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Welcome to the "Ask An Expert" section of the AA-ISP. We understand that inside sales is a growing industry and that we often learn by "trial and error" or "as we go". Sometimes there is no clear answer to some of the challenges we face. Ask An Expert can help inside sales reps or leaders gain feedback from our industry experts on various challenges that we face. Please complete the information in the form provided and we will respond to your question promptly.

I am a sales manager and will be conducting interviews for a Marketing Director. I am looking for a couple key questions focused on collaboration between the sales and marketing functions. Any creative questions from people that have done a cross functional interview like this?

Steve, here are just a couple I have used in the past. In general, I like them to site specific examples and ask for the results that happenened as well. I'm sure others will have some comments so we will get this posted right away. Good luck with your search. 1. Can you describe an example of a campaign you created which was the result of a collaberative effort between sales and marketing? Describe it from beginning to end including how it was developed, what worked in that process, what you learned, what you might change next time, and finally the campaign results in terms of achievement of goals, whether it be revenue, leads created or others. 2. Can you site an example of a situation where marketing and sales were at odds over a decision or perhaps were having issues working with eachother. What in your opinion caused that situation and then describe how you handled it and what was the resulting outcome?

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Good morning. We are starting am inside sales group and we are trying to determine commission rates. We are a large service provide as well as a product re-seller and the company pays commission based on the gross profit of a sale. For example if a customer send us an order for 20k for product only and our cost for the product is $17k the commission would be paid on the GP of 3k. What is a nice starting commission rate for a new inside salesperson? Should the commission rates vary for inbound sales and outbound sales? For example if a sale is generated from a customer contacting us should the commission rate be lower than if we generated a sale by cold calling? So to sum it up I am trying to get an idea of a reasonable commission rate to pay inside sales based on type of sale inbound or outbound. I was initially thinking 5% for outbound sales and 3% for inbound

We currently use Insidesales.com power dialer, but they don't offer an automated "robo-dialer". Has anyone used a robo dialer to do calls off hours successfully, and who did you use?

I have a prospective client who was referred to me and is not the right fit for our services. I am looking for some help to find a company that is. They are an insurance company that used to sell through channels but are now going direct to the consumer. They are building an inside sales team to close deals with consumers directly and need someone to come in, take what they have, develop a curriculum and train their team. She talked about having a playbook, getting away from scripts and being more consultative over the phone. They are located in FL. Do you know of any companies that would be a good fit for this type of engagement?

As I am not sure how to respond directly to a question so I am opening a new thread. I was last asked: "Expert Response from Tbertuzzi: Edgar, can you provide more specificity? I interpreted your question as that you are looking for a provider to develop a selling guide (Sales Playbook) but rather than be in a written/electronic format you are looking for it to be built via video. Am I correct?" The answer is that we are looking for someone to create a selling guide that teaches how to transition from a traditional face to face selling model to a Video selling one. Specifically, something that details and teaches how to Engage the Customer, Active Listening Skills, Objection Handling, Extending the Call, Transitioning and Handling Technical Challenges. Thanks Edgar.

I am looking for a system, similar to Zoom Info, where I would be able to build a lead list based on location, type of business, SIC code, and contact title. I want to own our own email addresses and be able to export the list directly from the system in a quick and easy manner. I also would like to be able to select companies that have been updated within the last 6 months and only choose headquarter locations. Can anyone help me?

I am interested in hearing about how RMAs are handled with other inside sales teams. My company has a detailed process for handling RMAs and I feel that my team is spending way too much time handling them rather than selling and taking orders. I also find it very difficult to be pressuring customers to return product or gather detailed technical information and then in the same breath ask them for a sale on the quote they did for the two days ago. Who normally handles this type of situation in most organizations?

Comp plan question as I reviewing the plan for 2012: What is your Commission Rate to Quota percentage for IS rep level 1, 2 and 3? Thank you for your quick responses

Our company is looking for a vendor to partner with that can develop a video selling guide for us. Is there anyone that knows of or can refer a company with experience in this selling medium? Thanks.

