Virtual: An Evolution in Selling

In the reality of a world impacted by Covid-19, businesses are embracing new and creative ways of selling through the use of digital tools and technology. Now the fastest growing and most widely adopted sales motion across the globe, virtual sales is winning the war for attention. Are organisations ready to realize the significant competitive benefits this sales evolution delivers?

Sales is the revenue-driving force for business and face-to-face interactions has historically been seen as the primary catalyst to closing a deal. This notion has evolved in the last decade. In today’s fast-paced digital era, the traditional sales process has undergone significant change with the rise of virtually based inside sales professionals (virtual sales).

Looking back to a world before Covid-19, virtual sales was already the fastest growing and most widely embraced sales motion across the globe with virtual sales hiring dramatically outpacing their field counterparts. This exponential growth was fuelled by a combination of changing customer purchasing behaviour together with advancements in technology driving the increasing effectiveness of virtual sales teams. Even so, some businesses were not keeping pace and remained overly reliant on field sales.

The Covid-19 pandemic has hit the fast-forward button on virtual sales progress forcing businesses across the world to double down on digital sales tools and universally conduct sales remotely. This sudden shift of the balance between field and virtual sales is unlikely to return to where it was before and virtual selling will be fundamental to survival and growth in a post Covid-19 world.

In Cisco, our sales teams are equipped with the latest innovations in technology and the virtual sales organization is an integral part of our business consistently delivering double-digit growth to the company.

Over the next few weeks, I will discuss what is fuelling the rise of virtual sales, provide viewpoints on how it may evolve in the future and lay out what it takes to reap the benefits and make virtual sales work for you.

Check out more posts on selling in the virtual world and connect with my team and I on LinkedIn here: