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Choosing the right RevOps platform to integrate into an existing tech stack is an important decision for revenue leaders to make. On the one hand, the shiny new AI tool promising to improve workflow efficiency is enticing; on the other hand, opting for a tried and true platform poses a safer option.
Finding a platform that balances both ends of the spectrum, according to experts, is key to solving the RevOps puzzle.
"Most RevOps platforms offer similar features, so it’s less about choosing the perfect tool and more about how you implement and adopt it,” Megan Hermosillo, chief revenue officer of SupportNinja, a business process outsourcing company, told Revenue Brew in an email. “Execution is what drives real revenue impact."
External vs. internal landscape: Revenue leaders have indicated that looking both externally at their markets and internally at their operations is crucial when deciding which RevOps platforms to use.
At Sovos, a global tax compliance software company, for example, aligning the business across each region proved to be a pain point when onboarding a new platform.
“We had some siloed systems across the global business, and it would take days for our ops team to write macro code to generate the data that we needed to operate our business and get a single view of the business so we can predict the bookings, look at the leads, follow through the lead process, etc.,” Alice Katwan, president of revenue at Sovos, said. “It was very, very challenging for us. Each region operates uniquely, so we wanted to build a global framework that empowered the regions to adapt to the global framework."
Sovos ultimately built a platform leveraging AI to bring together the company’s data sources.
“Now we don’t have to spend hours writing the code,” Katwan said. “We use AI to accelerate that integration effort to be able to give us that single pane in view across the data sources.”
Solving a need: Bringing on a new RevOps platform is in response to solving a need. Bonus points if it solves the issue quickly.
Steve Schley, chief revenue officer at UnitedLex, a data and professional services company, explained that the business recently added sales communication tool FrontSpin to its tech stack to address connect volume, or the total number of customer interactions.
“If I call you and 99 other people, the system starts recognizing that it’s my phone number, and it’s going to start tagging me as spam,” he said. “[FrontSpin] had a system to basically utilize at random a variety of different phone numbers. They said that would improve the connectability that we had through this calling program. That’s one we took a little bit on faith. By being able to measure that and see that over 30, 60, 90 days, yes, this actually is holding up to what we put in our business case, we could actually prove that was true. That’s a little bit earlier than actual revenue, but then we can use that kind of approach then to carry it on through the rest of the sales stack—all the way through to revenue.”
Now after six months of using FrontSpin, UnitedLex business development representatives are making 15 to 20 dials per hour, compared to five to seven manual dials before its implementation. The number of daily conversations has increased, too.
Barriers to entry: Onboarding new platforms takes effort, and teams can sometimes be reluctant to carve out the necessary time and energy. The new product also needs to integrate seamlessly with the existing tech stack, which includes go-to platforms like Salesforce, Salesloft, Demandbase, and others.
“The biggest issue is the adoption and the time it takes to enable and get the adoption across the board,” Katwan said. “It’s something new for [the team] to implement. It’s a big process. Once you test out the tool, you prove out the tool, you do a pilot of the tool, and then you implement the tool. Then you have to go through a whole cycle of how are you going to enable on the tool? Getting the adoption and getting the outputs that you want—it’s not just a plug and play. It does take time.”
Big picture: While ease of use and optimizing efficiency are key factors when considering adopting a new RevOps platform, teams need to be willing to take the time to integrate them into their daily tasks.
“No platform runs itself,” Hermosillo said. “We assign ownership from the start and continuously optimize based on what’s driving results and what’s not. At the end of the day, the tool is only as valuable as the strategy and discipline behind it.”