Highspot Blog

For sales reps and marketers, survival skills begin with the ability to separate long-term signals from short-term noise.  This influences where reps invest their time, how marketers construct their awareness and demand gen strategies, and the prioritization criteria for sales enablement leaders who need to manage everything from in-context training to playbooks and more.  

Today we’re going to dive into AI (Artificial Intelligence) and its evolution from a trend-making concept to a core feature of any modern sales enablement platform. Continue reading article ›

Last week, Highspot attended Sales 3.0 in San Francisco. For those that don’t know, Sales 3.0 is a long running—and evolving—conference run by Gerhard Gschwandtner, the founder and CEO of Selling Power. It’s devoted to introducing B2B sales leaders to sales-technologies, trends, and strategies to produce increased revenue and improved sales performance, and delivered hugely this year!

Photo of Gerhard Gschwandtner kicking off Sales 3.0

According to Gerhard, Sales 1.0 was about hustle. Sales 2.0 was when everything went online and became a science. And now, Sales 3.0 centers around the app explosion (think Salesforce App Exchange) and the inclusion of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in all aspects of our lives, while balancing technology with our innate human qualities.Continue reading article ›

For sales reps, innovation that matters is innovation that pays.  Today we’ll illustrate how reps win more deals by leveraging modern sales enablement technology to stay focused when others waver.  And how an aligned approach to sales and marketing innovation makes this possible. 

Compare & Contrast

When you first heard about sales enablement, what was the problem you were trying to solve?  How were your existing processes and technologies getting in the way of solving it?  What strategies and tactics did you prioritize?  Chances are, many of the issues encountered in the early days of your sales enablement journey persist today, if in a different and more competitive form.  Odds are equally high that at some point, self-imposed distractions have prevented you from fully solving your original problem.  As a consequence, your sales reps and their revenue goals have suffered. Continue reading article ›

When asked to share the secret of their sales enablement success, most high achievers answer similarly: position your team to make the most of every conversation.  And the surefire way to accomplish this?  Know the difference between what works and everything else.  A dedicated approach to best practices is a great place to start. 

Learning and Doing

At many companies, identifying and sharing best practices is a learned skill.  One reason is that specific strategies and tactics that may have outperformed in one environment aren’t always neatly transferable.  Another is that cross-team alignment and expectations can vary dramatically.  Today we’ll illustrate how sales enablement leaders can set themselves up for success by leveraging the power of best practices.  Continue reading article ›

Sales and marketing often hold different worldviews.  Left unreconciled, they can flatten innovative ideas and the career-making opportunities that accompany them.  Today we’re investing a few minutes in how to identify differences between perception and reality, and use the results as a launchpad for revenue growth.   

The Other Side of the Lens

At one point or another, we’ve all perceived a sales and marketing reality that didn’t exist.  We anticipated a behavior that fell short or an opportunity that didn’t materialize.  In the final analysis, chances are you, too, vowed it would not happen again.  This is about minimizing the probability it will.  Continue reading article ›

Ask any sales leader to point out the difference between success and failure. Chances are, they’ll mention content and training before you can count to three.    

Just as a good plan is only as useful as a team’s ability to execute it, so too an optimal sales enablement platform is a direct reflection of how it delivers the full range of what users need.  The partnership between Highspot and Brainshark is built upon this premise.  

Starting today, customers of both companies have seamless access to the features that make each unique.  For Highspot customers, the power of Brainshark’s sales training solution is now available within the Highspot user experience.  For Brainshark customers, the content authoring, training, and coaching they rely upon may now be accessed via Highspot’s industry-leading sales content management, customer engagement, and analytics platform.  It’s a partnership that rewrites the scope of modern sales enablement capabilities and helps sales teams overcome their most daunting effectiveness challenges.       Continue reading article ›

Sales enablement is giving businesses the competitive edge they need.  As illustrated in this year’s State of Sales Enablement Report, critical performance advantages have emerged at companies investing in this high-growth category.

Fundamental sales enablement strategies and tactics are now in place among a broad cross-section of companies.  From smaller sales teams just getting started to larger and more complex organizations, sales enablement has become a strategic commitment with significant upside.  Continue reading article ›

Road trips are a great way to get to know someone.  They reveal compatibilities, interests, and perspectives on everything from the best route to worthwhile stops.  These rites of passage are similar to shared expeditions of buyers and sellers.  Both require clear understanding of the ultimate destination, open communication, and eagerness to engage.  

Still, buyers and sellers are different.  On one side there are needs to fulfill and benefits to derive; on the other, revenue goals and customer satisfaction.  What is a journey for buyers is a process for sellers.  Successful sales and marketing teams manage both paths to mutual advantage while accelerating the results they care about most.

From then to now

We hear many stories about how the buyer’s journey is changing.  How it’s becoming more fluid and dynamic, and how buyers have more control than ever before.  All true.  What’s not true but remains broadly perceived is that the journey is now a random walk.  That buyers are less likely to follow a well-worn trail and more apt to advance from one stage to another with little predictability.  High-performing sellers know better.  Today we’ll share how they remain proactive – and how sales enablement helps establish strong links between the sales process and the buyer’s journey.   Continue reading article ›

As we’ve all settled back into life the first few weeks of 2017, there have been plenty of water cooler conversations about holidays, trips, and new year’s resolutions around the halls of Highspot. We’ve also talked a lot about what we learned in 2016, and how we plan to apply those learnings in 2017.

Sales Kick Off (SKO) is often one of the best places to put together a structured plan for applying new learnings. By planning ahead for what your reps truly need to succeed after SKO, you can have your best sales year ever.

Put a little focus on these five areas, and you’re bound to see long-term success from this year’s efforts.Continue reading article ›

Recently, CEB posted about a little-discussed correlation in selling organizations—the more burdened a sales team, (in terms of content, disparate tools, complex internal processes)—the lower their sales conversion rate.

As it turns out, more isn’t always more. According to research, the more we overload sales teams with content, tools, and processes, the worse they have a tendency to perform. CEB reports that 62% of perceived seller burden can be attributed to overly complex internal processes and procedures. In other words, the majority of sellers attribute their job frustrations to their own sales (and marketing) organizations.

Odds are, I don’t have to sell you on this correlation. We ask today’s sales reps to do a lot, and by weighing them down with more, more, more, we restrict them from delivering more of what they really need: sales.Continue reading article ›