Artificial intelligence (AI) technology has exploded in recent years. Common AI personal assistants such as Siri, Alexa, and Google Assistant are helping people figure out their daily schedules, controlling the lights and thermostats in homes, and helping commuters find the best route to work. And while these recent advancements are amazing, theyre really only a sneak preview of how AI can and will impact society as a whole.

Sales efficiency is an area ripe for AI assistance AI is at the point where it can be just as useful, if not more useful, in the office than at home on ones handheld device. Business AI has evolved from being a sophisticated calculator or database analyzer to an entity that can tell businesses solve their biggest challenges and enhance their market offerings. Although more organizations spanning industries are tuning into the potential of AI, many are still not capitalizing on its potential to transform their sales practices.

For many organizations, consistent lead generation is elusive. Despite the increase in tools, technology, and access to customers, companies still struggle to speak to the right target customers with the right message at the right time. Often, lead generation feels like throwing darts at a board and hoping one will hit the target.

The best lead gen tools will always be people; having the opportunity to spend one on one time with targets, listening to their goals and frustrations is a dream for every sales person. But its not realistic. Luckily, organizations like LeadCrunch are enhancing AI-fueled lead-gen platforms that enable organizations to understand customers on an individual basis so that they can eventually connect with them, person-person throughout the sales cycle. Providing a holistic B2B demand generation solution, it uses an effective combination of AI technology and human verification to engage the best targets for your customer base.

Because AI has such a wide reach, companies can use it to gain and vet more leads, which will ultimately result in more possibilities for contact and upselling while minimizing the need for a large sales team. The Harvard Business Review recently found that when Epson implemented an AI sales assistant, their lead response rate increased by 240%. Furthermore, as the technology continues to improve, companies can scale back or reprioritize its human sales component without the risk of losing potential clients.

In addition to initial contact and lead generation, AI is useful for assisting sales associates with administrative and routine tasks. Rather than having your human sales team be bogged down with paperwork, initial contacts, sorting, scheduling, and other administrative duties, AI is able to complete these quickly and with a high level of accuracy. Administrative tasks dont necessarily need a human component and, as such, are well within the capabilities of modern AI.

Without administrative tasks, a salesperson now has more time to pursue leads sent to them by AI so they can begin to establish a human relationship which is often needed to eventually get the sale. In a recent study, the average American employee spends 40% of their working hours on administrative tasks. With more time to focus on building relationships with clients, sales associates can work with even more clients at once, making the entire process much more efficient.

Moreover, AI can coach your sales force as well. Rather than having your sales team focus on administrative duties and analytics, companies can let AI figure out how and why a particular sales person is struggling. By identifying potential weaknesses, sales associates can rely on AI to prepare them and coach them for future interactions.

The beauty of an AI_driven platform, like LeadCrunchs is that it has the power to adapt and apply new customer insights to future initiatives. Customer behaviors and marketing engagements change on a day-to-day basis, and until now, the audience data that companies rely on has failed to keep up. The implementation of Artificial Intelligence enables LeadCrunch to provide its clients consistnetly evolving data that allows them to grow with their target customers, rather than play catch-up.

AI is great for generating leads and for performing routine jobs to help the sales team focus on sales, but its also useful for managing an already-existing customer base as well. For companies with large user bases that offer renewable subscription services or upgrades, AI can help manage a system to both pitch and sell those subscriptions, renewals, or upgrades. After all, the probability of selling more to an existing client is 60% 70%

This is especially useful for Internet companies that want to keep only a few individuals on hand but still be able to manage a large number of clients. For example, rather than having a team of sales representatives standing by to field questions, AI can field and respond to most of these questions instantly. Furthermore, for customer service issues, having an AI platform act as a gatekeeper will facilitate quick responses to frequently asked questions while letting human customer service agents deal with more complicated issues. With AI, a company can meet the needs of an ever-expanding clientele base without spending large amounts of money.

From generating leads, to assisting with administrative tasks, to maintaining and upselling current customers, LeadCrunchs AI lead generation platform is the ultimate sales hack. Its a unique tool that will give a company a much broader reach without any of the traditional overhead, a once unimaginable concept.

What are some other ways AI can help your company with sales?

This post is part of our contributor series. The views expressed are the author's own and not necessarily shared by TNW.

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Why AI is the ultimate sales hack - TNW