Trying to add comment on my first question about comp plan but did not figure it out... annaul quota is 680k per rep/year - not saas - Medical industry - but still selling software - high margin

My company uses ExactTarget for email campaigns, where we can monitor in our CRM the click through rates. Is there something similar for individual emails that someone can reccomend? Both our inside and field teams are looking for such a tool - easy to use for sending an email to a specific customer, but able to monitor whether a customer opened the email and clicked on any of the links (but also brings the customer to our website rather than the provider's website - ala Brainshark).

Hi Experts, at present I am a front line sales manager and have been presented with a unique opportunity to lead a new business development organization. As part of the selection process I have been asked to put together a short term / medium term business plan to demonstrate how I would attack the role and build success quickly. The new business development role will mean no longer being involved in the closing process, and my success will be measure on slightly different metrics, primarily pipeline found, opportunities qualified by sales team, and opportunity conversion by sales team. Are there any recommendations on the format of a short / medium term business plan? Or anyone who has gone through a similar transition, any ideas from a planning standpoint which could help ramp the new team as quickly as possible, or generate quick wins? I see success coming from development of the new team (how quickly I can get ramped up and performing), understanding goals and key initiatives of the sale steams I will be working with and aligning our activities. Any other strategies, best practices or resources which can be shared would be really appreciated, thank you.

HELP! I need to train my outside team on pening up sales calls via telephone. Any ideas for telesales and helping train traditional in person sales people on telesales?????

I understand there are some statistics that suggested 9 out of 10 sales people hired today are selling from an inside perspective rather than outside. I wanted to dig into this a little deeper with the goal to better understand if there is any research to support the effectiveness of inside sales people vs. outside selling and I was hoping you might be able to direct to where I could find this information.

Hello experts, I recently became a member of AA-ISP primarily to learn more about how to start a new inside sales organization. I work for a mature manufacturing company that sells highly engineered, durable goods through regional distributors. Our intent is not to bypass distribution and sell direct. However, I am interested in exploring different approaches to implementing an inside sales organization with other manufacturers who continue to sell through independent distributors. Are there member companies in AA-ISP that fit this profile and would be willing to share their experiences with me?

Currently our Inside Sales Agents are on a monthly comp model that takes into account the revenue generated from the 1st of the month through the end of the calendar month. While we do not have a hockey stick effect at month end, the revenue collected in the month is bottom heavy (16-31st). Are there any studies or organizations that have successfully run month end, on the 15th of the month vs the end of the calendar month and ended up gaining productivity from the simple period change?

Good afternoon. I am a new member and so far I am very pleased with the valued information this website provides. We are considered a small business company and we have 24 locations though out North America. We have 35 outside sales people including myself. I was recently asked to head up an inside sales department with my company. We have never had inside sales before. We are looking to start with 4 other inside sales reps who will work under me. I wanted to know what advise you can provide in starting up an inside sales team. The plan is to grow inside sales and phase out 70% of outside sales. I am looking for any information on outbound calling and inbound calls. process as to how we can set up structures and proceedures. Any insight on starting an inside sales department would be great. Thank you

We are reorganizing our inside sales centers across the country. This is a great time for us to reevaluate what regular training/coaching programs we should have in place. Can you provide any best practices for what on-going training, coaching, observation, quality control systems companies have in place? Secondly, are also revisiting our contact strategy. We are a b2c company selling in the hospitality space. Are there any best practices for creating a contact strategy to sell to known customers?

How do you see the value of using online commerce with an inside sales force?

We are building a business case to invest in telephony integration with SFDC so our reps can dial in-screen and log their calls, etc. in system. Wanted to see if anyone does this today -- how much does it cost (per user?) and what are the benefits you've seen? We're looking at Cisco but also wondering if there are other vendors that provide this functionality? Thank you!

