Regardless of their finger dexterity and caffeine consumption, every sales rep can save at least an hour a day through efficient sales automation.
Sending follow-up emails, scouring the web for leads, running reports — these small tasks add up.
And software can do them for you, enabling you to spend more time on the activities that put money in your pocket:
- Making calls.
- Building relationships.
- Strategising about how to close a deal or break open a new account.
Read on to discover everything you need about B2B sales automation and how to use it for better team productivity, increased sales, and higher employee satisfaction.
What is sales automation?
Sales automation involves using software, such as artificial intelligence (AI) and other digital tools, to streamline and automate sales tasks that are typically manual and time-consuming. It helps managers and sales reps manage and streamline their day-to-day responsibilities.
In other words, it’s the act of outsourcing parts of your sales process to software platforms like CRMs and sales intelligence tools.
For example, many SDRs automate their cold outreach process with sales engagement software.
These tools allow them to create cold email templates that auto-personalise when sent to a lead.
That way, they can send 100 emails in the time it used to take to send one.
Here are some other sales tasks you might automate:
- Email follow-ups.
- Lead routing.
- Data transfer between your tech stack.
- Cold email personalisation.
- Lead list building.
- Reporting and forecasting.
The goal of sales automation is not to replace salespeople. B2B sales still run on relationships, and most software does not have that function.
Instead, the object is to reduce the busy work in a salesperson’s day so they can spend more time doing their core function: selling to potential customers.
4 awesome sales automation benefits
Sales automation can speed up and improve every stage of your sales process, from lead generation to contract negotiation.
Here are four reasons why a sales automation system is a gift to B2B sales managers and their teams:
Better productivity
Salespeople have fewer repetitive tasks and can accomplish more important work each day.
Increased sales
Automation allows sales reps to do more in less time, inevitably leading to more calls, meetings, and closed deals.
Happier sales reps
With more time for revenue-driving work, reps are more successful and happier. Plus, this happiness can boost productivity.
Faster ramp periods
Automation in sales enforces standard operating procedures and best practices, making it easy for new reps to understand.
Of course, the impact of automation depends on how you and your sales team use this newfound free time.
Some ideas:
- More sales practice and mock calls. Hone the craft.
- More social selling. Build that network.
- More strategising and research. Find ways to move the deal forward.
More time off since everyone is crushing quota?
That’s up to your sales leaders😉
What is the difference between CRM and sales automation?
CRM (Customer Relationship Management) and sales automation are essential for managing customer relationships and increasing sales efficiency. However, they serve slightly different purposes and have distinct functionalities.
CRM sales automation is a broader term encompassing various activities for managing customer interactions and relationships. This includes tracking customer interactions, managing leads and opportunities, analysing customer data, and creating personalised marketing campaigns.
Sales, marketing and customer service teams typically use CRM systems to improve customer relationships and drive sales growth.
On the other hand, sales automation focuses explicitly on streamlining and automating sales-related tasks such as lead generation, email outreach, follow-ups, and reporting. Sales automation tools utilise AI and machine learning to automate repetitive tasks and allow sales reps to focus on building relationships and closing deals.
In summary, a CRM is a comprehensive tool for managing customer relationships across multiple departments, while sales process automation specifically targets sales processes to increase efficiency and productivity.
Both are essential in a successful sales strategy but serve different functions within the overall sales process.
Sales automation examples and types
Many repetitive tasks make up an effective B2B sales funnel, which is why brands swear by sales automation platforms - here are some popular examples of activities streamlined by automation:
Email follow-ups
After the first follow-up, sales email reply rates rise from 49% to 220%.
Remembering to send these follow-ups can be challenging, especially when managing hundreds of leads.
That’s why this sales email automation is so powerful.
For example, in your sales engagement tool, you can write a templated follow-up email and set a rule to auto-send it to leads after several days without a response.
Notifications and reminders
While not the most exciting type of automation, notifications and reminders ensure that you’ll never forget to send that contract or attend that demo.
They keep you on task, prevent silly mistakes that could hurt a deal, and avoid work from slipping through the cracks.
Almost every tool in your sales stack should have notification automation you can set up.
