Salesforce Canada

Content marketing is an important tool for your sales team. Used well, it can help salespeople move customers through the pipeline and close sales faster.

If you’re a restaurant owner and a new eatery opens up down the street, what’s the first thing you do? Make a reservation, of course, and see what the competition is offering.

There’s going to be lot of fast food consumed. T-shirts will be flying off the shelves. Pop stars will be singing their anthems. And somewhere in the middle of it all, there might also be a little football game taking place.

The past 15 years have brought about a lot of change in the technology world. Flashback to the year 2000: a tablet was a piece of stone and birds were the only things that tweeted. It’s not just technology that has changed dramatically—the state of sales and how businesses engage with customers has too.

No one wants to offer any confidential information that would give competitors an advantage, which can sometimes make it difficult for Canadian small and medium-sized businesses to figure out their growth strategy. One way to start is to focus on what not to do.

We all have our items to check off before the work day is truly done. A sales leader might need to conduct a staff meeting, for instance, or follow up on a deal that may be moving in the wrong direction. Reps have calls to make, presentations to create or in-person pitches.

Not everyone is a born actor, but make no mistake: selling involves a degree of performance where a customer is shown the possibilities of a better future. And to do that well, you’re going to have to practice.

The stats back up the facts: Canada is the top spot for start-ups. Its people, economy, and other factors make it one of the best places in the world to start a business.

If call centres were the only places where you needed to document customer service issues, Canadian small and medium-sized business would have it pretty easy. After all, as the recordings often say, calls can always be recorded for quality assurance purposes.

The next time you're presented with trend information about the market you're serving as a sales team, think through a few areas to determine whether it's worth your while and if so, the best way to move forward.