Good day, AAISP, and Happy Tuesday, I have been given a unique opportunity to build the foundation for what I expect to be a formally recognized "Social Sales Team" within my organization. This team would leverage Social Media and all similitudes to walk alongside potential buyers from the start of their buying process to the moment they choose to purchase. Questions that I am looking to answer, amongst others, are as follows: 1. What is the social sales landscape? What companies can be considered early adopters with respect to leveraging Social Media to sell more effectively? What are their best practices? Are there case studies readily available for me to view? 2. What are the mission critical metrics used to assess and evaluate a social sales strategy? What metrics should define success? 3. What ought I keep in mind when establishing the social sales philosophy and/or rules of engagement for my organization? 4. What are the core competencies that a salesperson must have to engage in the virtual realm? Is it better to have an exclusive unit focusing on social selling, or can all currently active sales representatives seamlessly move between physical and virtual interactions with customers and suspects? Any insight would be much appreciated. Best, Chronically Curious

My company has decided to expand the line of product sold by my IS team. Does anyone has any information on how this change will affect the existing close rate on actual products? How should I review quotas for the actual products, knowing that the ramp up for the new line will take an average 6 to 9 months?

My company is looking at adding more products in my IS team portfolio. I am wondering what will be the impact on existing product quotas/performance, as we will not hire more rep for the first 6 months. Any shared experience would be helpful- thanks

We are seeking outside legal counsel to help provide advice and guidance relative to Federal and State regulations on Telemarketing and related activities within the US. We are hoping to get a recommendation for an experienced firm or two that could help in this area. This would include but not be limited to restrictions on the use of power dialers, recording, etc. Thank you.

I am curious if there is any data or feedback from the client perspective as to how they are accepting of some of the latest in selling tools. For example, how do they view inside sales reps who are using a video camera feed for presentations. Also, how do clients view the use of social media by inside sales. Thank you!

I'm building out our local sales team and we are targeting local advertisers. I'm looking for some templates of very basic terms and conditions for print advertising with a credit card auto renewal option.

What is the average budget used for contests / spiffs, or other non-commission plan related incentives on a monthly basis? We typically use contests to motivate the staff or drive certain metrics - what does your company do?

I am looking for some recent trends in Inside Sales - how is the role changing for different customer segments such as Enterprise (admin support or transaction based), mid-market(none or with channel partners) and SMBs? Is there a move towards becoming more inbound focused (2-way conversation), rather than outbound focused (cold calling etc.). thanks

Any suggestions for a click-to-dial software that is easy to implement and plays nice with Salesforce.com?

I’m looking into the feasibility of having home-based inside sales reps. We have a hybrid inbound sales model in which 60% is customer service related and 40% is proactive selling to existing customers and repeat business. I believe I understand how to set-up, monitor and measure the proactive sales portion of the remote position. I’m not sure how I can do the same for the customer service piece and to assure timely and accurate response to the customer. A vast majority of our correspondence to our customers is through email which makes monitoring and tracking more difficult. Thanks for any thoughts.

I am wondering if any expert can share what larger companies typically budget for inside sales training on an annual basis. We are looking to see if our current allocaiton is within industry standards. Thank you.

Trying to determine the best US City to open a new, hi-tech inside sales team. Starting with 10-20 folks, and moving to 50+ over time. Open to suggestions, key criteria we should be looking at and general advice. Thanks!

My company is looking at potentially increasing our Inside Sales Managers compensation. Our managers supervise a team of 12+ reps and carry large sales and renewal quotas. The reps are senior level sales professionals (not entry level) and have a large and complex product bag. Can anyone provide me with some data that shows average inside sales manager compensation (salary and bonus)?

Hello Team, I am looking for some more insight into driving a sale past the initial call. Our team has been doing fair on the first presentation, but is lacking on follow up calls. We are seeing people not picking up on verbal queues and we are looking for ways to do some type of intensive training. Any documentation or leads where to find this type of information would be appreciated.

All, looking for some insight on what mix of base pay to at-risk organizations are using for strictly in-bound telesales teams. Thanks for your thoughts!

Has anyone done any research on the effectiveness of an onsite inside sales team versus a remote team? I am building an inside sales team but struggle with the question of hiring resources that are within commuting distance to an office, instead of hiring the talent wherever they may be located. I lean toward hiring talented remote workers rather than trying to fit the office model but management is not convinced that a remote inside sales team can be managed as effectively. I also fear that not having the ability to work remote will not make us as competitive in the market. Anyone have any data that may shed some light?

As a follow up question to the one that I asked a few weeks back about the ability to virtually call monitor, what calling features are need to haves and what calling features are nice to haves for an inside sales call center and why? Thanks for your expert opinion.

