to build stronger relationships and improve your chances of closing the deal.
In addition to these features, Drift also offers a range of analytics and reporting tools to help you measure the effectiveness of your sales enablement efforts.
And if you were wondering, Drift easily integrates with many tools, including HubSpots CRM and Sales Hub.
DialPad
DialPad is a cloud-based phone system that helps sales teams easily have conversations with prospects and gives you the ability to understand what’s working, what isn’t, and how to improve your calls.
Some of the key benefits of using DialPad for sales enablement include:
- Seamless communication: Your sales team can communicate with prospects and customers across a range of channels, including voice, video, and messaging. This can help to improve collaboration and make it easier to manage relationships.
- Intelligent call routing: DialPad’s intelligent call routing system can help to ensure that sales reps are connected with the right prospects at the right time. This can help to maximise the chances of closing the deal.
- Analytics and reporting: DialPad offers a range of analytics and reporting tools to help you track the performance of your sales team and identify areas for improvement.
On top of all this, DialPad also integrates with many platforms, including HubSpot Sales and CRM.
A good sales enablement system needs a phone calling software, and DialPad is the way to go.
Recap
That brings us to the end of our exploration of the best sales enablement tools for 2023. Whether you’re a business owner with a well established sales system, or you’re just starting out, these tools can help you close more deals and drive revenue growth like a boss.
But hey, don’t just take my word for it. When selecting the right tools for your team, it’s important to consider your specific needs and goals. Look for tools that offer the features and functionality that are most important to you, and that can help you achieve your sales objectives.
And let’s not forget about the importance of aligning your sales and marketing teams. When these two powerhouses work together, you can create a sales enablement machine that will knock your competitors’ socks off.
So go forth, my friends, and empower your sales team with the right tools and resources. With a little bit of hard work, a lot of determination, and the right sales enablement tools, you’ll be closing deals left and right in no time!
