First, focus on efficiency<\/p>\n
“Effective and efficient collaboration across internal teams and departments is vital. Sales teams usually have to lean on subject matter experts across the business to gather knowledge to inform proposals or craft responses, so organizations establishing guidelines or templates to streamline efforts and processes offer clear direction for employees to know where to look for such materials. Effective collaboration ultimately gives time back to everyone involved and eliminates the back and forth,” said Ganesh Shankar, CEO, RFPIO<\/a>.<\/p>\n Second, utilize response management tools<\/p>\n Implement and lean on software like response management solutions to supplement and optimize the efforts of your sales team. Buying into technology that eases the burden on employees’ shoulders and allows them to focus their attention on unique tasks or projects is crucial, especially if employee numbers are down,” said Shankar. <\/p>\n Third, be realistic<\/p>\n “Be realistic about taking on business leads and proposals. A recent benchmark report found three-quarters of companies plan to increase the numbers of proposals they submit in 2021, 72% plan to increase the number of RFPs they proactively seek out, and 82% will also complete more proactive proposals. This is great, as long as leads and proposals are vetted thoroughly to ensure they’re worth pursuing. Software can help analyze how long a response will take, how many team members will be required to tackle the project, how much information is already at hand and how much information will have to be researched, and the likelihood of winning the business. These insights can help drive the decision making process as to which leads are worth pursuing, and will also benefit sales teams since they can focus on leads that have the most potential,” said Shankar. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":0,"template":"","categories":[1],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\t\n