Does anyone have a good, comprehensive, job description and title for a Sales Admin that supports an Inside Sales team? We have basically modified an existing CS Support Rep role but the demands on this new role go beyond the scope of that description. I'm looking to see if there is a description somewhere between the CS Support Rep and a traditional Sales Admin role. Thanks,

good morning experts. I have a couple of questions. 1) we have a cutting edge, new to market technology that really needs to be pitched at a high (senior) level to get the right traction. We have little marketing support, it is ramping. I was hired in march to initiate a new lead generation team, and hired 2 people in May. In the past month, we have been building lists (our database has few of the right names), reseearching in ISell and LinkedIn for good titles, hunting down contact information, and doing research, so our outreaches are "warm", or at least educated. We're capable of about 20ish calls/day with all that effort, and expect to ramp to 30ish or so. Our current commissionable activity is to find a SPONSOR (Solution Selling), who ADMITS PAIN, and the sales rep agrees that there are NEXT STEPS. Our current quota is 12 of these qualified leads/month. In my research with peers, and my experience outbound prospecting for the past 6 weeks, that feels high. We're able to connect with about 15% of our outbound outreaches, but only 1 has converted to the definition of a commissionable lead, and even that has lost steam already. I am looking for advice on the following issues: benchmarking -- what are other companies defining as a commissionable "lead"? We cannot use BANT, it is a cross-departmental business solution, we do not sell into IT. Tactically - in SFDC, how are other organizations "delivering" such leads to sales? I have a meeting tomorrow to discuss these points, and a meeting on Weds to discuss with my boss, who is openminded to resetting expectations. Please reach out to me directly if I can provide enough more detail to get the answers that will help me. I'd prefer to keep this anonymous to the rest of the audiece just now. thank you. Diane

Good Morning Experts, Our inside sales team has 2 promo reps that are out in the field generating leads. As a manager I am having issues tracking their daily activity and planning. Does anyone have a suggestions on a daily managing tool that these promo reps can submit on a weekly basis to track their activity?

We have an established inside sales team looking to open a new location to help with covering US time zones. One of the things we're looking at is salary costs for high tech inside sales reps in different US locations. Does anyone have any suggestions for how to track down this data? Or, suggestions of locations that are ideal to establish a second/third site? Thank you!

Does anyone have any suggestions for consulting firms who have an inside sales specialization? We have inside sales teams across the globe and are looking to create better leverage and scale across geographies and business units. Would like to engage additional help on this, but not sure where to start. Would appreciate any advice! Thanks.

I'm giving a presentation on attacting, hiring,and retaining Inside Sales Talent. Does anyone have information on this?

What key attributes should I look for when hiring an Inside Sales Manager?

What are some key best practices for determining head count for an Inside Sales function?

I'm home based with an inside sales team out of one of our offices 2000 miles away. I'm not able to listen in on their calls unless we conference call as they are on a different phone system than I am. Is there a SaaS solution that we can use so that I can virtually "Y-jack" and they don't have to conference me in every time?

Hello Experts:

I am struggling with the Exempt/Non-Exempt issue as I build a team of "inside sales" reps with the responsibility to rely upon outbound prospecting skills and research to develop qualified leads for my field sales team. We are 90+% outbound research, focusing on identifying the right targets, matching our solution to their business issues (research & reasoning skills), educating them and developing the beginnings of a sales process (communications skills).

Based on these requirements, they don't meet the criteria I have seen for Non-Exempt Inside Sales reps, except that the name our team has is Inside Sales. Since we're less than a month old as a team, we can still modify the definition if necessary. Can you offer advice on what it takes to turn this into an EXEMPT role? There are a myriad of names we can choose from, and I realize that the official "title" is the least relevant component, but I also want to avoid raising any flags. Also - what is the risk?

http://www.parkplacetechnologies.com/About-Us/Working-with-Us/~/media/Job%20Description%20files/PPT/BDR20100607.ashx

I found a job description that is clearly EXEMPT from 2009 that might help:

thanks much!

Hello Experts! We are currently struggling with best practice on how to comply with legal standards (ie, privacy concerns) on outbound calls without telling the customer on every call "this call may be recorded." I know the laws vary by state. Any idea what best practice looks like in this regard?? Thanks!

