Close deals faster with sales process automation

Advancements in software have made the sales landscape more competitive than ever. Sales process automation, such as data enrichment, has made it easy for reps to find and connect with high-quality prospects. Lead-scoring software is helping boost sales productivity and efficiency, while email automation has made scalable, personalized sales outreach a reality.

And with activity tracking and reporting, sales teams can streamline workflow and quickly adapt to changing customer needs.

The proof is in the pudding: according to the 2020 State of SMB Sales, sales teams who invest in sales process automation tools are 52% more productive, convert 47% more leads, and generate 45% more referrals than those who don’t invest in the tools.

To close deals faster and boost sales, you need to invest in sales process automation.

Fast-track lead generation with data enrichment

Over one-third of sales teams find lead generation to be one of the most challenging steps in the sales cycle. Reps can spend hours searching for prospects on social media and company websites, and even then, it’s not always easy to find the right contact information for the prospects identified.

Data enrichment tools help automate this process so reps can spend more time building relationships.

With sales process automation tools like data enrichment, your reps will always have a pipeline full of prospects. Your team will spend less time researching new opportunities and more time building relationships and closing deals.

Qualify more leads with automatic lead scoring

Most sales teams use lead scoring models to qualify and prioritize prospects. Lead scoring involves assigning a numeric value to prospects based on predetermined attributes.

For example, let’s say your highest paying customers are sales managers in SaaS startups. In a lead scoring system, those attributes – being a sales manager, working for a SaaS startup – would be given high numeric values. That way, any incoming leads who match those criteria can easily be identified, qualified, and prioritized by reps.

But unqualified leads can still slip through the cracks. And when that happens, productivity plummets. Often this is a result of:

• Not knowing which attributes constitute a qualified/unqualified lead

• Forgetting to screen leads for certain attributes

• Dealing with inaccurate customer data

The solution to these problems is simple: automate the process.

Sales process automation tools will automatically screen prospects for high-value attributes so reps don’t have to.

Personalize outreach at scale with email automation

Personalized sales emails have a higher click-through rate than those that aren’t, according to research by GetResponse.

But crafting personalized sales outreach to hundreds of leads a day is time-consuming and tedious. After all, it can take an average of 14 to 16 emails over 20 days to successfully connect with a prospect.

With sales process automation tools, personalized email outreach is sustainable and scalable.

With many sales email automation tools, you can also use merge tags (also known as merge fields) to further personalize email outreach. Merge tags act as placeholders for specific customer information – their name, company name, product, etc. When added to an email, they automatically populate personalized information for each email recipient based on their customer profile in your sales CRM.

Personalized email templates (common in sales process automation) can be saved for future use, saving reps valuable time in manual labor. With some sales process automation tools, reps can even schedule emails to be sent at specific intervals (e.g., every five days, or after two days with no response).

With email automation tools, it’s possible for reps to send personalized outreach at scale.

Streamline workflow with automatic activity tracking

Reps can spend multiple hours per day on admin tasks alone – logging notes from a customer call, recording emails sent and appointments scheduled, and so on. That’s time reps could be selling or interacting with customers.

With sales process automation tools, these activities are automatically logged and tracked in your sales tool. Sales reps can spend more time with customers and less time on tedious administrative tasks.

And, as a sales rep, automatic activity tracking makes it easier to focus on high-level, high-value tasks. Reps can focus less on tedious admin tasks, and more on closing deals and building relationships.

Gain actionable insights with smart sales reports

Increasing revenue month after month requires an agile approach to sales. You need to know exactly what’s working, what’s not, and why – and you need to adjust your methods accordingly.

For example, you need to know how leads are progressing through the sales funnel. Where are prospects getting stuck, and why? What was the number one deal loss reason this month compared with last year or six months ago?

Specific insights like these can be hard to obtain without the right reporting tools. It can take hours, or even days, to compile and analyze historical data points like the ones above.

Sales process automation tools track and analyze all your historical sales data for you. For example, managers often need detailed, customizable reports that cover multiple data sets, including:

• Deal loss reasons: Why sales are being lost
• Pipeline analysis: How leads are progressing through the sales funnel
• Deal sources: Where high-value leads are coming from
• Sales activities: Sales rep activities like calls made, tasks completed, and sales won

Customer service automation for every business

Many companies know the benefits of sales automation—but today, the bigger opportunity is automating customer service. Once a deal is closed, customers expect fast, accurate, and personalized support, no matter the size of your business. Outdated or patchwork systems make that harder and more expensive than it needs to be.

Zendesk customer service software makes automation accessible to everyone—from startups and SMBs to global enterprises. With AI-powered workflows, integrated data, and a unified platform, you can streamline operations, reduce costs, and deliver seamless support at scale.

Try customer service software for free