Are you Listening to Your Prospects?

There is an unprecedented amount of listening going on right now. Customer-centric companies are listening to customers after lots of touch points, including visits to web sites, calls to the contact center, in-home visits from technicians, visits to a store and so many more. Most of this listening is being driven by more sophisticated Voice of the Customer (VOC) initiatives that empower organizations to not only listen to these experiences, but also understand how they went and act on them.

But there is one touch point that most VOC programs do not include and it may be the most important one of them all - listening to prospects during the sales cycle.

If you think about it, the majority of voice of the customer efforts focuses on how the customer experiences the delivery process – after the sale is closed. Yet, sales shape expectations of delivery, especially in B2B transactions.

There are a few good reasons for including the sales experience in your VOC program. These are:

• Big ROI – When you course correct after a poor prospect experience, it could mean saving a sale and the lifetime value of that future client

• Training Checkup – Asking about specific competencies and behaviors your sales team is delivering from the prospect perspective allows you to evaluate the effectiveness of your training investment

• Performance Improvement – Discovering pockets or individuals where sales competencies are not well established gives you an opportunity to intervene and deliver individual-level coaching and development to help that sales person improve their performance

• Focus on your Bright Spots – When you know which salespeople your prospects really love and why, you are able to hold them up as heroes within your organization for all the right reasons

To make it easier for companies to listen to their prospects, PeopleMetrics has partnered with Richardson, a leading sales training and performance improvement company. Together, we have co-created a Voice of the Prospect solution that enables companies to listen to their prospects, understand and act on their feedback ... and use that information to improve the performance of the salesforce through targeted training.

Start listening to your prospects. You will be glad you did!