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Digital Sales Transformation: Best Practices for Adopting New Sales Technologies

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Digital Sales Transformation: Best Practices for Adopting New Sales Technologies
Blogs

Digital Sales Transformation: Best Practices for Adopting New Sales Technologies

Digital Sales Transformation: Best Practices for Adopting New Sales Technologies

Don’t let your reps fall behind. Spark your Digital Sales Transformation with the ultimate 3 best practices for skyrocketing revenue growth.

The last few years — particularly with the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic — have seen a rapid rise in online shopping. An online marketplace also means more and more options are available to consumers, as physical location is no longer the crux of a business. With this change in medium comes changes in the priorities that shoppers have: in the digital age, customers value speed, transparency, and authenticity. This necessitates companies to proactively optimize the digital landscape and adopt sales technologies that ensure smoother customer experiences for them.

In addition to improving the logistics of sales and related processes, the need for digital sales technologies is to keep up with the rapid growth of the market and evolving customer psyches. Digital sales channels and the increasing use of data analytics have become the norm in today’s businesses. Conversely, businesses that are slow to pick up on these trends are more likely to lose out on leads as well as the benefits these technologies bring them.

Here, we take a look at three important aspects to consider while implementing digital sales technologies in your company.

1. Assess your current sales processes and find a focused solution

Digital channels can be used to improve various aspects of the sales process — such as market research, customer relationships, and data aggregation. There is an abundance of options that address each of these aspects individually or in an integrated manner.

While researching and choosing what technologies are likely to improve sales, companies must assess the specific areas within their current sales process that require improvement or optimization. Being informed about this will allow decision-makers to narrow down on tools that are functional, cost-effective, user-friendly, and employee-friendly. As a research tactic, companies can also assess tools and technologies used by competitors or companies with similar operations. 

2. Understand customer expectations and prioritize them

At the heart of any business operation is its customers. The advantage of digital channels is their agility and ease of access. Customers today are more digitally savvy than ever before and are likely to do some research before they settle on the brand of their choice. With countless options in the online market, they also value business interactions that are personalized, detailed, and quick. Digital sales technologies enable sales departments to keep up with these expectations.

They can be used to increase the efficiency of customer interactions. For example, customized chatbots can be set up to address client concerns swiftly. You can use analytics to understand customer expectations and pain points on a more specific level, allowing you to better anticipate the nature of interactions with them. This data can then be used to create automated response templates for more common queries/issues. It can also be used to create contingency plans for when sales executives need to manually address queries and issues that are more complex.

3. Focus on training and support for sales employees

Adapting to new technology can be overwhelming, so it’s essential that all personnel who will engage with it are trained properly.

Training and support can be provided to employees through comprehensive modules (off-site or online), additional reference material, demos from the vendors, etc. Beyond all this, it’s important to keep track of how well employees are actually adapting to newly introduced systems. This can be done through regular check-ins and feedback sessions.

By being proactive and involved throughout their training, companies can ensure that the transition process goes smoothly.

To sum up

To thrive in the global economy, it’s essential that companies adopt digital technologies that drive sales and ensure their relevance in the market. With the online world becoming increasingly fast-paced, this is unlikely to be a one-time effort. With each upgrade, companies must be considered in their approach to choosing the systems most suited for their operations and customer engagement. They must also invest in the right training and support so employees can successfully adapt to the new systems.

Understanding Cloud Maturity: A Critical Aspect of Successful Cloud Adoption
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Understanding Cloud Maturity: A Critical Aspect of Successful Cloud Adoption

Understanding Cloud Maturity: A Critical Aspect of Successful Cloud Adoption

Cloud maturity can be messy at a time when organizations are concerned about their budgets. How can you prioritize costs and maximize innovation?

The cloud has become a crucial element of modern-day computing, with numerous organizations embracing cloud technologies to attain enhanced agility, flexibility, and cost-effectiveness. As per a report by IDG, there has been a notable acceleration in cloud migration for over 69% of organizations in the last 12 months. Furthermore, the percentage of companies with a majority or complete cloud-based IT infrastructure is anticipated to increase from 41% to 63% within the next two years.

Cloud maturity refers to the capacity of an organization to effectively leverage cloud computing by implementing optimal practices, procedures, and tools. In this article, we will dive deep into the concept of cloud maturity, its benefits, and the best strategies for achieving it.

