James Palmer, VP of Sales at Seismic: “AI doesn’t hinder human-to-human relationships in sales”

If you needed convincing that the world of sales is changing, we suggest you take a few minutes to read our interview with James Palmer, the Regional Vice President of Sales at Seismic. Whether it’s AI, data-driven insights or the need for sales and marketing teams to align he has a view.

“[Technology is] a crucial enabler in helping sellers stand out to prospective customers,” James told us. For instance, he points to sellers using “AI-powered enablement platforms to accelerate content development and personalisation at scale”.

But that doesn’t mean AI and algorithms can do it all. For success, sellers should consider augmenting “the technology’s intelligence with their own knowledge and instinct throughout the buyer journey”. The end result? More sales in a shorter time.

This is just one way in which clever use of data, AI and other technology systems can smooth the sales process, which James knows from almost two decades of sales management experience in the technology industry.

We can’t claim that we’ve packed all that experience into one interview – but James shares his knowledge generously so it’s well worth reading.

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Can you give an example of a complex problem in sales that you – or your company – have been involved in tackling with technology? 

Keeping up with how B2B sales have evolved over the last couple of years has probably been our most complex challenge. With most sales interactions taking place online, the digital ecosystem has become oversaturated with content and information, and sellers need tools to reach the right buyers and break through the noise.

Customers are also interacting with sales reps in a completely different way than before. B2B brands have been grappling with the impact of inflation and geopolitical uncertainty. This has resulted in more stakeholders being involved in the buying decision process, and customers want to feel they are getting more value for their money. This requires more than just looking for a great product or service. Personalisation is the cornerstone of the buying process, so sales professionals have had to find ways to offer unique experiences to each customer.

For us, it made sense to find that through technology. It’s a crucial enabler in helping sellers stand out to prospective customers. For example, sellers can use AI-powered enablement platforms to accelerate content development and personalisation at scale. By learning deal factors and buyer profiles, AI can generate personalised recommendations that are automatically embedded into email prompts and presentations. Sellers can then augment the technology’s intelligence with their own knowledge and instinct throughout the buyer journey, resulting in more successful and meaningful interactions. It makes content more impactful and contributes to speeding up the sales cycle.

How has technology helped marketing and sales work better together? Or, if you feel differently about it, has it increased the gap between those two departments? 

It’s definitively brought them closer, not further apart, and that’s in large part thanks to technology. With access to a unified sales enablement platform across marketing and sales, go-to-market (GTM) teams can deliver a consistent customer experience throughout the buyer journey. Building a GTM process on a single, cloud-based platform can then let sales and marketing teams unleash the value of their data and enhance activities systematically and agilely.

Take content production and governance. Enablement platforms can aid marketers with content distribution and management. Personalised insights, driven by AI, mean sales teams are equipped with the relevant, approved content when needed, enabling them to form better customer relationships while staying compliant and on-brand. This will ensure optimised and personalised interactions at scale but delivered where and when buyers want to engage.

Ultimately, the cloud is a foundation upon which all sales, marketing and customer-facing activities can be built to deliver a connected end-to-end GTM operation that optimises sales performance and turns digital interactions into business wins.

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What are some examples of AI being used in sales that stand out to you? 

So, contrary to popular belief, AI doesn’t hinder human-to-human relationships in sales. When we use it correctly, it enhances and humanises relationships with buyers. For example, when preparing for a sales meeting, AI-powered automation can help sellers focus on listening, building rapport, and delivering a personalised experience to clients and prospects.

There’s data to back this up, too. According to Salesforce research, reps spend 70% of their time on non-selling tasks. We need to free them from work that doesn’t allow them to focus on the conversation at hand and move the deal forward in a timely manner, like using AI to create meeting notes and actions. By offloading repetitive tasks to AI, sellers can focus on what truly matters: generating more sales.

That said, it’s important to highlight that AI is a co-pilot in the sales process, not the one driving it. While these technologies make sales more effective and efficient, you can’t let go of the wheel.

Oh, and one last thing. AI-assisted training programmes to support internal training are also proving effective in sales teams. Businesses can implement just-in-time enablement tools to let sellers quickly aggregate peer-to-peer coaching tips and access recommended answers to customer questions. With a more personalised approach, an AI-assisted skills development platform can also use data to highlight individual strengths and weaknesses. This returns time to managers and team leaders, who can quickly identify gaps and provide more bespoke coaching to those who need it.

Thinking of data, can you share some specific examples of it being impactful in driving revenue? 

Sure. So, access to data-driven insights is critical in helping B2B sellers work more effectively. Unfortunately, many organisations lack these insights, limiting the impact of sales conversations. Harnessing data analytics allows sales teams to gain insights into buyers, trends, preferences and pain points to provide insights into buyer trends. For example, enablement platforms help GTM teams standardise, automate and enhance the creation and delivery of data-driven, personalised presentations and customer-facing assets that drive client engagement.

Data and analytics provide people with end-to-end intelligence on what works and what doesn’t. For instance, sellers can analyse data captured from buyer interactions to understand the behaviours and activities that will deliver the best outcomes at each stage of the sales cycle. Or they can tap into in-depth content insights to create personalised resources for specific buyer personas to accelerate purchasing decisions.

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When thinking of international expansions, how can technology help? What role can it play in developing and executing a strategy for commercial activities in a multinational context? 

Great question. A key consideration when expanding internationally is that the entire GTM team must have access to unified messaging and product knowledge. Technology can aid in the process and streamline onboarding for new teams, wherever they are, to deliver a unified customer experience. That’s critical.

The thing is, onboarding and getting sales teams up to speed with the specificities of the products they’re selling can be a lengthy and difficult process. With access to a unified enablement platform, all the resources sales teams can live ‘under one roof.’ Training must go beyond each sales rep reading through pages of documentation. AI-powered sessions can personalise feedback to each individual and use engaging sessions to quickly get each team up to speed and make sure they have the relevant knowledge. Technology can also then help translate and localise content for new teams when expanding into new markets, so it’s readily available, with unified messaging across a company.

With fully established teams in place, AI also plays a crucial role in helping to build buyer personas – whether it’s a new title, industry or new country – so GTM teams can better understand their buyers and enter new markets. While collecting data on new persona once took weeks or months, the process can now be done in a few hours with the right prompts and data fed into an AI tool, streamlining commercial activities in a multinational context.

Can you name a startup in the sales tech space that has caught your attention (and why)? 

Fluint.io is a great one. It’s an AI-driven sales business case builder that helps you sell with your buyers instead of at them. It guides each buyer’s journey from the first call to upsell using nothing but written content, which is impressive. For example, their AI can transcript a customer call and then write a business case narrative using the customer’s language. It’s brilliant.