Let’s
take a moment, close our eyes, and think back to the 1950’s. These were the
times when everyone smoked cigarettes, kids played outside until the
streetlights went on, dinner was on the table at 5:00 (typically smothered in
butter), and hats and suits were the daily uniform at work. And for the
majority of these stereotypical 50’s folks, the occupation of choice was --yep,
you guessed it, sales!
Whether it was door-to-door or corporate sales, there was
one thing that stood out about these salespeople: their briefcases. Picture one
of them with his large briefcase, carrying copious amounts of paperwork about
his customers and forms to fill out. What a pain! If you told them that in 60
years, that briefcase would be replaced by something the size of a deck of
cards, what do you think they would have said?
Sales is an out of the office, mobile profession. Welcome to
selling on-the-go. This concept has been around for a long time, but thankfully
as technology advanced, so has the sales profession. Laptops, smartphones, CRM
software – these are all common to modern day selling. The challenge is that
when they are visiting clients or prospect, their customer data is generally
still in the office. Many will print out customer data, try to memorize the
data, or even take notes on the data before they go to meet with a client, but
the problem with these solutions is that they are not “real time”. Things can
change without any notice and without live, real time data, the salesperson is
going to be at least partially blind.
We’re
in the age of the “CrackBerry” and having a smartphone in this profession is a
must. But why? Well, having one of these devices provides the individual with
the opportunity to carry LIVE information (not on paper, not on a laptop, not
scribbled on your hand; that is a lot of work and uses many resources) without
carrying a large object. Smart phones can put customer info in the palm of your
hand at the point of contact. They can present interactive CRM and sales data
(name, address, phone number, interests in the company, notes of customer
interactions in the past, products, analytics, etc) that allows quick review of
information prior to a meeting and increased intelligence during the meeting.
If
you’re in sales, you NEED this data to be highly accessible to you at all
times. With today’s global market you never know when you might need to see
this information. But this isn’t all that a salesperson needs. To optimize your
sales meetings, having access to comparative and analytical data shows your
customer or prospect how you’re positioned in the market place. You can have
the ability to access the data in your product warehouse to see real time inventory
and product pricing data.
A mobile sales application brings real time critical
data, not just a picture of the data. They help to better serve your customer
and increases customer satisfaction. Mobile sales applications are simple to
use and provide you with information that creates a more fluid and seamless
relationship with your client.
Our recently signed on client BlackRock describes why they
purchased a mobile sales application:
“We wanted a mobile solution that would support
all sales systems from one mobile platform instead of a point solution from
each vendor,” says Gary Bigley, Managing Director at BlackRock. “Pyxis
Mobile provides a robust and scalable platform that integrates with the variety
of business systems we use today, but also can integrate with other systems
we’d like to mobilize in the future.”
Client AIC discusses their
successes with their mobile sales application:
“We chose Pyxis Mobile because
we feel it is the best in class application,” says Miles Radoja, AIC Vice-President, Sales Administration. “We knew that
user adoption would be strong because of its popularity in the financial
services industry and it turns out that it has been far better than we planned
for. Feedback from the field has been extremely positive. Every wholesaler has
jumped into this with both feet, and there hasn’t been any resistance from the
field in using it.”
Are you currently using any mobile applications to facilitate your sales needs? What difficulties do you find when out in the field?
Recent Comments