What international databases (similar to jigsaw) would anyone recommend for a company that is calling into sales, marketing, HR, Operations, IT and most main business functional departments?

Does anyone know of a social networking tool that integrates blogs, chat, e-mail, IP phones, message boards into one screen for the sales rep?

I just accepted a position as an Inside Sales Manager as the first step in creating an Inside Sales team for a software start-up. I have a compensation plan with an agreed upon variable target, however, I don't have any reps yet and we need to define those details as we go along. I would assume that for the remaining 7-8 months of 2011 that it would make sense to tie my variable to the overall company sales number. Any other suggestions? I'm trying to avoid getting paid as an "individual contributor" because I feel that it may take focus away from the team I need to build and new processes we need to create (versus just getting on the phone and trying to sell). Thanks!

What is the best way to find new clients? I run an outbound virtual call center and I am looking to find new clients. We specialize in high end IT products and services, such as training for Microsoft and Cisco for mid to large sized companies. We are also expanding to inside sales as well as appointment setting.

I'm building a team from 7 - 20+ in Charlotte, NC by the end of this year. Any advice on how to get networked in the area quickly and other tactics to use to be able to staff this many people in a short amount of time? Also, any gotchas that I should avoid in ramping this quickly? Thanks!

Has anyone seen statistics on how long it should take to ramp up an inside sales agent? Any data on specific organizations and how long they take?

I work for a small firm that needs to outsource fulfillment of requests for hard copies of brochures or product materials. This is a smaller quantity per year, less than 1000, and on an individual request basis. Are there companies that still do that and if so, can you suggest one or two that I might speak too. Thank you.

Does anyone have an inside sales team that is salary based? If so, how did you implement, i.e. did you have to overcome any legal obstacles? Did you convert from hourly wages to salary or start a team from scratch? Really looking for feedback on logistics of implementing salary vs. feedback on the challenges of managing salary.

Does anyone have information on individual and team coaching metrics that are appropriate to the Inside Sales function relative to each of these 3 Inside Sales Models: Lead Generation, Market Segment Owners, or Mixed?

I'd like to get comparisons on pros and cons of various CRM systems for Inside Sales. I'm providing ISS Start Up training and would like to provide basic information on the pros and cons of CRM systesm like Oracle, Sales.force.com, SalesLogix and Pivotal. Does anyone have comparisons or information the advantages of one of these systems above another. In other words, why would one opt for Sales.force.com ofer Oracle or saleslogix? Thank you in advance for your insigt

Hello all! I have a need to train several employee's in some basic business writing techniques. They are in our customer support/operations area of the company and interface with our customers everyday. Any suggestions? thanks, Lynn

Does anyone have information or a brief write up on why good Inside Sales Infrastructure (Office Space requirements, phone systems is important)?

I am thinking of switching from a commission plan to a bonus program. Does anyone have any examples of a Bonus schedule / template? Thanks

Does anyone have information on individual and team coaching metrics that are appropriate to the Inside Sales function relative to each of these 3 Inside Sales Models: Lead Generation, Market Segment Owners, or Mixed?

Can you please suggest a good tool for monitoring Social Media traffic? Most notably Twitter. We would like to monitor and respond as appropriate. Thanks.

I saw a demo of a product called Lattice Engines today, I am interested if anyone has used the product and can comment on the effectiveness of the tool versus others?

I'm adding a new position within my Inside Sales organization which may be similar to a Telemarketing role. The main function of this new position is to contact a pre-defined customer list to promote our company's services. The customer list is relatively small in which they can get through repeatedly each quarter. There will not be immediate feedback or results to measure against. My question is how to compensate this position and what type of mbo or measurements?

Does anyone have Social Networking Listening teams they manage? Meaning a team of agents that listen to the chatter for your companies or clients and interact with the posters or have some action based on the posts. What is the success criteria for the team? Is it sales lead gen? Customer satisfaction score measurements? How are agents measured? I am looking at some options for my team and would like to see what best practices there are out there.