Even Google Calendar’s 30-minute warning for an upcoming sales call is considered a reminder automation.
Most sales automation technology allows you to choose how you receive notifications—on the platform, by email, or by text.
Make the most of these and use your memory or email calendar for more important things.
Cold email outreach
Sales reps can use sales engagement software to automate cold email outreach tasks such as personalising, sequencing, and bulk emailing.
For example, with a tool like Outreach, you can create a templated cold email with open fields for things like {lead name} or {company} name. These will then autofill with information from your CRM.
This way, you can send cold emails to hundreds of leads in just one click.
If you’re sending email sequences, the tools will track each lead’s location and notify you when to click send on the following email.
With advancements in generative AI, many email tools now offer an AI writing assistant that generates copy for your sales email based on your specific prompts and the tool’s data about your product, brand voice, and target audience.
Keen to see how sales Outreach automation and a tool like Cognism work together for improved sales pipelines? Here’s an interactive demo 👇
Lead routing and scoring
CRM and lead management software allow you to create lead-scoring models and routing rules that automatically send qualified leads to the ideal salesperson on your team.
Instead of manually assessing a lead’s level of qualification, identifying the right salesperson for the job, and emailing them the lead’s information, reps receive high-quality leads in their inbox.
So they can save time on poor-quality leads or manual routing work.
This helps streamline your lead generation process and enhances your leads’ experience.
To illustrate, with automated routing, you could route all leads interested in a particular product line to the rep with the most expertise in that product.
That way, the lead is immediately in the hands of the best person to help them close the deal.
Compare this to an inbound SDR passing the lead to a new hire, who fumbles the call and, in a panic, passes the lead to another more experienced rep. Thus, the lead is given the runaround, not to mention a first impression of incompetence.
Sales reporting and coaching
Most Sales automation CRMs have an automated reporting function.
Tell it what metrics to track and how often you want the reports, and it will automatically generate and send them to you simultaneously every month, quarter, or year.
This saves you the trouble of having to generate sales reports yourself. Your team can then conclude and develop action steps based on the reporting.
Some sales tools will even provide you with AI-driven recommendations on improving your sales process, cold call strategy, or whatever else you’re monitoring in the system.
For example, Gong tracks each call your sales team makes, identifies what tactics and phrases work, and then makes suggestions to other reps accordingly.
This automation empowers sales coaches to focus on teaching and training rather than analysing calls.
Prospecting
Building targeted lists of high-quality leads takes a long time when done manually.
These manual tasks are time-consuming:
- Use Google to find companies that match your ICP.
- Go to their website and find the decision-makers.
- Use an email finder tool to find their contact information.
- Write this all down in your spreadsheet.
And a lot of the time, your efforts don’t even pay off.
The phone numbers are the companies’ main lines. The email addresses are incorrect.
This is why many B2B sales teams use a sales intelligence tool to automate the lead list-building process.
After all, quality B2B data is the first thing you need to get before you can automate successfully - and it’s where a tool like Cognism comes into play.
Cognism automates the prospecting process with unrestricted access and data views to quality GDPR data.* (subject to a generous fair usage policy) Plus, users can verify potential contacts with Diamond Data®.
Book a call with a data expert to discuss how Cognism can help your team beat quota 📞
Once you’ve done your prospecting, you must segregate your list and ensure everyone fits your ICP. Many people start automating by getting excited by the number of leads they find. They’ll get on the phone with these leads and realise they’re not a good fit.
This is an example of automation taking up more time if you’re a salesperson.
Sales teams use automation to get many results, but this isn’t worthwhile if you’re not getting the right results. You must still qualify the leads and understand your total addressable market to get the most out of automation.
How to get started with sales automation?
To start with sales automation, we recommend automating one high-ROI task.
That’s a task that is:
- Easy to automate with your current technology.
- Administrative and tedious (there will be few complaints about its automation).
- Taking up a large chunk of your sales team’s time.
Then, set up the automation and collect feedback from your reps about its progress.
From there, you can continue automating other parts of your sales process.
How to automate the sales process?