Cloud Maturity Model

A Cloud Maturity Model is a framework that assesses an organization’s level of cloud adoption and provides guidance on progressing toward a more advanced and optimized cloud environment. It also enables organizations to evaluate their cloud capabilities and devise a roadmap with areas that need improvements. Typically, the model is organized into distinct stages, wherein each stage denotes an elevated level of cloud maturity.

The following are the different stages of the Cloud Maturity Model:

Ad hoc:

The organization lacks a well-defined strategy or established processes for cloud computing, resulting in an ad hoc approach.

Opportunistic:

Some cloud services are adopted in an ad hoc manner with minimal standardization or control.

Repeatable:

The implementation of standardized processes and controls for cloud adoption, ensuring that the procedures can be replicated consistently, thereby making them repeatable.

Managed:

Mature processes and controls with a focus on optimization and continuous improvement.

Optimized:

Highly optimized processes and controls, with a strong emphasis on innovation and automation.

The Benefits of the Cloud Maturity Model

Helps You Understand Your Cloud Capabilities

The Cloud Maturity Model offers an in-depth understanding of your organization’s cloud abilities, allowing you to identify areas of improvement. It provides a framework for evaluating your cloud adoption in key areas like governance, security, and management and a plan for developing your cloud capabilities. By assessing your present cloud capabilities, you can devise a focused approach to improving your cloud maturity.

Improves Business Agility

The Cloud Maturity Model is a game-changer for businesses seeking to enhance their agility. It offers a well-defined roadmap to the cloud, enabling them to stay ahead of the curve. This solution seamlessly elevates businesses from inconsistent cloud utilization to a refined, curated, and streamlined cloud environment. It empowers enterprises to efficiently adapt to dynamic market trends, evolving customer preferences, and business requirements. Cloud technology enables businesses to easily distribute and expand resources, thereby reducing time-to-market and elevating their competitive edge.

Reduces Costs

The Cloud Maturity Model offers a significant advantage in terms of cost savings, making it a highly sought-after solution. By advancing along the maturity model and optimizing their cloud usage, businesses can reduce costs. This includes maximizing resource efficiency, curbing unnecessary cloud expenditures, and minimizing management expenses. Adopting cutting-edge techniques and improving cloud governance can help organizations reduce costs dramatically.

Improves Security and Compliance

Cloud security is a critical concern for businesses of all sizes. The Cloud Maturity Model is a must-have for organizations seeking to elevate their security standpoint, as it offers an in-depth framework for integrating top-notch security protocols. It assists organizations in identifying potential security threats and weaknesses, while providing them with expert advice on effectively addressing the challenges. As businesses move up the maturity model, they elevate their compliance with industry regulations and standards, thereby mitigating the likelihood of data breaches and other security incidents.

Enables Innovation

The Cloud Maturity Model facilitates business innovation by offering a pliable, scalable, and economical platform for experimentation and development. Through the optimization of cloud usage, organizations may free up resources for innovative and experimental endeavors. This enables enterprises to experiment with new technologies and business models, expediting their digital transformation.

How to Achieve Cloud Maturity?

Achieving cloud maturity requires a systematic approach and a commitment to continuously improve cloud capabilities. The following are some essential steps businesses can take to achieve cloud maturity:

Develop a cloud strategy:

Crafting a cloud strategy involves devising a comprehensive plan that outlines the approach a company will take to integrate and manage cloud services. The cloud computing strategy should align with the business objectives, effectively tackle the challenges, and capitalize on the opportunities presented by the technology.

Establish a governance framework:

For ensuring effective management and operation of a cloud environment, it is essential to establish a governance framework. This framework outlines the policies, procedures, and guidelines that a business will follow to govern its cloud infrastructure. The implementation must encompass comprehensive policies, controls, and processes to guarantee proper usage and management of cloud resources.

Implement robust security measures:

A company’s primary objective in adopting cloud computing should be to implement stringent security procedures. As per Gartner, by 2025, it is predicted that a staggering 90% of organizations that lack proper control over their public cloud usage will inadvertently disclose confidential information. Thus, organizations must deploy a holistic security approach encompassing data encryption, access controls, and identity management.

