Big Data Helping Companies Grow Sales

Big data-for-sales pioneer, Lattice Engines, has announced the results of its survey on Big Data in sales and has shown it to be of significant importance for driving sales. Key findings from the survey include:

About sales representatives experiencing difficulty accessing information necessary for closing deals:

• 82 percent of respondents felt sales reps are handicapped by the time it takes to research prospects and by the amount of information available.

• Sales reps potentially search up to 15 data sources like LinkedIn, search engines, and internal CRM systems, to find information on customers and sales prospects.

• 89 percent felt that being unable to keep up with prospect information resulted in missed sales opportunities.

On existing technology not designed for big data :

• CRM systems have reached 80 percent saturation rate but only 44 percent of respondents belief it is effective at making internal information more easily accessible, and almost 0 percent reported that CRM is ineffective at finding information from external sources.

• Over half of polled companies do not have the technology in place to deliver external and internal information sales reps, relying instead on the reps themselves doing necessary research.

• 90 percent of executives expect great benefits to sales from better data access and insights delivered from a singular system

“Sales have more to gain from Big Data technology than perhaps any other part of an organization because the results directly impact the bottom line,” said Shashi Upadhyay, CEO of Lattice Engines. “The findings in this survey reflect what our customers are telling us: they are overwhelmed by information and existing technologies aren’t designed for the social and data-intensive world we do business in today. World-class organizations are already taking advantage of Big Data technology to increase sales productivity and win more deals.”