Sales Engagement Software: The Complete Market Guide

Have you looked at a list of SalesTech vendors recently? Right now, there are over a thousand companies offering sales engagement software. And it’s not going to stop there — many experts in the space have likened this to the MarTech boom, which experienced 1,776% growth in just the last four years.

How can buyers figure out what they need in such an overwhelming marketplace? From understanding sales engagement software to deciding which tools are most important for their sales stack and knowing which questions to ask vendors when buying the technology, this guide has you covered.

What is sales engagement software?

Put simply, sales engagement software helps your reps engage with buyers. A good platform will help reps reach out not only on the phone but also via text, voicemail, email, and video meetings. But making these engagement activities frictionless is just the tip of the iceberg.

Gartner’s Market Guide for Sales Engagement Applications outlines eight essential capabilities of sales engagement solutions to meet the growing demands of revenue teams.

1. Remove complexity from sales sequences and increase adherence to sales playbooks.
2. Make the quality and speed of interactions significantly better by leveraging buyer intent data points.
3. Automate the onus of manual and tedious data entry tasks on sellers.
4. Make messaging recommendations based on the circumstances specific to each buyer and selling situation.
5. Adherence to data and compliance regulations.
6. Make it easier for sellers to execute actions across channels with integrations.
7. Analyze data to ensure sellers are using the right workflows and assets.
8. Get the most out of the existing tech stack.

Sales engagement solutions that meet these requirements enable sellers to achieve maximum productivity with minimum wasted effort through better workflows. For example, reps can do their work with fewer clicks, plan better, and ensure maximum CRM adoption.

So it’s no wonder that 51% of B2B companies currently have sales engagement software, and another 13% plan to add it to their tech stack this year.

What should you look for in sales engagement software?

There are a lot of technical requirements out there, but to keep it simple, great sales engagement software should help you with the “three Ps”:

1) Productivity

Reps spend less than 36% of their time selling. However, with the widespread adoption of sales engagement software, this is set to change as companies invest in new ways to increase sales productivity. Companies are using sales dialers to automate key processes like dialing and leaving voicemails, and sales dialers are especially powerful if they can automatically log data in your CRM without requiring manual effort from reps (e.g., a Salesforce dialer). To supercharge your reps’ productivity, your sales engagement software should include features like:

• Automated data logging
• Inbound call tracking
• Voicemail automation
• Automatic Dialer
• Dialer-integrated texting
• Email automation

2) Personalization

McKinsey referred to personalization as “the prime driver of marketing success” over the next 5 years, but personalization requires accessing the right data in the right context. Companies often store heaps of customer data in their CRM or BI tools, but how useful is this data if reps can’t access it in the right context? The right integration between CRM, telephony, and other customer data sources can provide reps with the data they need to personalize calls, including communications history, notes, ad preferences, and more. Features that help with personalization include:

• Computer Telephony Integration (CTI) delivers customer data during the moments that matter
• Real-time conversation intelligence on calls
• Email snippet libraries that make personalizing emails easy

3) Prioritization

Sequencing tools are helping to remove the guesswork by providing reps with a dynamically prioritized list of “next best actions” that reveal who to contact, how to contact them, and what to say. In fact, Gartner’s research also shows that more than half of companies will be using guided selling over the next five years to help remove the guesswork from sales with prioritized “next best actions.” If prioritization is an important business goal for you, look for features like:

• A sales cadence solution for outbound email
• Sequences that can be triggered automatically based on pre-defined criteria
• The ability to provide “next best action” recommendations to reps
• Intelligent lead response routing and alerting

5 Questions to Ask When You’re Buying Sales Engagement Software

So you’ve found sales engagement software that meets your needs, and you’re ready to get a demo and assess if it will fit into your tech stack. How can you ensure that you’re an informed buyer and asking the right questions to ensure the solution will work for you?

The SalesTech marketplace can be tricky to navigate, so the Revenue.io SalesOps team set out to create a foolproof litmus test for new products. Don’t forget to ask these tried-and-true questions; you can feel confident that you’re choosing the perfect sales engagement software for your team.

1) Does it automate manual processes?

If a sales engagement solution can automate certain parts of your workflow, then it’s worth considering. But if it can’t automate anything or will create more work in the long run, then eliminate it as an option. While assessing your options, here are a few things to keep in mind:

Good automation will…

• Make less work for you and anyone else on the Ops team
• Lead to more accurate data, since you don’t have the element of human error
• Relieve other teams (such as sales reps) of the burden of data input, if you’ve been relying on them to self-report

But bad automation can…

• Break or mess up your data.
• This causes you to find reporting issues later than if you’d been inputting data manually.
• Lead to a lot of cleanup work

So, good automation can make your life much easier, but bad automation is worse than no automation. It pays to be a discerning buyer.

