TinderBox cracked the code on B2B customer-behavior, sales productivity

TinderBox is TechPoint’s “Featured Company of the Week.” Learn about the program below.

Business-to-business sales professionals have been trying to crack the code of customer behavior for as long as companies have sold products and services to one another.

Understanding customer behavior is one driving factor for why companies around the world have spent $100 billion — that’s $100 b-b-b-billion with a “B” — on customer relationship management (CRM) software and related costs over the past three years.1

Despite these significant investments, sales performance is decreasing both in percentage of sales representatives achieving quota and revenue targets, according to a 2015 CSO Insights survey of more than 1,000 chief sales officers.2

Why is sales performance decreasing globally?

It’s because the sales process is overly complex and far too many sales forces still operate from a combination online/offline network of presentations, proposals and contracts.

Sales processes like these are hard to update, making them inconsistent across the enterprise and nearly impossible to track — even among companies that have powerful CRM systems that collect extensive business intelligence.

In fact, because of antiquated processes, many sales teams are missing out on the full benefits of CRM.

“Sales is one of the last places remaining in the enterprise that’s still using decades-old technology,” said Vice President of Marketing Mitch Frazier in an interview with the Indianapolis Business Journal. “Companies are coming to us and saying, ‘Help me bring my sales process online.'”

What’s the solution?

Sales productivity company TinderBox believes they have cracked the B2B customer behavior code. Their cloud-based software products can take the place of the messy patchwork of PDFs, PowerPoints and hard-copy contracts that should probably be extinct by now because we all pretty much expect everything to be digital nowadays.

It’s the real-time analytics and alerts, though, that give sales pros insight into how deals progress through the different steps of the sales cycle and lets them peer into the mindset of customers based on how they interact with the software.

TinderBox users receive alerts when proposals are opened and by whom. This is one of those features that seems like a small thing, but can eliminate a lot of guesswork and unnecessary back and forth with customers. Anything that saves time and hassle on both sides of the sales equation is welcome in today’s info-based economy.

In addition to who opens what when, TinderBox users see how much time customers spend on each page. This can speak volumes to a sales manager concerning which next steps are most likely to help close a deal faster.

For example, if a prospect’s legal department skips past every other page but spends an hour looking at the payment terms, addressing those terms or proposing alternatives in follow-up communication could eliminate a barrier and close the deal.

How does it work?

TinderBox brings a company’s existing documents and content into cloud-based, data driven presentations, proposals and contracts that sales teams can click and drag to update and edit from shared online content libraries.

TinderBox also integrates with other major software brands like DocuSign, so when prospects are ready to sign they can sign digitally. No messing with contracts in triplicate and couriers like the old days.

What is the ROI?

TinderBox itself is rapidly growing. The company has doubled in size in the last two years and secured more than $12 million in venture capital to keep up with market demands and opportunities.

After the first full quarter of using TinderBox, IT infrastructure company Scale Computing had the largest revenue quarter in company history and accelerated its sales cycle by 53 percent when compared to deals closed without TinderBox.

Clint McVey, chief operating officer at Scale Computing, relies on TinderBox to provide valuable insights into the sales process and help his sales teams close more deals.

“TinderBox has streamlined our ability to quote and has given us insight into our buyers’ attitudes,” said McVey.

“We’ve also gained more awareness of transactions while shortening our sales cycle. Scale Computing views TinderBox as a must-have addition to our sales toolbox.”

Footnotes: 1 Gartner Group. 2 CSO Insights

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