Highspot Blog

Tis the season for must-attend events! Up next is SiriusDecisions Summit 2017. If you’re going to be in Las Vegas for the event, stop by our booth (#623) to say hi! We’ll have a drawing and swag that we know you’ll love and can answer any questions you may have about improving your sales enablement processes.

Speaking of sales enablement, in addition to the top-notch exhibitors, this year’s Summit includes several sales enablement sessions that you won’t want to miss. In these sessions, SiriusDecisions analysts offer research-backed guidance to help you accelerate your sales enablement and training programs.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 ›

When it comes to sales and marketing types, they want to like each other. In fact, in my experience, they want to love each other! After all, sales and marketing work towards a common goal—generating more revenue. But the fact remains that as long as sales relies on marketing to help close deals and marketing relies on sales to get the company message out, there’s bound to be conflict.

What we have here is a failure to communicate.

Sales wants very specific, personalized content that they can find at a moment’s notice. Marketing feels they publish volumes of content (and they do—but 65% of it can’t be found), and they’re sensitive to changing content because it changes the company message. In the end, we have two mission critical groups with a common goal—but different ways of getting there—and mounting frustration.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 ›

The second Sales Enablement Society Seattle meet up took place in probably the coolest building in downtown—at least for a history fanatic like me—The Smith Tower. Built in 1914, it was considered the tallest building west of the Mississippi. Stepping into the antique—serviced—elevators was like going back a century in time to the “good old days.”

As I walked into the meet-up, my first observation was that our newly-appointed Chapter President, Chuck Marcouiller, had the words “Chaos Imperative” scrawled across the whiteboard. Continue reading article ›

Competitive marketers know how every step they take impacts sales.  They combine boldness with shrewd analysis to win deals and keep customers happy. As sales enablement becomes increasingly vital to their company’s success, these same marketers are again expanding their comfort zone to drive greater top-line impact.  Today we’ll share how and why.  

A larger role awaits

Marketers face daily decisions on the style of offense they’ll play and how long they’ll play it.  Too often, the hyperactivity of a product launch, announcement, or campaign gives way to pursuit of the next new thing.  Ideas and supporting assets are defended rather than fine-tuned and sales teams are given less than optimal support.  By abandoning the offensive too early, many marketing teams shortchange the revenue growth they originally set out to achieve.    

Our recommendation: stay in the game.  

Continue reading article ›

Did we tell attendees what to expect? No.

The meet-up description was rather vague, simply a promise that it wouldn’t turn into a “vendor” discussion. Frankly, we had our brand value to hold up, so we wanted to ensure that our first inaugural Seattle Sales Enablement Society meet-up was truly centered around the core mission of the society: To elevate the sales enablement profession.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 ›