Modern Selling: Six Ways to Implement AI for Sales

2. Keep the “why” at the front of your mind. The advantages of artificial intelligence tools in sales are obvious: More productivity, more accurate forecasts, lower overhead, etc.; however, these things may not matter to the average salesperson. Ask them what they truly want, and you may be shocked: More time with customers, less boring meetings, and more sales and commissions are their typical desires.

3. Start by focusing on one priority. Don’t try to shift every aspect of your sales organization to AI at once. As a team, rank the things you want to improve, such as estimate/proposal generation, RFP reviews, pipeline management, outbound marketing campaigns, and presentations. Unless it’s destructive to the organization, pick whatever your sales team wants. If they embrace this first step, they will work hard on future changes.

4. Decide on enterprise or best-of-breed. AI can be implemented with integrated enterprise systems that have a suite of tools included (i.e., a comprehensive ERP system), or as best-of-breed solutions (i.e., a standalone estimating tool). There are advantages to both paths. We recommend clients start with best of breed, especially since we advise them to focus on one initial priority. After a few solution sets have been implemented, it might make sense to move to an enterprise system to take advantage of the integration benefits.