Optimize cloud costs:

It is imperative to eliminate waste, leverage cost-effective cloud services, and optimize resource utilization to optimize cloud costs. It is also necessary for organizations to periodically assess their cloud expenditure and optimize their resources accordingly.

Adopt DevOps practices:

Implementing DevOps practices can facilitate the quicker, more reliable, and superior delivery of applications and services for organizations. The process entails integrating the development and operations teams, implementing automation, and ensuring continuous delivery.

Conclusion

As the trend of cloud technology adoption continues, achieving cloud maturity will gain paramount significance. Organizations that successfully achieve cloud maturity will be strategically positioned to fully leverage the potential of cloud computing and effectively accomplish their business objectives. By implementing optimal approaches and addressing cloud maturity challenges, organizations can attain increased agility, flexibility, and economic efficiency.

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Gen-Z-min
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Marketing to Gen Z

Marketing to Gen Z

Gen Z is influencing trends and shaping how people relate to brands. How can marketers capitalize on this shift?

Generation Z is changing the consumer landscape, and its impact isn’t limited to its own generation but expanding to the entire population pyramid. It’s time marketers rethink how they connect to customers and address the new market demands.

With this generation evaluating everything in-depth and prioritizing access over possession, creating campaigns that resonate with them could be a huge game-changer.

How Gen Z is different

Gen Z is radically different from the previous generations. With an aversion to labels and expression being an innate need, this generation is all about seeking truth. Gen Z is way more open to diverse viewpoints and opinions. Stereotyping is not their thing.

A broader belief system allows this generation to be more respectful of diversity and connect to causes different from their own. Zoomers are a generation that’s more tolerant and accommodating.

Marketing Strategies for digital natives

With GenZ preferring learning things online over traditional education and marketing methods, it makes insane sense for brands to create an engaging digital experience that allows Gen Z to self-learn and self-serve.

Self-service allows modern customers to save the time they spend waiting on agents. Brands must optimize the experience for customer satisfaction, giving them what they want with minimal effort.

Gen Z likes brands with a voice- brands that know when to take a stand. It’s not about being politically correct or having diverse topics to cover but more about knowing what matters to a brand and how they decide to show up. If you want to strike a chord with the Gen X workforce, transparency is the key.

Zoomers are well-educated, and the matters they need to learn about-they know how to look for information and form a solid viewpoint. Inconsistency is on their radar screen, so brands must walk their talk. If businesses say something matters to them, and their actions prove otherwise, Gen Z wouldn’t blink twice before taking their business elsewhere.

But in contrast, if brands make mistakes and correct those slip-ups, Gen Z would be more tolerant than any previous generation.

In the End

The buying behavior has evolved tremendously in the last few years, and there’s no going back. The hyperconnectivity of the digital age makes the influence of GenZ stronger than brands previously conceived.

The sensible move is to understand the psychology of this generation and cater to those needs. More isn’t always better, but personalization certainly is.

All you need to know about Revops
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All You Need To Know About RevOps

All You Need To Know About RevOps

There is a chasm between those that have fully embraced Revops and those that have simply rebranded existing sales or finance teams.

Think about running a business, laying the foundation for a startup, or tasks in a multinational company. All of them work towards driving higher revenue for their business. This can be achieved by focusing on new customer acquisition as well as improving satisfaction amongst existing consumer base.

Previously organizations operated as separate departments with independent objectives, disjointed client encounters, and disorganized data analysis. Efficiency and cohesion were required to manage operations across Marketing, Sales, and Service. Here is when RevOps was introduced. According to Salesforce report, decision-makers comprehend the mounting significance of revenue operations to achieve their desired outcomes as an individual, team, department, and the organization as a whole.

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A staggering 86% of the respondents have explicitly acknowledged the indispensable role played by revenue operations in fulfilling their organization’s objectives.

Revenue operations, also known as RevOps, is an intricate and comprehensive strategy that aims to align and integrate the different functions of marketing, sales, and customer service. The ultimate goal of RevOps is to optimize the customer experience and ensure maximum revenue generation.

To achieve this goal, RevOps eliminates any internal inconsistencies and inefficiencies that might have existed in the past, and brings all revenue-generating departments under one common objective. This means that formerly siloed departments, processes, and tech stacks are streamlined and made to work together in a seamless and harmonious manner.

