Scout Analytics is Making Sales More Nimble

Posted by: Matt Shanahan

Just finished up at OnDemand Conference 2009. Scout Analytics was asked to present our view on how to create a nimble sales organization. There was a lot of interest in the potential impact of analytics on sales productivity. My presentation focused on how uncertainty about customer demand negatively impacts sales performance. In particular, the presentation focused on why knowing the demand profile of customers is critical to identifying and qualifying revenue opportunities.

Two interesting themes emerged from the audience during the Q&A. The first is that while some companies evaluate usage to understand potential churn, very few have looked at how usage to determine up-sells and cross-sells. The second is that most organization do not have a means to measure and track the change in demand over time.

These themes point out, companies are wanting to move beyond simplistic measurement of demand to more insightful analytics. Using analytics to remove uncertainty about customer demand provides critical insights that improve the nimbleness of sales, marketing, and customer service.