I am looking for some information and direction on "cold calling email". I am hoping to target executive level and BOD members with emails. Most normally I can't get thru to them via phone but in many cases their emails are available on websites. Any suggestions or even sample letters would be most appreciated. Thanks, Sandy

Do you have a good technique for Inside Sales Pre-Call planning? What are some good techniques to use for planning my call before I dial? I have two roles: Lead generation and telesales. Please provide a sample Inside Sales Pre-Call Plan. What are the components.

Are there people who specialize in healthcare services lead generation in the c-suite? If so, how do I find them?

Has anyone had experience with a point based compensation plan? For example, instead of paying out X on an attainment of Y, points would be assigned for achievements in support of new account sales, organic growth within existing accounts and account retention.

I'm building a B2B client "onboarding" team in order to increase future sales opportunities and retention with our existing relationships. This team would also be responsible for inbound calls. I would like to learn best practices from others in the area of goals, metrics, candidate qualifications, organizational design, and delivery processes. I'd love to hear from you if you've done something similar!

We're testing Connect & Sell at IronKey and on day one made 1000+ dials, made 40 live connects, and had 80% referrals to the proper contacts. Nothing converted to pipeline yet. Have you heard of other companies using Connect and Sell? Any best practice tips?

Are you aware of an Inside Sales common practice regarding telephone numbers? Specifically, when expecting a call back on a voice mail message to a cold prospect, should a salesperson leave a toll free number, or a local number, and why? And are there any specific occasions when one is preferred over the other? Also, I believe one should almost always leave a number, and perhaps repeat it as well. And given a choice, one should also use a direct dial number. The only issue I would like addressed in the responses is to provide a toll free number, or a local number, assuming all the calls are made outside of the local area. Thank you.

I am looking for call-recording software to help coach my lead generation team. What experience has anyone had with using this type of software and any recommendations for vendors

Are there resources that offer suggestions for helping an inside sales rep conquer a serious case of phone anxiety--just not wanting to talk to customers on the phone? I would like to try to coach to the problem before coaching her on a different career path.

At my company, we've historically had two sales team -- inside and field sales. Both are cradle to grave, quota carrying teams with geographic territory. The inside sales own any opportunity where customer has 2000 employees or less while field sales focuses on any larger account. With some of our verticals it’s becoming harder to make cutoffs based on employee or revenue size due to lots of affiliations and consolidates in the industries I’m interesting in hearing from or speaking with anyone who has implemented a "team sales" model where both inside and field are still quota carrying cradle to grave with individual quotas but where a significant part of comp is tied to overall territory goals. I'd like to understand the pros/cons, lessons learned, and specifics about how the comp plans work

Is there a source for RFP Templates that can be adapted easily for multiple partners?

I recently began working at a company as the national inside sales manager. The first challenge is to train reps that have been in the job virtually unsupervised and untrained for up to 2 years. One, does anyone have suggestions about re-training where to begin? Secondly, does anyone have a sample of a day's schedule. I am working with them to revamp their current schedules and include block calling times. Any suggestions?

We are located in Nashua, NH and want to start an inside sales function with limited funds. Consultants are not in the budget! We have SAP business one with a CRM but we think we may be better off with other software that is more focused toward inside sales. Any one have any experience with our current CRM? Any suggestions, being able to build in work flow I believe would save us time and I want to be able to "trickle" e-mails.

I'm looking for some statistics that I can reference for a sales presentation I am putting together. Specifically I am looking for the following info. can someone point me in the right direction to sources that I can reference without having to pay for an entire study? Thanks. 1) industry averages for cold call success rate 2) the number of cold calls it takes to get a meeting. 3) What forms of communication that executives respond to

Is there any information available that shows the trending of Inside Sales jobs vs. Outside sales jobs, i.e. is there a steeper increase of inside jobs vs. outside? Also, documentation showing what the projections are for the number insides sales jobs growth as well as earnings (sellers compensation) for insides sales for the next 5-10 years.

I have a friend who asked me this question: One area I could use help with is in role playing objection-handling...since I work on my own (she's a sales team of one and works from home), I don't have "teammates" to practice with. Are you aware of any ways for me to connect with others to do some role-playing? Help please!

I need a great format for a sales meeting agenda that generates dialogue and cross talk on opportunities. Help!