By doing so, RevOps facilitates a more predictable revenue and growth trajectory, and enhances the overall customer experience. This is accomplished by combining the collective strengths of marketing, sales, and customer service to provide a more holistic and satisfying customer journey. In essence, RevOps can be viewed as a cohesive and synchronized approach to revenue management that enables businesses to thrive in today’s fast-paced and highly competitive marketplace.

“REVOPS CAN HELP YOU OPTIMIZE YOUR LEAD NURTURING PROCESS BY ENSURING THAT THE RIGHT LEADS ARE GETTING THE RIGHT MESSAGES AT THE RIGHT TIME”

Revops impacting businesses

Revops creates a central hub within the organization for customer information. It takes a toll on every significant aspect and connects the sales, marketing, and service team to increase customer acquisition, bookings, recurring revenue, customer churn, and satisfaction. RevOps emphasizes revenue growth by fragmenting internal department silos and facilitating collaboration between customer-facing departments. Revenue operations also assist organizations in leveraging analytics and AI tools to catch and follow trends and opportunities driving revenue streams.

The Need of Revops

Some organizations rely on distinct technological stacks and systems (such as CRM, spreadsheets, business intelligence, and marketing automation) by sales teams, marketing teams, and customer success teams caused a significant disparity in data. This disconnect results in teams presenting their own reports, thereby wasting time on validating and comparing data, leading to an inability to make informed and precise decisions.

The importance of RevOpS lies in its expertise in meeting customer expectations of positive online experiences and personalized interactions. Its framework includes administrative teams, chief revenue officers, and software vendors that create tools to improve data integration and remove silos. The primary focus of RevOps varies with each organization, where some want it to look into marketing operations to drive revenue. While others emphasize sales prospecting or improving upsell and cross-sell capabilities in the service department.

Benefits of implementing Revops

Additional benefits of the RevOps are the alignment, direction, and simplification it bestows on the business through its strategies and teamwork. Bringing together the customer-facing departments ensures impeccable growth in the sales funnel. It guarantees efficiency by creating a common endpoint in mind, such as generating leads, closing deals, and expanding existing accounts.

The final word

To summarize, RevOps is a critical strategy that any organization can adopt to remain competitive in the ever-changing market and meet the ever-increasing expectations of today’s customers. It facilitates organizations to create a flawless personalized customer experience that translates to better revenue growth and a more efficient and productive internal operation.

Maximizing your Cloud Advantage in 2023
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Maximizing your Cloud Advantage in 2023

Maximizing your Cloud Advantage in 2023

Although cloud gains can be slow, they are significant for your business. Getting total value from the cloud requires a commitment to continuous reinvention.

Current Cloud Value

Businesses are rushing toward cloud adoption to drive greater resilience, efficiency, and growth. They are seeking to build the agility to tackle current challenges and drive ongoing competitive advantage. However, many companies still require additional effort to materialize their cloud aspirations and progress toward reinvention.

The global outbreak of COVID-19 served as a crucial turning point, compelling businesses to regard cloud computing as a pressing imperative rather than a mere option. With a thriving economy, companies embarked on their cloud computing journeys with ambitious visions in mind. According to an Accenture survey, approximately 32% of the companies perceive their expedition to the cloud as finalized and are content with their ability to fulfil present business objectives. Moreover, 41% acknowledge that their cloud journey is still in progress and persistently transforming to accommodate the varying necessities of the business.

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Overcoming Problems with Extensive Data

The contemporary landscape of enterprise data operates on an entirely different magnitude. To many organizations, the cloud has persistently opened up an increasingly broad spectrum of sophisticated data capabilities, primarily artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML). Research shows that a mere 25% of organizations are presently attaining the full potential of their data and analytics initiatives. However, AI can only achieve its maximum potential once businesses resolve data-related issues.

Adapting shifting technology spend

According to a cloud computing report, during the early stages of cloud adoption, providers and enablers promised a significant reduction in operational expenses, ranging from 20-40%. Despite the fact that some organizations have achieved this goal for certain workloads and applications, there are few that have achieved such efficiency across a wide range of tasks. Numerous entities are encountering setbacks in realizing their ROI and contending with spiraling invoices on a monthly basis.

