How To Lead an Effective Sales Team Call
The prep work is the key to an effective strategy call between sales and marketing. You need to have a list of questions ready to go. And you need to send these questions out beforehand.
You want to keep the call focused.
Your goal is to find out how to help the sales team with content that supports conversions. You’ll be discussing the challenges they face, and that opens the door to a possible venting session.
You don’t want that.
The best way to avoid that is to have leadership on the call to ensure the conversation stays focused.
Questions To Ask on the Sales Call
You must be prepared to get the most out of your sales call. The following questions will help you guide the sales team to the feedback you need for creating significant assets and strategies.
Questions About Leads:
★ How would you define your ideal lead?
★ What are the disqualifiers for leads?
★ Are there any audiences that you feel we should prioritize?
Questions About Pain Points:
★ What are the most common, immediate pain points of sales prospects?
★ What are they worried will happen if they don’t solve those problems?
★ How do you convince prospects that your solution will solve their problems?
★ Do prospects describe their problem or your solution differently than how your business describes them? (If so, can you list a few examples?)
★ What solutions have prospects usually tried before?
★ Why haven’t these solutions worked?
Questions About the Product/Service:
★ What product or service do most leads choose? And why do you think that is?
★ What expectations do they have about working with your business?
★ Are there any misconceptions between the service or product your business offers and what prospects think those are?
★ Are there any “No Fly” terms or phrases you avoid during the sales cycle?
★ What gets them excited about working with you?
★ How long is the sales process typically?
Questions About Concerns/Objections:
★ What are the most common objections prospects have that make them hesitate or say “No” to choosing your product or service?
★ How do you help them overcome those objections?
★ What myths do prospects continue to believe interfere with the sales cycle?
Additional Notes/Questions:
★ Is there anything else you’d like to add?
★ Is there a tool, resource and/or template you think would help convince prospects that they should work with you?
Usually, the sales call will take about an hour. But you may need more time if you haven’t done one with the client before or if the sales team’s involvement is high.
You can schedule a second call to wrap up this discovery if that’s the case. But you don’t want to go longer than an hour in one sitting as the answers may be rushed. You also want to be respectful of everyone’s time.
What To Do After the Sales Team Meeting
After the call, it’s time to take action.
The first thing you need to do is send a follow-up email thanking everyone for their time. The sales team and leadership are busy. Reinforcing how productive and helpful the call was is key to ensuring they’ll be open to future meetings.
Yes. There will be future meetings.
In the short run, if you run out of time to discuss all the points, you may need to schedule a follow-up call to finish collecting data. Or, you could send the form in an email for the sales team to complete. (But, unless this is reinforced by leadership, it likely won’t happen.)
You will also need to follow up with the sales team at least once a quarter. This is because markets, businesses and customer demands change. As a result, the sales team may have new insights to share.
You can also review notes from sales calls if you need additional insights.
You can usually find these in your client’s CRM. Ask them to do it if they don’t have one or don’t track client calls. This information is critical for developing marketing collateral that drives conversions.
However, it’s important not to get lost in the data. Analysis paralysis is a real thing. Block out time for reviewing the data. After, get to work building out the strategy.
How the Sales Call Supports Client Retention
The key to retaining SEO clients is to go beyond keyword data, backlinks and other generic jargon. Instead, you must establish yourself as a partner determined to grow your business.
SEO is the skillset you use to make that happen.
Working closely with the sales team to create assets that support the buyer’s journey and help close deals makes you a critical member of their team.
SEO done this way builds a relationship with your client that isn’t solely tied to traffic rankings and confusing SEO jargon. In other words, if their site fluctuates, they won’t be second-guessing their decision to work with you.
Instead, you’ll have established your agency as an essential partner tied to their growth.
And that’s how you retain clients.
