Business after business are announcing that they are not going back to the office.

There is good reason for this, one UK Bank has worked out that they make $0.026 cents more profit for every $ they generate if they close their offices.  This additional profit flows direct to the bottom line.

In addition, companies do not want to be ground zero for "super spreader", I've included one, of many examples of where companies, unknown to them at the time spread Covid19 throughout the world. 

My point being is that companies are NOT going to allow, unknown people to arrive and have meetings.

The face to face meeting in sales and marketing is dead for the time being.

And Artificial Intelligence is NOT coming to save you!

What Does Gartner Say About Sales and Digital?

Interesting article by Gartner, here are some of the highlights

"Over the next five years, an even greater rise in digital interactions between buyers and suppliers will break traditional sales models."

"The Gartner Future of Sales 2025 report predicts that by 2025, 80% of B2B sales interactions between suppliers and buyers will occur in digital channels. Chief sales officers (CSOs) and other senior sales leaders must accept that buying preferences have permanently changed and, as a result, so too will the role of sellers."

 "Sales organizations must be able to sell to customers everywhere the customer expects to engage, interact and transact with suppliers"

"Gartner defines the future of sales as the permanent transformation of organizations’ sales strategies, processes and allocation of resources, moving from a seller-centric to a buyer-centric orientation and shifting from analog sales processes to ....  digital-first engagement with customers."

"Gartner research shows buyers typically only spend 17% of their time meeting with potential suppliers when considering a purchase. With less and less customer face time, virtual selling via digital channels will predominate."

"B2B sales reps need to embrace ... a new manner of engaging customers, matching their sales activity to their customers’ buying practices and information-collecting needs."

But My Clients Are Not on Social - Really?

The latest social media figures from Simon Kemp, Hootsuite and We are social are out and here are the highlights.

"More than 4 billion people around the world now use social media each month, and an average of nearly 2 million new users are joining them every day."

"The world is spending more time on social media too, with the typical user now spending roughly 15 percent of their waking life using social platforms."

"Social media adoption has jumped by more than 12 percent in just 3 months"

"The time we spend using connected devices continues to rise"

"A clear ‘age gap’ defines digital use in the workplace"

"Marketers may be missing out on some of today’s biggest digital opportunities"

The research is clear, social media has changed society and changed the way we do business.

Total world population: 7.81 billion people

Number of people using mobile phones around the world: 5.20 billion

Global internet users: 4.66 billion

Worldwide social media users: 4.14 billion - 53% of the world's population use social media in other words, more people use social media than don't use it.

However, when it comes to social media, users clearly prefer mobile devices. Kepios analysis reveals that 99 percent of the world’s social media users access via mobile devices, but just 1 in 5 use a laptop or desktop computer.

The struggle we see for business is that leaders are "scared" of social media.  Sales and Marketing leaders "think" they understand social, or won't admit they don't.  The same for sales people, they think they understand social media, when they don't.

Here is an example, Mark Woodhams, a Senior Sales VP from Blackline thought he knew all about social and was blown away - see this post.  

Another example is James Stirk, he wrote an article about how he thought he knew all there was to know about social and how wrong he was. 

And Catherine Coale, wrote about how Telstra Purple was transforming to being a "social" business.  A social business, not being a non-for-profit, but being a business that uses social strategically, rather than tactically. 

Don't believe me, contact them.

Where Do We Go From Here?

For those unsure of what to do, DLA Ignite will complete a review of your current social / digital / virtual / remote selling capability.  For free. 

We will take your team (up top 10) and perform a complete root and branch Social Media Performance Assessment.

Sales, Marketing, Management, Technical, HR. Procurement ....whoever you want to include.

This will include: Profiles, connections, followers, inbound and outbound activity, content, engagement, follow up, results.

(Happy to provide the list of deliverables).

We will map your business against the DLA Ignite baseline and present back to you our findings. We will show you where improvements can be made and what results should be expected.  No hard sell, just present back to you a road map.  

You entered lock down analogue, this is your chance to leave this pandemic, digital.

Please contact me here or one of the DLA Ignite team here, so please pick one of our industry experts or one of our experts in your geographical locality.  Our website is here.