Enabling and Accelerating Cloud

Cloud technology is a significant catalyst for the transformation of data and a critical facilitator of groundbreaking business prospects. It provides built-in and seamlessly integrated platform services for organizations in various industries, including centralized monitoring and logging functionalities, scheduling, and orchestration. Moreover, cloud technology permits easy customization of computing and storage capacity according to specific industry requirements and enterprise needs, utilizing a range of offerings, from optimized computing power to storage nodes.

Editor’s note

Commitment to cloud computing has skyrocketed in two years, and realizing its full potential is now more attainable than ever. However, realizing this requires a shift in mindset, focusing on the journey toward cloud adoption rather than solely on reaching the destination.

It must be acknowledged that cloud computing is a muscle that requires continuous strengthening. Although transforming existing technology to the cloud is a heavy lift, the possibilities that await are numerous. The momentum gained from successfully migrating to the cloud paves the way for Total Enterprise Reinvention and puts you on the fast track toward achieving your goals. The key is identifying the right opportunities and persevering even when facing challenges or setbacks.

We have now reached a turning point in this journey. Migrating to the cloud is the first step in unlocking its full potential and driving continuous transformation. The real challenge lies in identifying the appropriate use cases that revolve around a more expansive definition of value. We can optimize operations and expedite growth by utilizing cloud computing as an operating system that integrates data, artificial intelligence, applications, infrastructure, and security.

How AI Continues to Transform Healthcare
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How AI Continues to transform healthcare

How AI Continues to transform healthcare

Things AI is doing for healthcare aren’t fiction anymore. Artificial intelligence is changing the healthcare industry and doing it well.

Ai in healthcare

AI and deep learning are doing some of the things humans do- only quicker, better, and more economically. Frost & Sullivan predicts artificial intelligence (AI) will help the American healthcare industry save over $150 billion by 2025.

AI-powered healthcare solutions are helping with medical diagnosis, drug discovery, medicine, and more.This article will drill down and give you insights into the substantial ways Artificial intelligence is playing a huge role in healthcare. 

AI and the path ahead

Artificial intelligence will transform the lab of the future. Healthcare data platforms would help doctors and scientists better understand diseases and their treatments. Biopharmaceutical researchers have achieved a lot in this space in the last couple of years, but we’re still far from having a systematic process for medical intervention for different patients. There are limits associated with reductionism in medicine, and AI can bring in a step change.

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The Precision

  • Robot-assisted surgeries allow medical professionals to perform complicated procedures with precision. These surgeries are minimally invasive and boost doctors’ precision. 
  • AI also helps diagnose diseases early, making the treatment overall more effective than the traditional diagnosis. 
  • A Nature research article found that an AI system surpassed human doctors in detecting breast cancer, enhancing the efficiency and accuracy of cancer screening.
  • Different lifestyles, genetics, and environments call for precision medicine. Massive parallel sequencing, or NGS, is capable of sequencing a person’s genome with insane speed (Compared to traditional sequencing that almost took a decade to achieve the same!).

The Prediction

  • A Stanford study found that AI was better able to predict how long the patients have to live (The AI algorithm showed an accuracy of 90% compared to 64% for human doctors).
  • The complexity of human bodies makes drug discovery a long process. Some scientists believe AI will expedite the process and have a drug available for treatment in 1/10th of that time. Artificial intelligence can deliver results here at an unprecedented pace and scale. 
  • AI can predict the diseases an individual is prone to, treatment options, and the readmission risk in certain patients.
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A Grain of Salt

AI algorithms can amplify existing biases in data sets. Since medical data can be very biased, we must build AI models that are fair and on the level. The other challenges that can come up are integrating engineering with complex human biology, data privacy, upgrading technology & infrastructure, and more. Mastering these complexities will be arduous but equally impactful.

The Editor’s Note

Technology can’t replace human expertise, but the convergence of the two will help drive innovation swiftly. Artificial intelligence is helping healthcare practitioners and experts eliminate manual tasks. Companies need to understand and define their north star to make progress in the right direction, and AI will help them move there faster.

Human ingenuity combined with the power of AI and machine learning will not only help achieve the present results at a breakneck speed, but also achieve things the healthcare industry previously deemed impossible.