2) Are the integrations thoughtfully designed?

Plenty of sales technologies these days tout lists of integrations with other products in your tech stack. But it’s important to understand that not all integrations are created equal. When you’re looking at a product, ask what sort of integration they use so that you can better understand how it will fit in with the rest of your tech stack. These are the four main forms of integration, from least to most desirable:

• Manual or third-party integration: This requires you to import and export CSVs or use a third-party system like Zapier.
• Unilateral integration: This works with a one-way sync (A → B), where certain types of information can go from one system to another at certain times of day.
• Bilateral integration: This offers a two-way syncs between platforms (A ↔︎ B), which solves the issue of inconsistent data. It still has a preset sync schedule and some limitations on what you can send.
• Native integration: This gives you full access to all the data between two or more systems. Whatever’s in one system can exist in the other. It’s constantly updating and syncing in real time.

3) Does the sales engagement software give you actionable data in the moments that matter?

Data is only useful if you have it when you need it. If a sales engagement platform keeps your data stuck in a silo or makes it inconvenient to access, then it’s not serving its purpose. The right tools make the most up-to-date information available in the most important moment: now.

For example, let’s say you’re buying a dialer for your sales reps. If the dialer gives you actionable data at the decision point, then it’s presenting your reps with the data they need to have meaningful conversations on calls. Data like: what time zone the person they’re calling is in, their title, what company they’re in, etc. If it can give them information on past emails or phone calls with that person, then so much the better.

You’re probably collecting all this information right now, but you can gain a lot more value from it by giving it to reps right when they need it (rather than making them seek it out in other systems). The point of the story is that any tools that make your current data more valuable are worth considering.

4) Will it bloat your sales stack or save you space?

To ensure that any sales technology you buy will earn its keep, stick to this rule: no single-use solutions. Every product you buy should be able to solve more than one issue for more than one team.

To do this, it’s best to look beyond whatever initial issue you’re trying to solve with a particular purchase. For instance, let’s say that your reps need a source of contact data to get accurate phone numbers for prospects. In addition to solving that issue, it should also be able to provide contact data to marketing to enrich their send lists or offer value in other ways.

Whatever you do, make sure that the data can flow easily between departments and that it can help at least two groups of people. By doing this, you’ll build a strong tech stack that can operate throughout the entire company, preventing your Sales Ops team from getting bogged down by administrating lots of tools that solve only one problem at a time.

While it’s certainly possible to buy one platform for your dialer needs, another for your video meeting needs, and yet another for your email needs, you’ll risk creating huge data and integration headaches. Consolidating your tech stack will always pay off, which is doubly true regarding sales engagement platforms.

5) Is it worth a long-term investment?

Don’t quickly buy sales engagement software to fix a short-term problem, thinking you can always rip it out later and replace it if something better comes. It’s best to put in the time and research up front because implementing a new platform is expensive, both in terms of time and money.

Implementations of products that integrate with your greater tech stack take time, usually a few months (although some products out there only take a few minutes; they’re rare). Once they’re implemented, you’ll need to take the time to drive adoption across your company with orientations, training, and troubleshooting.

Also, if you’ve already followed the other four steps while assessing your purchase, then the chances are that this technology will be deeply embedded in your go-to-market plan. So, look at all your options with the long term in mind, and take your time with the purchasing process.

“Aligning Sales, Marketing, and Customer Success around your tech stack’s data isn’t a nice-to-have. It’s a must.”

– Jordan Henderson, Sr. Director of Revenue Operations at Revenue.io

The Roadmap to Alignment

Let’s assume you’ve decided what you need, assessed what’s out there, and bought a new sales engagement solution for your tech stack. What now?

• Align on Definitions and KPIs: If you’re going to use the data from your sales engagement platform across multiple departments (and you should; it’s great for reports on your company’s health!), make sure that they agree on the definitions of key metrics, such as qualified opportunities.
• Integrate: Connect your tech stack to your new sales engagement software and test the connection to ensure that it works as needed.
• Automate: Prioritize automating data entry and processes into your system of record for the most important data points (such as ones that show up in company-wide goals).
  
• Iterate: Whenever you have new company goals or roughly every quarter, revisit your sales engagement platform to build new automation and improve old ones.

Learn More

Curious to see what other people are buying for their tech stacks this year? Dig into the latest research on what your peers are investing in, upgrading, or replacing in the 2023 Revenue Operations & Customer Acquisition Benchmark Report.