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When it comes to sales intelligence software, we’re not in Kansas anymore.
But if your sales team is, and is selling, say, an AI tool used in precision farming to a company in Wichita, Kansas, they’re probably utilizing a highly advanced prospecting platform to track them down.
These tools have taken us from an inside look at a business to an all-seeing eye. Think hypertargeting, laser-focused filters, tags on anything and everything, and deep databases that can deftly weave into your CRM. Add in AI, and the analytics on your outreach might end up as the most critical tool in the kit.
Sales intelligence platforms like ZoomInfo profess to hold the keys to identifying your next client, down to the smallest detail. But how are they actually being used?
Sales teams at Sharp Business USA, Sago Health, and Custom Ink are each using the platform in different ways, from cold-calling to efficiently scaling teams. Here’s how they are leveraging ZoomInfo’s database to organize and weaponize outreach.
Cold-calling reinforcements
Melani Patterson, associate vice president of sales strategy at Sharp Business USA, said that she introduced ZoomInfo to her team during the Covid-19 pandemic when she noticed prospecting norms were changing.
She credits the decision for keeping her team ahead of the curve in an environment where cold calling and general outreach were becoming more difficult.
“Now you have a tool that can give you alerts and education and news and tell you what’s going on and help you see different layers of even different products that they might need. Your call is so much more succinct, and then you’re not wasting people’s time,” Patterson said.
She said she now sees using an information database that can adapt to a sales team’s data as essential in today’s sales world.
“I think if somebody’s not using a program or a partner that helps you to grow your strategies, and you’re still sitting in something, or methods that were being done 10 years ago, you’re already behind, like bottom line,” Patterson said.
Using AI to build teams
ZoomInfo offers different modules for varying use cases, which can come with additional costs. Primarily known for its outreach database, ZoomInfo now offers AI insights and sales enhancement features. While Sharp has used ZoomInfo to enhance its existing capabilities, Sago Health CRO Ashley Wade used the platform to build a new outbound sales motion.
With speed as a priority, Wade said using ZoomInfo’s conversation intelligence tool, Chorus, makes educating and preparing her sales team on messaging and approach much faster.
“I don’'t know what I would have done if I didn’t have Chorus as a tool to use for onboarding,” Wade said. “For my new business developer and BDR, to sit there and listen to the conversations—the good, the bad, the ugly, for the rest of their teammates to learn from and have that as a coaching opportunity was just a total game changer.”
Alignment across an existing tech stack remains top of mind for Wade. She said using ZoomInfo across the revenue organization and implementing it into the CRM has improved performance on metrics like connect-to-meeting rates and objection-handling accuracy.
“Building pipeline, meeting conversion, being on the road, those are all table stakes for what they have to do, and I didn’t want them to have to move across multiple different systems in order to get that done,” Wade told Revenue Brew.
Aiding an enterprise transition
For Custom Ink CRO Ryan Massimo, an enterprise transition has led his team to utilize ZoomInfo not just as a prospecting tool, but to create an almost 360-degree view of clients—from genesis to life cycle management.
For example, he uses the platform to identify clients at risk of moving to another company, when they have a backfill, and when to send a trigger. Moreover, throughout Custom Ink’s enterprise transition, Massimo has been working closely with his marketing team and has been using ZoomInfo to stay organized.
“Getting down to that title and organizing, sending marketing materials, and then having our sales team follow up those marketing materials in more of a programmatic way, they’re getting a value proposition that here are the elevated features that you get by working with your sales team at Custom Ink,” Massimo said.