Closing more deals is the number one priority for B2B business development representatives (BDRs). Unfortunately, your BDR team spends only 22% to 37% of their total time doing the actual selling. They’re also performing tasks like:
- Scheduling appointments
- Researching leads
- Logging calls
CRM management and updates take roughly one-fifth of their time. This leaves less time for closing deals … and it also leaves BDRs feeling bogged down and frustrated. And with an average of only 2% of cold calls leading to appointments, it’s no wonder most BDRs feel like they’re constantly spinning their wheels.
Enter artificial intelligence.
Introducing an AI-powered platform to help with repetitive tasks frees up your BDR team’s time to focus on what they’re good at: selling. AI gets mundane tasks out of your BDRs’ way, freeing them to make more calls with better prospects — and close more deals.
However, simply adding an AI platform to your team isn’t enough. You need a plan to leverage that AI for your BDRs. Here are some benefits of using AI to power your BDR team:
1. Cold-Calling Sucks
Cold-calling is one of the least favorite activities of BDRs. It’s often cited as the number one reason people leave the BDR role. In fact, 63% of sales reps cited making cold calls as one thing they hate most about their job — and it’s obvious why.
Cold calls are time-consuming, often requiring up to eight calls to sell to a customer. They have an abysmal success rate, with the average BDR saying only 2% of their calls turn into appointments.
Besides, most prospects find cold calls intrusive. They’re very likely to hang up when they realize they’re speaking to a sales rep. This rejection can be tough on even the most experienced BDRs and lead to burnout and turnover. So, how does an AI wingman help?
By using AI to identify when a prospect is interested in your solution, you can help your BDRs avoid the frustrating experience of making countless cold calls that go nowhere.
With AI for BDRs, your reps will quickly identify which accounts are worth pursuing and which ones they can safely ignore for the time being.
2. AI for BDRs Helps Narrow Your Outreach to Likely Buyers
One of the benefits of using AI to power your BDR team is identifying which of your accounts are in-market. This means that you can focus your outreach efforts on the prospects that are most likely to buy from you right now.
Many B2B sales teams hone in on an Ideal Customer Profile that’s limited to firmographic data, such as:
- a certain number of employees
- in a specific industry
- in a particular region
This is a good starting point, but AI can help you spot far more actionable signals, including:
- Technographic data that identifies a prospect’s website tech stack, or changes they have recently made changes to their site
- Which companies are searching for keywords relevant to your business, or researching competitors
- Which potential customers are moving deeper into their decision-making process — even if they haven’t filled out a form on your site
This information is valuable; it helps you adjust your outreach strategy on-the-fly to ensure you’re always staying one step ahead of your competition.
By using data, AI identifies patterns and trends among your best customers and uses that information to find more leads that look like customers, behave like customers, and are likely to buy like customers.
This saves your BDRs time. But it also helps them be more successful. They’re only reaching out to those leads that are most likely to convert.
3. AI-Powered Buyer Insights Can Help You Close Deals
In addition to knowing who you should talk to, AI can also help your BDRs know what to talk about. When you understand customers’ intentions and their buying-journey stage, you can tailor pitches to be more consultative and helpful. You can also provide more relevant information based on their needs.
Using this approach, your BDRs will stand out among the competition — and build trust and credibility with potential customers.
AI for BDRs can provide your team with critical information about a customer’s needs, pain points, and budget by analyzing customer data. AI-powered buyer insights help you close more deals by:
- Understanding your prospect’s role in their business, and specific pain points
- Understanding their research journey so you can offer solutions and distinguish your solution from competitors
- Automating sales execution tasks to free up your BDRs’ time
These insights also help sales managers focus their training and coaching time on BDRs who are working to reel in strong accounts. In addition to maximizing pipeline value, this generates wins that boost morale and reinforce new skills.
6sense: Your Ideal AI Wingman
With the help of 6sense, your BDRs can say goodbye to the days of cold-calling and start generating more qualified leads that are ready to buy. 6sense is an AI-powered platform that provides real-time intelligence about a customer’s intent and buying behavior.
6sense also offers valuable insights into a customer’s needs and budget so BDRs can customize their pitches. Best of all, 6sense integrates with your existing CRM and marketing automation tools.
If you’re ready to take your B2B sales to the next level, book a demo today to learn more about how we can help arm your BDR with game-changing AI capabilities.