To automate the sales process, you’ll need to identify time-consuming sales tasks, find the right tools to automate them and train your team on how to use them.
Below, we dive deeper into each step.
1. Identify repetitive, time-consuming tasks
The first step of sales process automation is to find one to two sales tasks that are the most time-consuming and easily automated.
Here are some ways to find these tasks:
Review your standard sales process
Go over each activity in your sales process, from lead generation to closing, and identify repetitive ones.
Ask your sales team
Interview sales representatives or conduct surveys and ask if there are aspects of their jobs that should be automated.
Read up on industry best practices
A quick Google search will pull up dozens of articles about sales workflow automation and what can be automated. Ask peers what tasks they’re automating, how they do it, and the ROI.
Review your sales tools’ automation features
Which tasks can your CRM and other tools automate?
It makes sense to start there before investing in new tools.
Don’t spread yourself thin trying to automate everything right away. Start with the most critical tasks and run through the automation sales process we outline below.
Focusing on one automation at a time makes it much easier to build a culture of automation and learn the skills necessary for implementing it.
2. Find the right sales automation tool(s)
If you already have the automation features in your sales tech stack, that’s fantastic!
Follow the tool’s instructions and set up your first few automations.
Here are the different types of sales software for automating each part of the typical sales process:
Prospecting
Prospecting is time-consuming. Reps must research, track down prospects, and contact them. Then comes all the data capturing.
Many major sales teams, like SalesDRIIVN, use sales intelligence solutions like Cognism to automate this part of the sales process.
This cuts down prospecting time, builds the sales funnel, and gives reps more confidence, knowing their calls will go through to the right people.
“The direct dials in the UK and Europe are phenomenal. The SDRs no longer have to spend time sourcing the data manually.” “The fact they’re able to reach the decision-maker in one touchpoint massively boosts team morale and increases performance.”
Inbound lead management
Lead management software like Chili Piper helps you automatically score, route, and set appointments with inbound leads. ChatGPT for sales could also help here.
Email automation
There’s a lot more to sales than cold calling. With outbound sales automation, reps don’t have to remember to follow up, qualify leads, and send them content that helps increase conversions. Email automation tools like Sendinblue allow you to schedule outreach so you never forget a lead.
Deal management
CRMs offer deal tracking, automated follow-ups, and other features for handling tasks that move a prospect through the pipeline.
Team management
The better sales and marketing align, the better your sales. By automating sales management with tools like Monday.com, you can monitor campaigns, gain valuable customer insights and automate tasks to keep everyone aligned.
When searching for sales automation tools, ensure that they integrate with the rest of your tech stack and databases.
That way, an event in one software can trigger automation in another. For example, a lead responding to your marketing email may trigger a reminder in your sales engagement platform to send the lead a follow-up email.
3. Structure your data
Store all your B2B data uniformly across teams. This will ensure that anyone using your CRM and sales automation software can make the best sales or marketing decisions.
Secondly, it’s a good idea to check that all your data is accurate and GDPR compliant; use a sales intelligence provider like Cognism, which includes CRM enrichment features, to ensure accuracy and compliance.
Gradfuel did, and they tripled sales in the first six months👇
4. Train your team on sales automation
Teach your sales team how to set up automation for their respective accounts. If the software supplies video tutorials or courses or uploads them to YouTube, send them to each rep.
For many tools, the administrator may be able to set up team-wide automation so each rep doesn’t have to do it themselves.
Regardless, hold a meeting to review the newly automated sales process parts. Tell your reps how this will affect the day-to-day work of your sales reps.
In this meeting, talk about how this change will benefit your salespeople and help them make more sales, for example.
They’ll embrace sales automation best practices when they discover how helpful it is.
Continue monitoring your sales process and the tech landscape for other tasks you can automate.
Automate your sales process with Cognism
Cognism makes sales easier by minimising manual research, admin, and dialling incorrect numbers - activities that can easily take up 63% of a rep’s time.
Look at how Localz used Cognism to identify more relevant contacts, increase engagement with their emails and reduce bounce rates after just days of onboarding!
Ready to test our contact data?
Try Cognism for easy sales automation with 25 free leads 👇