Looking for some advice on starting a mentoring program for Sr. Inside Sales Reps to help new, developing Reps. Any insight you could provide would be very helpful. Thanks!

Team - What are the different kinds of incentive or bonus plans you use? I.e., how do you pay them out? Quarterly, montly, etc. Also, how do you structure them to be most effective? We've been using a quarterly plan that pays 60% on individual achievement and 40% on team achievement.

All opinions welcome please. Our company purchases HQL (highly qualified leads) In the past few months these leads are going downhill fast, they do not meet the agreement or filters. We are in dispute and butting heads. We pay an average of $100 for each lead, when I speak personally with the leads and get an entirely different view for instance "we are not looking to purchase and XXXX company mislead you" I will ask for an email confirming - and I present to the vendor they "blah blah blah ..pay us the money" I would appreciate any response.

Also for many days in May I was not receiving daily leads - I contacted my rep and they did not return calls, I sent read request emails and finally heard back claiming they were sent. It turns out that XXX company starting running massive campaigns and were on 4 national spam lists. They invoiced us for all leads - yet still have not delivered. Who is at fault here? The vendor's VP Sales points the finger at us and says it is our spam filter and we are to 'blame' -- yet the reps clearly dropped the ball. They could have offered to deliver thru FTP which they brought up after the fact (over and over and over again) Are we at fault?

Given the nature of a sales support role (hunter, risk adverse individuals), what percent of compensation should be at risk and what are the best compensation methods to incent incremental performance for this group (B2B environment).

I'm curious to know how other inside sales teams handle incoming call backs from customers. Does each Rep have their own individual, direct phone number/line? And is it an 800# or a local #? If local, are their customers from outside the local calling number? Thanks!

Has anyone ever commissioned on just team goals and not individuals? Meaning higher salaries but contributing to a pot of team commissions then distributed out to individuals at the end of a quarter? I think as companies move to more models that are for the good of the customer and team and the experience needs to be less for a sales rep that paying high commission and working in a territorial model is becoming less the norm, meaning the norm seems to be contributing to the companies goals, having more national and flexible sales talent, and then compensating as a team. Thoughts?

Can you please share any insight, experience, or research on advantages vs. disadvantages of an unscripted (vs. scripted) approach to Inside Sales?

What is the appropriate number and length of marketing messages that marketers should expect can be discussed on one Inside Sales telephone interaction?

I am curious if anyone has used team- pay performance for commisions only and if so how it was well implemented and how the breakdowns of received commission in the bucket were established per levels of the team.

For a business development/lead gen team, what is the average # of calls/day that should be required? What about live "Connects" or "conversations"?

I'm preparing the business requirements document that our IT staff will need to begin the research and selection process for our CRM tools, call center applications, and phone system enhancements. Does anyone have a time tested BRD or RFP template that captures the basic essence. This would be for outbound calling ISR's in a high technology sales development function.

We are preparing our Inside Sales force to, upon evaluation and qualification of an opportunity, either hand it off to the field territory manager or a channel partner. Does anyone have a score card or criteria check list to help facilitate that decision tree? It is not always black and white nor can it be solved just by a dollar amount.

I am starting an inside sales team for a SaaS based product and would like to see sample reports of how you measure success of a campaign. Does anyone have campaign results or the buckets you use to measure sucess for your inside sales team beyond just sales dollars?

Currently, our company has one (1) Inside Sales Rep who works remotely out of her home covering her territory. She lives two (2) hours away from our Corporate headquarters where our Inside Sales force works, and her manager works, so, she can easily drive to our Corporate office for training, important meetings, etc. We are looking to expand our remote Inside Sales program to offering positions in other states working from their homes, and/or from our manufacturing sites, etc. Do you have information on market trends for use of remote Inside Sales reps? What are other companies doing in regards to using remote Inside Sales reps? Are there legal restrictions you are aware of? Human Resource restrictions? I'd appreciate any information you have that you can share. Thanks.

What are some best practices or case studies on having an Inside Sales rep working with an Outside Sales partner? When I originally put together our Inside Sales team they worked independently with their own accounts and budgets. This was very successful. Now the CEO wants to team an Inside Sales rep with an Outside Rep to help the field rep meet budget and expand the territory.

