The Sales Intelligence Blog

The main difference between sales training and sales coaching is scope. Sales training is about teaching skills, techniques, and knowledge—it’s a structured process designed to equip reps with the tools they need to succeed. Sales coaching, on the other hand, is ongoing and personalized. It’s about reinforcing those skills, identifying gaps, and guiding reps toward […]

Simply put, a sales quota is a specific target that sales reps need to hit within a given amount of time. Quotas are nearly always numerical, in that they must be a certain dollar amount of contracts signed, revenue generated, or count of goods sold. Sales reps, sales managers, and sales teams all have quotas. […]

Not long ago, we showed you an example of a great compensation plan for your outbound sales development reps (SDRs). But what about inbound SDRs? Inbound SDRs, sometimes called marketing qualification reps (MQRs) or lead response reps, are a vital part of any inside sales team. They’re tasked with following up with leads that come in […]

Building a good sales cadence or sales sequence by following strong sales cadence examples can make your sales team more productive and enforce the use of best practices in your team’s selling efforts. 42% of sales reps find prospecting to be the most challenging part of the sales process, according to HubSpot. With a strong […]

Imagine you’re an inside sales rep who is given a list of outbound leads to call down. It can be tempting to just dial down the list cold, in hopes of initiating as many conversations as possible. But think how much more successful you could be if you had access to contextually relevant information about each […]

What if every lead that called your company could be instantly connected to someone specializing in the product they want? If you could do that, how much more business could you close? For example, let’s say that you sell cloud app hosting packages that you are advertising on Google AdWords. With Revenue.io, the moment a […]

Four of the most common terms you will hear anywhere in sales are prospect, lead, contact, and opportunity. Sometimes they are used interchangeably, but each has their own distinct meaning that directly refers to the sales process. So what exactly is a lead, a prospect, contact, and an opportunity? What do the terms mean, how […]

It’s common to use service level agreements (SLAs) in customer contracts or vendor relationships to clearly define the obligations of involved parties. SLAs can also be powerful internally as well, especially in a sales team. SLAs serve two purposes. The first is to define roles within the areas of overlap between different reps. Many teams […]

Bestselling author Chris Voss has negotiated some of the most difficult deals in history. As a lead negotiator for the FBI, he found himself in more than a few life-and-death situations. From his career in the FBI to his transition to being a business consultant, Voss consistently used a tactic to gain a powerful edge […]

Too many sales conversations are falling flat and failing to engage potential customers. And according to Forbes, 74% of customers choose the first company that adds value. How can sellers use artificial intelligence (AI) on sales calls to engage prospects and help them see value in every single conversation? The key to success lies in […]

One of the most motivating factors for sales reps is their sales compensation, and it can help companies attract and creating top sales talent. Inside sales research from ZS and Reality Works found that 40% of large technology companies plan to increase their inside sales headcount. However, the sales talent space is extremely competitive and […]

What are the best sales books of all time? To find the true answer, we first turned to Amazon and other sites to find the most popular sales books, ranked by the number of reviews and their ratings. We then asked the sales industry by running a March Madness-style tournament called Sales Madness. The books […]