Jake Dunlap, CEO and Technology Leader at Skaled, joins me on this episode.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• How do you reconcile the balance between technology and human relationships in sales? Jake says it depends on buyer behavior. Buyers increasingly want to go ‘down the funnel,’ themselves.
• Transactional selling will become a form of intelligent shepherding; enterprise selling will remain dependent on buyer needs. Jake predicts ‘the era of the buyer’ in B2B.
• The role of the salesperson will be increasingly more of an expert consultant about the entire product industry rather than an educator about their own product.
• Bots already set appointments. Jake expects there to be less friction between the buyer and the purchase as bots develop. The rep’s value will come later in the process.
• BDRs and SDRs will need smarter behaviors. They’ll need to understand real personalization and also how to build a defensible base of thought leaders that trust them. Your Rolodex® matters to get you in the door.
• Longevity within an industry helps you build a serious network. You need to understand the buyer’s industry space. Be very curious. Keep learning. Be active.
• Active users go to LinkedIn every day to get their professional news. Post news about your industry regularly and you will build a network of people who interact with your content.
• Look ahead 10 years. What do you need to master? What can you do to serve your customers better? The buyer will require you to be curious. You will not have a sales job if the buyer does not need your help.
• The sales industry has not caught up to the changing behavior of the buyer. If you can’t add value to the equation, that’s where the bots will replace you. The playbook will change. ‘Modern American Sales’ is over.
• Amara’s Law addresses the impact of technology in the short term and in the long term. Mastering the ability to add value in a human way in the era of bots will allow you to thrive.
• Reps need time in their day for activities to develop skills that will help them ‘crush it’ in a year, not just to hit this month’s sales. Set aside time every day to learn.
• Sales leaders must let go of activity volume and stress the effectiveness of activities. Create better processes, not more activity. What worked before does not work now. How do you help the buyer make a buying decision?