Outsourcing continues to gain momentum as part of the B2B sales process, especially with the growing trend of sales reps working remotely. The 2020 business disruption caused by the pandemic has resulted in many B2B organizations retrenching and restructuring their sales teams to reduce overhead and maintain sales quotas. For many companies, that meant relying more on sales outsourcing to increase sales.
There is no doubt that the COVID-19 pandemic has had an impact on B2B sales. Concerns started early in 2020 with 58 percent of B2B respondents surveyed saying they were worried about sales and revenue, 56 percent were worried about cash flow and liquidity, and 52 percent were worried about the disruption to their business strategy. One-third of B2B sales executives said they feared losing business due to coronavirus and 16.7 percent were afraid of losing business because they couldn’t meet with customers.
To address these concerns, businesses are finding new ways to drive B2B sales.
Why Remote Sales Is Here to Stay
The pandemic has changed the way we approach B2B sales forever. According to McKinsey research, you can expect B2B sales to be largely remote from now on. Only 20 percent of those surveyed said they wanted to return to in-person sales, while the majority say they want to see digital self-service or remote sales continue.
During the pandemic, in-person B2B sales dropped from 61 to 29 percent while videoconferencing sales interaction rose 41 percent, and online chat rose 23 percent. Globally, businesses believe the new remote B2B sales model is highly effective, ranging from 76 to 81 percent, including a 74 percent effectiveness ranking in the U.S.
Digital deal size also rose, with 32 percent of B2B buyers willing to spend up to $500,000, 12 percent willing to spend up to $1 million, and 15 percent willing to spend more than $1 million using remote and self-service digital sales.
Indicators show that sales reps can be effective from anywhere, whether they are working in-house or are outsourced. And with sales volatility an ongoing concern, outsourcing is more flexible and cost-effective.
What Drives B2B Outsourcing
To increase sales and reduce customer churn, companies are using outsourced sales as service providers for a variety of reasons:
- Ensuring sales ROI while cutting overhead
With increased worries about revenue and cash flow, outsourcing sales gives you the means to increase your sales support without adding personnel. Maintaining an in-house sales team is expensive. You need to pay salaries, bonuses, and benefits; provide sales tools and training; and license supporting technology. To justify the expense, most in-house sales teams assume responsibility for additional tasks such as lead qualification, which isn’t an effective use of their time or talents.
Outsourcing sales saves overhead and lets you scale as needed. You can expand the sales team to handle sales leads without having to hire. Outsourcing sales not only saves salary and internal costs, but you can scale faster, bringing new reps up to speed in weeks, not months. Here at MarketStar, we can add up to 100 new sales reps in just 12 weeks.
Outsourcing lead qualification also makes better use of your in-house sales team. Sales reps hate making cold calls, and lead qualification is not the best use of their skills. Using an outsourced sales organization that specializes in lead qualification means your team gets highly qualified leads. It also means you can generate more revenue with a smaller sales team.
Reducing customer churn is another major concern. It costs five times more to acquire a new customer than to retain an existing customer, and 5 percent customer retention can yield a 25-95 percent increase in profit. Outsourcing customer success rather than leaving it to your sales reps will more than pay for itself by reducing customer churn.
- Maintaining market agility
Retooling your sales team to react to market changes can be time-consuming and expensive. Consider the changes that you have already had to make to embrace digital sales during the pandemic. Outsourcing gives you more market agility.
With the right outsourced sales partner, you can adapt faster to changing market conditions. You can scale your sales team up or down as needed, focus on new markets, tackle new verticals, and deploy resources where needed. For example, if your enterprise sales are stalled because of changing budgets and market uncertainty you can use outsourcing to cost-effectively target small-and medium-sized businesses.
Outsourcing gives you the agility you need to pivot, no matter what the changes in market conditions.
- Harnessing more technology and analytics
Outsourcing also gives you access to sales technology without adding infrastructure. The best sales as a service providers maintain a state-of-the-art sales tech stack, giving you access to the tools, data, and analytics you need without having to license the actual technology.
More advanced technology is playing a larger role in B2B sales. According to Deloitte, robotic process automation (RPA) is being discussed in more than 75 percent of outsourcing agreements. Sales automation is a growing trend as more organizations look to improve sales efficiency and cut costs. When you outsource, you get access to the latest automation technology as well as other sales resources.
How the MarketStar Advantage Helps
MarketStar clients understand the benefits of outsourcing and have realized even greater returns during the pandemic. MarketStar is a pure play, B2B outsourcing partner with more than 30 years of experience in perfecting the Sales as a Service® model.
MarketStar gives you the expertise and agility you need to adapt to changing market conditions, open new markets, and increase revenue with better-quality sales support, customer success service, and sales analytics and intelligence. We provide the dedicated sales resources you need to meet your sales goals, no matter what they may be.
To learn how you might benefit from outsourcing, be sure to download our guide, Is Outsourced Inside Sales Right for You?
