‍Is sales art? Or is it data-driven science? 

That debate is as classic as the good ol’ Star Trek vs Star Wars.   

Well, we’d say it’s a mix of both. 

Traditionally, sales was viewed as an intuition-driven, people-oriented profession. It was a role that demanded a master's degree in “the art of persuasion”. Salespeople were required to look presentable, knock on doors, make cold calls, impress customers and offer irresistible deals that nobody could turn down. 

But, in a world that has long moved online and edging closer to living in the metaverse, the traditional view of a salesperson no longer holds. In recent years, data and technology have changed the way sales teams operate. 

Today, the art of selling has evolved to become data-driven. A pleasing personality and intuition alone aren't enough if you want to hit your sales targets month after month. You need rock-solid data to empower your sales teams with the right insights at their fingertips to close deals. 

This is where sales call recordings come into the spotlight. Your sales calls are a treasure trove of critical information and valuable insights. It provides your team with crucial intelligence, helping you optimize your sales strategy in real-time. Besides providing your team with actionable data points, sales call recording also helps with effective sales coaching. 

In a nutshell, call recording helps you hit two targets with one arrow. 

#1: Ace the science of selling by providing your team with the right insights gathered from your sales enablement software 

#2: Become a pro in the art of selling by getting the necessary material to coach and train your team members up their sales game 

It helps you master the science as well as the art of selling. It’s a competitive advantage that you cannot afford to miss out on. Let’s take a closer look at each of these advantages. 

Perfect the art of sales coaching 

Listen & learn 

One of the most effective yet simple ways to use call recordings is to - just listen. Sales managers can review calls one-on-one with their sales reps by listening to the flow of the conversation. Listening can help you identify the following: 

• Is the sales rep talking too much? 
• Do they sound like they’re just reading from a sales playbook or does it feel natural? 
• Is the sales rep picking up on the verbal cues of the customer and responding appropriately? 
• Is the rep allowing for natural pauses in the conversation so the caller can fully formulate their questions and thoughts? 
• Is the rep demonstrating the right level of engagement, or are they in a hurry to finish and close the conversation? 

By making active listening a part of sales training, you can help your sales team improve their performance, making the sales journey pleasant for both the rep and the prospect. 

Eliminate selling hurdles

There may be situations that prevent your team from converting a lead or closing a sale. Maybe the product's features are not fully documented, or the customers are asking for a specific technical detail that your sales agents aren’t able to answer. 

The chances are that it’s not just one rep who’s having these troubles but the whole team. By recording and reviewing sales calls, you can identify these hurdles and figure out the ways to eliminate them. 

By reviewing a broad pool of calls handled by different reps, you can spot the common difficulties faced by the team. By addressing and eliminating these challenges, you pave the way for improving rep performance, capturing more leads, conversions and ultimately more revenue. 

It’s not just about the mistakes 

There’s a notion that call reviews are just about pointing out the mistakes made by sales reps. While call recordings help to correct errors and identify skill gaps, it also provides you with an opportunity to recognize and reward positive achievements. 

• Is a sales rep closing deals consistently while achieving killer customer satisfaction scores? 
• Did a team member navigate a tricky conversation efficiently without offending the customer? 

There are many examples like these that deserve special recognition. Recording sales calls helps you shine the spotlight on reps doing a good job. It’s a great way to encourage friendly competition and bring out the best in everyone. 

Create excellent training resources with real-life examples 

Have you ever felt like your training material is outdated and no longer relevant? Recorded customer conversations are a great instructional tool for training and onboarding new hires. Even veteran salespeople can get plenty of insights and pick up new tricks by listening to the calls of their teammates. 

Curate a collection of call recordings with good and bad examples in a central location. Think of this as your own “internal” Wikipedia that the team can refer to whenever they require assistance on proceeding with a particular prospect. 

Recording, reviewing and listening to sales calls is as essential as athletes watching their game tapes. It helps improve the team’s performance as they learn from their mistakes and the mistakes of others. 

Simply put, it helps them refine and enhance their “art” of selling, making them top-tier salespeople, an asset to the organization. 

Now, coming to the science of selling, let’s look at how sales call recording helps in this arena. 

Master the science of sales enablement 

Improve the quality of your lead pipeline 

Have you ever called up a lead only to find out that it’s a customer who is unlikely to buy your product ever? 

Such poor-quality leads affect the call-to-conversation ratio of your team, and not to forget that it’s a complete waste of your sales team's time and efforts. So, how do you weed out these glitches? 

By using sales call recording software, you can track the sales call logs of your team to do a quality check of your leads list. You can track key metrics like:

• How many calls were not picked up by the customer? What is the ratio of answered vs unanswered calls?
• How many dead-ends in your list? (Candidates who are not the right fit for your products)
• How many outdated or wrong contact details are on your list? 
• How long should the sales personnel wait before disqualifying a lead? 

By analyzing sales call recordings, you can finally solve one of the biggest challenges for sales teams all over - when is the right time to cut one’s losses and stop pursuing a lead? This data can help your sales team optimize the sales process by building a high-quality pipeline of qualified leads. 

Pinpoint the “why” behind customer decisions 

Sales leaders can quickly identify the “why” behind wins and losses with the help of call recording software and conversation intelligence tools. Call recording and analysis software provide valuable insights about your customers and their interactions with your sales teams. It helps you get a clear picture of:

• How do customers perceive your brand? 
• How do they rank you against your competitors? 
• What do they think about your product?
• Does it provide them with the right solution? 
• What more do they expect from your brand? 
• The actual reason why the deal ends in a win or a loss.

Using AI-driven sales call analysis, you can also identify the seller’s strengths and weaknesses by identifying various metrics like talk-to-listen ratio, frequency of objections and more. 

With the help of these data-driven insights, you can optimize sales strategies and implement the best sales practices that match the expectations and needs of your target audience. 

Improve the quality of your sales calls 

When it comes to hitting sales targets, it’s not the quantity but quality that matters. Your sales team may make hundred-odd calls in a day. But if only a dozen converts, you aren’t utilizing the potential of your sales team to the max. 

To win more conversions, you need to improve the quality of the conversation and customer engagement. Sales call recording tools can tell you plenty about your call quality, and it can help you spot what you’re doing wrong. 

• Maybe your sales team is starting the call on the wrong foot, and you need to work on the call openings.
• Or maybe you need to trim the length of the call by making the pitch airtight. 
• Or you need to change the timing of your calls. 

Sales call recordings provide you with automated access to all these metrics. You don’t have to churn numbers and identify issues manually. It’s presented in an easy to understand, visual dashboard. 

You can then scrutinize call logs and call data to improve the quality of your calls, thereby scoring more conversions. 

So, what next? 

Now that you’ve seen the benefits of recording sales calls, the next logical step is to try out Wingman to record and analyze your sales calls with the power of automation. Wingman is an actionable sales conversation intelligence platform powered by Artificial Intelligence that offers you the functionality to unlock critical insights from every sales interaction. With Wingman, you can use call tracking features to enhance customer experience and build an optimized sales strategy. 

Book a free demo and start enjoying the benefits of recording sales calls. 

You can also check out other blogs from Wingman for practical and actionable tips on how to improve your sales game. Also, subscribe to “On The Flip Side”, our podcast where industry pros share insights and tips on improving the profitability of your sales organization.