Artificial Intelligence (AI) refers to a machine that can complete a task in a smart way, one that was previously performed by humans, and which needed human intelligence.
The intertwining of AI into our lives is becoming increasingly evident, from movie recommendations on streaming services like Netflix, to seemingly mind-reading recommendations on e-commerce sites like Amazon. There are even AI website builders using artificial intelligence to help small businesses create professional high-converting websites. It indeed seems like these AI bots already know our habits and patterns.
While AI doesn’t fully take on a human role, it does get the job done faster (regardless of the nature of that job) and much more efficiently.
How can artificial intelligence increase your sales?
Taking advantage of AI tools can definitely help you increase your sales, and help you to be smarter and faster in order to stay ahead of the game. At the end of the day, increasing your sales all comes down to having the MOST data that can be instantly analyzed and turned into actionable strategies. Thus, AI can help you achieve your goals by working more effectively and saving you time to do what really matters.
Taking advantage of AI tools can definitely help you increase your sales, which require that you be smarter and faster in order to stay ahead of the game.
Here’s how AI systems can be a major driving force for growth and help grow your business-to-business sales.
1. Spend Your Time Prospecting Accurate Leads
Potential leads are sourced from a variety of channels like LinkedIn or Google – and when you introduce AI into the process, it can validate your data against several sources, helping you gather the most accurate data possible.
How does this increase sales?
This AI-assisted process increases sales given that your follow-up success and close ratios improve, simply because you are working with accurate data from the very beginning. The fear of reaching disconnected phones or having emails bounce back due to invalid addresses are all long gone with the aspect of AI, which hooks you up with the most accurate data to get the most accurate leads (meaning more sales!).
2. Leverage Predictive Analytics to Improve Pitches
With an AI system at hand, you can build profiles of customers based on their behavior and habits. These profiles allow the system to simply predict what people need or would like to buy.
How does this increase sales?
Leveraging predictive analytics is especially beneficial to salespeople who can find information about potential customers before even meeting them. This not only paves the way for them to walk into the room with confidence, but they can, more importantly, tailor their pitches using these predictive insights and convert the lead into a customer.
With an AI system at hand, you can build profiles of customers based on their behavior and habits.
3. Find Replenishment and Upselling Opportunities
A business needs to strike a balance between generating new sales and retaining existing customers in order to continue growing. AI can answer questions like “When will this customer buy again?” and “How do they use this product now?”
Take Amazon, for instance. By using machine learning, an aspect of AI that makes machines learn as they are introduced to new data, the company expands beyond replenishment and is able to discern buying patterns as well as anticipate the needs of customers beforehand.
Uber is doing the same, too, by using heat maps and AI to analyze patterns and help drivers be in the right place at the right time. Such advantageous techniques are not only convenient to the customer, but to the growth of companies as well.
How does this increase sales?
Just think about how great it would be to have a program that reminds you when your clients will be running low on your product. Or to suggest other products that you have in your toolkit that your customers will find useful.
AI is proving to be effective on so many fronts these days, and taking advantage of its capabilities is key to the growth (and relevance) of your business.
4. Take Your Productivity to New Heights
“It would be great if I could work 24/7!” said no one, ever.
However, the challenge in today’s fast-paced world is that the more you stretch the number of working hours in a day, the more you stay ahead. With limited time and an increasingly demanding lifestyle that’s packed with responsibilities, our to-do list is becoming endless and our time is getting crunched.
This is where the benefits of AI come in handy. Its machine learning aspect lends itself to being the one that does the work 24/7. And you? You get to simply guide decisions and make the final call without having to work longer than you need.
AI programs work around the clock to analyze data and provide fresh insight and ultra-qualified leads for you to follow up on.
How does this increase sales?
This ultimately boils down to more selling hours and less busy work. While you and/or your sales team are building relationships, closing sales, or quite frankly, sleeping at night, your AI programs are working around the clock to analyze data and provide fresh insight and ultra-qualified leads for you to follow up later on.
5. Get a Reliable Assistant to Do Your Busy Work
To further increase your productivity, you need your own digital assistant. It is a win/win on all fronts.
You must have CRM systems in sales, and it’s easy to imagine that your reps hate the data entry required to keep them up. Every time you make a change or update your systems, you also have to retrain everyone and pay the expected associated costs and learning curve.
How does AI increase sales in this situation?
Voice-controlled digital sales assistants allow your reps to record information from any device at any time. And what’s better, they are smart enough to ask the right questions and lead your reps through the information that they need, too. It is a conversation at the end of the day. And let’s face it, salespeople are great at conversations… they are not the best at data entry!
According to Olin Hyde, CEO and founder of LeadCrunch, a B2B lead generation company that relies heavily on AI and machine learning, “AI creates superhuman salespeople. They cannot be replaced by a machine, but a machine can certainly make them smarter and stronger.”
Let’s face it, salespeople are great at conversations… they are not the best at data entry!
While some embrace the changes that AI has put forth, others fear the notion of AI and the fact that it’s quickly becoming integrated into our lives. However, the beauty of AI is that it doesn’t simply replace humans’ work; rather, it helps businesses amplify their presence and improve their sales by providing effective solutions.
Artificial Intelligence is no longer just in the realms of self-driving cars like Tesla or Apple’s iPhone companion Siri. It is living in our daily space and has the potential to greatly improve our productivity and success. Now is the time to start leveraging artificial intelligence if you want to keep ahead of the competition.
