B2B Outsourced Inside Sales Explained

Inside sales is a common tactic that companies employ to generate as many leads as possible. But is there a better way to do inside sales?

Yes: outsourcing it.

Outsourcing your B2B inside sales team is a good way to cut costs while increasing the number of deals you can make.

In this article, you will learn about the strategies for outsourcing inside sales and what to look for when hiring an outsourced inside sales team.

Inside sales is the process of selling using any method except for being in person. Sending cold emails, calling prospects, etc, are methods of inside sales.

The inside sales team is responsible for all outbound outreach, helping set appointments, scheduling demos, closing deals, and reporting on these activities to management.

It's more common for companies to utilize inside sales teams instead of outside sales because of costs.

Most products and services can be sold online or on calls, so having a robust inside sales team makes sense.

Inside sales for B2B companies can be outsourced for many reasons.

The first reason is because of the ability to optimize your workforce. Depending on how many inside salespeople you have, there may or may not be enough work for everyone to do at any one time.

Since the business is usually busy during certain times of the day, hiring outside representatives available during specific hours makes sense. Outsourcing B2B inside sales allows flexibility in your outbound strategy since most outsourced inside sales teams work remotely.

Another reason that outsourcing B2B inside sales makes sense is because of the huge costs associated with hiring, training, and retaining talent. Many expenses are involved in recruiting qualified people to grow your inside team. If you find yourself always looking for new hires or struggling to keep good employees around, outsourcing might be your solution.

Another pro about outsourcing inside sales is that you always have proof of performance.

Outsourced inside sales teams provide daily reports on their activities and conversations, meaning that you always know which campaigns produce results and what strategies must be adapted or changed.

There are plenty of strategies for outsourcing inside sales that may work for your business.

The first of these strategies for outsourcing inside sales teams is a dedicated direct-hire team from an offshore supplier. This approach is considered the most expensive, but it may be necessary for some companies that have difficulty finding talented employees locally to fill their inside sales positions.

Another strategy for outsourcing your inside sales is to hire a third-party firm as a bridge between you and your offshore suppliers while ensuring consistent results.

In terms of execution, a good strategy when outsourcing an inside sales team is to have a plan and projection for what you want to accomplish. This should include how many meetings you want the outsourced inside sales team to book per week and month and how many leads you want them to reach out to.

An equally important strategy is to work with the outsourced inside sales team on content. If your outsourced inside sales team is sending 60 emails per day per SDR, the content of the email must best reflect the value propositions of your product or service.

You can go even further and have the outsourced inside sales team a/b test the content of the emails.

When hiring an inside sales outsourcing company, there are certain qualities that you should consider before making a purchase.

The first thing you should look for is whether or not that inside sales outsourcing company has experience in your industry. For instance, if you are hiring an inside sales outsourcing company for a tech company, chances are they have more experience working with similar tech companies.

Another important point when hiring an inside sales outsourcing company is to ensure that the company has the tools it needs to endeavor an outbound strategy successfully. If the inside sales outsourcing company you're working with already has its own tools and email services for lead generation, that will help you get started immediately.

A third thing to consider when hiring an inside sales outsourcing company is its size. This is a very important detail because the larger an inside sales outsourcing company is, the more sales cycles it can handle. It will also be easier for you to hire more outsourced SDRs if the company you're working with has a large pool of them.

Anything new will always have reservations from the old world, and that applies to outsourcing inside sales. Below are some myths that companies may think about when outsourcing sales.

This isn't true for the slightest bit.

The work that your inside sales reps do, whether in-house or outsourced, doesn't require expertise in the product.

The job of the outsourced SDR is to book meetings with prospects and convert them into leads, but most of the time, an internal employee of the company will go ahead and take that meeting.

The most important job for the inside sales team is to generate leads while you close them.

Like the previous myth, this one is also far from the truth.

Most of the time, outsourced SDRs won't be selling your product. If they are, then your product is probably not that difficult to explain.

Your outsourced inside sales reps will be selling the opportunity of the meeting itself.

If you have generated strong leads and it is time for them to set up a call with the prospect, outsourced SDRs shouldn't have any problems doing so.

This is also a myth that many are quickly proving wrong.

Outsourced SDRs are just as good, if not better, than in-house SDRs because they've worked with several B2B businesses and are masters of their trade. Their experience allows them to understand your product and know how to sell it.

They also work with the same processes that in-house teams use. They are just as organized and efficient, if not more so, because they have built up a process over time, and quotas and KPIs measure their performance.

The more businesses an outsourced SDR has worked with, the easier it is for them to start immediately.

In-house SDRs, however, require an immense amount of training and onboarding. You must show them what deals you want to close, how the product works, and how to sell it.

You must also invest time in them so they can understand your company's value proposition and become experts at selling your product. This extended learning period means you won't see any results until months later when that time could've been spent generating leads.

Outsourcing inside sales teams is less expensive than in-house teams because of the lack of recruiting and onboarding costs.

An advantage of outsourcing inside sales teams that haven't been mentioned yet is the flexibility of their work with you. If you don't see results when you want them, it is easy to terminate a contract with an outsourced inside sales team.

Doing that isn't much of a burden since you didn't spend much time onboarding and assimilating them into your company.

- Inside sales teams can be expensive and risky.

- Outsourced inside sales teams aren't as expensive and risky as you might think and offer great flexibility.

- More advantages of outsourcing inside sales teams include not having to worry about recruiting and onboarding

Inside sales is one of the many parts of sales that's ready for outsourcing.

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