Xactly, the leading innovator of cloud-based Sales Performance Management (SPM) software, today hosted its first-ever global Unleashed Virtual Summit, stimulating a series of dynamic discussions around how organizations can adapt to the changing seller experience in a virtual world.

In his keynote delivered at today’s conference, Xactly founder and CEO Chris Cabrera detailed the strategic imperatives that companies must apply in order to succeed in the future of sales, emphasizing why now, more than ever, they need to leverage data to make informed sales decisions and pivot their plans based on real-time insights.

Marketing Technology News: Sitel Group To Hire 1,000 Licensed Insurance Agents In North America

Demonstrating this point, he highlighted the findings of a new Forrester report issued today, which showed that a majority of business leaders (84%) consider it necessary to be able to adapt sales incentives to market changes, execute real-time course corrections, and make decisions based on trusted data. However, less than a third say they have the ability to course correct or adapt their incentives, underscoring the vital role that SPM and AI-enabled solutions play in enabling companies to access and utilize real-time sales data to make business decisions — particularly in the current environment, with market pressures at an all-time high.

Marketing Technology News: Vision Critical Appoints Steve Winter to Board of Directors

Further, Cabrera revealed the three main factors — according to new research from the Center for Generational Kinetics — that keep sales reps engaged and motivated in today’s landscape: trust, performance and transparency. In order to deliver on these key elements, he explained that organizations must adopt technologies that accomplish the following:

• Drive the right behaviors by meeting reps where they are in their existing workflows.
• Allow sales leaders to access engagement insights to help align their teams with corporate goals.
• Reimagine business strategies, tactics and visions by tailoring them to new market realities.

“We are living in a different world today than we were even three months ago, and adjusting to the new virtual seller experience is imperative for organizations that want to stay agile and grow their business,” Cabrera said. “To adapt, business leaders must think differently, with greater urgency, and develop data-informed sales strategies that focus on driving the right behaviors and aligning teams with corporate goals. Companies that invest in tech solutions today will have a better chance at bouncing back from current economic challenges and setting themselves up for success in the future.”

Marketing Technology News: Unbounce Secures $52 Million to Give Small Businesses an AI-Powered Edge