Does anybody have any tips for asking for referrals? From both a new and a renewal business perspective, and from both losses and wins.

What are the key metrics that I should be tracking on an inside sales dashboard?

What are general guidelines for defining A vs. B vs. C leads?

Are most Inside Sales positions salary or hourly based? Is there regulation regarding how these positions are compensated?

The current Inside Sales function at my company is currently an Order Entry Desk. I have been asked to turn the function into a profit center and create a true Inside Sales Team. I have read several of the white papers, but would like to know if you have any suggestions on how to compensate these new roles (use of spifs maybe?) and also how to transition the current order entry role into a inside sales role and not lose the existing relationships between the outside rep and the order entry rep. Thanks

Hello everyone, I am looking for a more solid one on one form. The form I use now is pretty generic and so are the ones I've see available for free or pay, online. My form now has areas for reps with respect to: performance, rep generated discussion, state of pipeline, and to do's/timelines. I am looking for something, preferably in digital format, which is a bit more intuitive and will help me to stay on top of the important task of following up on my commitments to my reps, yet is easy to hold them accountable for managing to the document as well. Thanks for any ideas/help! Adam

We have a territory of outside field reps requesting a new ISR for their region. What is a suggested process for deciding whether or not to make such a change. I would also be interested in suggestions of how to implement such change should we move forward with reassigning.

I have been given the green light to expand my inside sales team. What should I consider when developing the expansion plan?

I'm looking for productivity benchmarks or industry standards for an Inside Sales group direct selling an SaaS product. What is a standard connect rate, a standard conversion rate (# of connects that agree to a web presentation) and win rate (# of presentations that result in wins). I'm also interested in average # of presentations per day and per week. FYI -- target accounts are SMB and avg deal size is under 10k. Thanks in advance for your assistance!

I am looking for articles, White Papers, or reports about companies that outsource their Inside Sales. Ideal content would be statistics, success stories, information on trends etc. Thanks in advance

I have had a number of individuals recently ask me about organizations and technologies to help improve productivity, particularly in the area of CRM tools and add-on’s. I was hoping some of the Expert Panelists would have some thoughts they would be willing to share. Thanks.

I would like a recommendation on a Sales Assessment Tool. I would like one that is good for both Inside and Outside reps. Thank You

Looking for some advice on scripts. Due to the nature of our business, it's important the team knows all of the 'ins and outs' of latest compliance codes and trends. Does anyone have a tool that they use to have that info physically at hand (not electronically)?

During our Summit it was highly recommended that 'levels' be created within an Inside Sales Team to create a career path. Do you have any white papers or information that may help me get started?

What are the key components of a training designed for a Supervisor of Inside Sales? Thanks

I am currently working on a research project for the Rochester Institute of Technology. One of the questions we want to answer is: "What percentage of sales do companies spend on sales and marketing, both separately and in the aggregate" If you answer the question your companies will NOT be individually identified. Thank you, David

Hi, I'm a new member and wanted to see what kind of trends are you seeing in the industry right now? Thanks.

I would like to begin internet Live Chat with customers. Do you have any vendors you can recommend? I am looking for something easy to get up and running, with little time and money. Any recommendations and best practices would be helpful? Thank you!

Is 10% of base pay a good percentage for variable pay?

We sell all of our products through distribution, so we do not get the end user's PO in hand. I am trying to come up with some compensation metrics that are measurable and challenging. Does anyone have any advice for me?

Could you please suggest some resources that could provide inside sales rep versus hiring a rep agency to manage a geographic area? I am working on a proposal that will help expand our Inside sales department and need some information on pro's and con's of rep agencies and inside sales representatives.

I have several new reps starting soon and I want to get them calling as soon as possible, do you have any suggestions and/or reference materials? Thanks

Our Inside sales teams are staring to work more with our field sales teams and they are getting resistance from some of the field reps and managers. Do you have any advice on how this can be overcome?

How is an "Inside Sales Strategy" defined? What are the essential components of an Inside Sales Strategy?

What is the right ratio between inside sales compensation and quota? In other words, if a rep wants to make $100k per year, what should their annual quota be? Thank you.

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