This is the third in a series of interviews I am conducting with subject matter experts and practitioners in the sales profession. I am examining where we are today with AI in sales and where we are going.
This interview is with Amelia Taylor. Amelia is the lead evangelist for Regie.ai. Regie helps sales, marketing, and success teams write engaging content faster using AI.
Here’s a summary of our conversation and below this summary is the full transcript of our interview.
1. A salesperson leveraging AI will replace a salesperson who is not
Some salespeople fear that AI will take their job. Amelia believes AI will do the grunt work, allowing sales teams to focus on the higher value tasks. However, this does not mean we can ignore AI. Just like other important tools like Google search or LinkedIn, professional salespeople will need to learn tools like ChatGPT. Amelia believes that, “AI is not going to replace a salesperson, but a salesperson leveraging AI will replace a salesperson who is not.”
2. The human touch
Tools like ChatGPT will become part of our workflow, allowing us to get more done in less time; however, we won’t be able to hand over all writing to the AI and not be involved at all. It’s more likely to be an “80/20 rule” where the AI writes a large amount of the text then we go in and add the last 20%, which makes our email or content piece really resonate (with other humans.) Amelia says, “With Regie, our AI tool, for example, about 80% of the content I send out is AI-generated, but 20% is generated by me.”
3. AI the idea generator
Amelia echoes the sentiment I’ve been reading around the Internet that tools like ChatGPT can be great for idea generation. You can ask the AI for questions on a topic and see where there are holes in your own thinking. This can help you with approaching a prospect or generating a content piece. “It’s great when the AI finds something interesting that I didn’t realize was even out there. It saves me hours of research time. Sometimes what the AI generates even gives me an idea that I might not otherwise have had”, notes Amelia.
4. Leverage communities
We know that buyers are increasingly seeking the advice of other buyers in communities. Amelia sees an opportunity for salespeople to become actively involved in these communities by being helpful to the community members. AI can help in this regard by being the salesperson’s assistant and surfacing (and developing) content that matches the buyer’s needs, even personalizing it to that individual buyer.
5. Tools without training hinder growth
As mentioned by one of the previous interviewees in this series, training your sales team on the usage of new tools is critical, and frequently inadequate or missing completely. AI holds great promise for sales teams but like other tools it will only realize its full potential if salespeople are appropriately trained and coached in its use. Amelia has come across several situations where “no one was teaching the salespeople how to use all these tools. The enablement was missing completely. If you give people a lot of great tools but then let them go run free, without being trained on them. That will hinder growth for your company.”
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Interview Transcript
Nigel: Where do you see AI impacting the sales profession in the next couple of years?
Amelia: I think there’s going to be a boost in sales productivity, simply because there’s AI doing a lot of the grunt work. It’s going to produce quicker sales cycles. You’re going to be reaching your prospects faster because AI’s doing some of the personalization. AI is not going to replace a salesperson, but a salesperson leveraging AI will replace a salesperson who is not.
Nigel: Do you think buyers are going to care whether something’s written by AI or by a human?
Amelia: I think some buyers will. As I buyer, I can tell when I’ve been thrown into a sequence. You know when you are a part of something that is going out to many people.
Nigel: That’s how buyers experience it today, I’m wondering how AI is going to change that? Are we buyers we still going to be able to tell if something was written by a machine?
Amelia: I think AI can be an idea generator. With Regie, our AI tool, for example, about 80% of the content I send out is AI-generated, but 20% is generated by me. You can look at the text Regie generates and say, “I don’t really like this part, or this part is a little bit lengthy or let me regenerate this part completely”.
Nigel: Is that how we’re going to use AI? Are we going to have the AI generate something and then we’re going to go in there and do the last 20% ourselves?
Amelia: I personally don’t think that there should be any 100% reliance on AI. The human touch is critical. It’s great when the AI finds something interesting that I didn’t realize was even out there. It saves me hours of research time. Sometimes what the AI generates even gives me an idea that I might not otherwise have had.
Nigel: If it’s going to be so easy to generate content, do you think content will be less valuable?
Amelia: I think content is just going to get better. I think people are going to learn how to do things in more strategic ways. Figuring out more about the people they are approaching, what their passions and interests are, and sending things that are very relevant to them.
Nigel: Networking for salespeople is a personal favorite topic. Can you give an example of how AI can help with networking?
Amelia: There are many ways you can use AI to better engage with communities. I have AI set up to help me within different communities that I’m a part of. I’m able to be in the background reading, soaking in information, figuring it out, while also engaging when it seems right to do so.
Nigel: How do you see AI applying to prospecting? How do you see AI affecting quantity versus quality in prospecting?
Amelia: I think salespeople can use the AI to act like their own assistant. It can help them get in front of the person they need to talk to. For example, with Regie, we use a “three-P” methodology. First you figure out your target Persona. Then the Pain point that you are addressing for this persona, then the value Proposition you bring to help solve this pain. Regie can help the salesperson with figuring all of this, as if they had an assistant. The AI does not replace the salesperson, but it makes the work less burdensome.
Nigel: Some industry experts now were talking about “sales tech stack bloat.” Do you agree with that?
Amelia: Yes, I totally agree with it. In the past, I worked for a rev ops services firm and client CEOs and CROs would tell me how heavy their tech stacks had become. Meanwhile no one was teaching the salespeople how to use all these tools. The enablement was missing completely. If you give people a lot of great tools but then let them go run free, without being trained on them. That will hinder growth for your company.
Nigel: Are there any particular technologies you think we don’t need?
I’ve seen many situations where technology is duplicated. Companies have two different CRMs, you’ve got HubSpot for marketing and Salesforce for sales. Where is the full transparency of what’s going on and where does collateral live? It’s not within a CRM because marketing and sales don’t have the same CRM! In these cases, where you have more than one tool carrying out the same function then there is definitely a place for removing one of the tools.
Nigel: If you were running a sales team what would be the top two things you would look at or do to hit your number this year?
Amelia: First, I would lean into communities. I would leverage communities to drive growth. Now than ever buyers are buying from their peers and they’re asking others, “Hey, what should I be buying? What should I be doing?” Instead of requesting a demo from your website.
Secondly, I would invest in making sure my sales team was equipped with the right tools such as AI. And I would make sure they know how to leverage those tools in detail, including weekly training sessions on the tools.
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