Top Sales Tools You Need in 2024 if You’re in B2B Sales
Staying ahead in B2B sales can sometimes feel like surfing. It’s a hyper-competitive industry, with pressure on all sides to perform, meet and exceed targets, and keep your customers happy. And just when you think you’re getting the hang of how to manage your sales funnel, a new tool or trend comes along and disrupts your whole process. Suddenly, your competitors know more about your prospects than you do and you’re scrambling to stay afloat.
The trick to being a top SDR is to anticipate the waves of new technologies and new ways of tracking customer insights, and to learn how to ride them. So you’re not caught out and washed up with your Surfeboard in tatters.
We’ve pulled together this comprehensive guide of the top sales tools SDRs should be using in 2024, so you can focus on leaning into the swell and reaching the crest of your sales potential.
In a rush? Skip ahead:
Data Management Tools (CRMs)
Imagine your tech stack like a human brain. Your CRM functions as the long term memory. It’s where you store all of your historic customer data, including their contact details, their job status and the company and industry they work in. But which CRMs offer the best capabilities for sales teams in 2024?
Salesforce
Possibly the world’s most popular CRM system, Salesforce stands out due to its robust customization options, seamless integration with external plugins and tools, and its native AI-driven insights. It enhances customer relationship management by providing a comprehensive view of customer interactions, so you can make better decisions on how to tailor your sales strategy for your prospects.
HubSpot
Another market leader in the CRM space is HubSpot, renowned for its user-friendly interface and advanced automation capabilities. Ideal for growing companies, HubSpot scales with your business needs, ensuring continuous support and flexibility.
Pipedrive
Pipedrive’s powerful analytics provide actionable insights, aiding in better decision-making and strategy refinement. Its ease of use and focus on sales activities make it a preferred CRM for businesses aiming to boost productivity and drive growth.
Your choice of CRM will depend on the size of your organization, and the needs of your sales team. So carefully assess your budgets and team structures to find the system that fits the bill for you. But no matter which CRM system you choose, you’ll need to ensure the data it contains is clean to prevent costly data decay and lost sales. Surfe’s CRM cleaner can help. By constantly monitoring the state of your CRM records, Surfe notifies you when a contact changes company or job title, and gives you the option to update them.
Analytics and Insight Tools
Zendesk
If you’re looking to refine your customer experience, the chances are that you’ve already considered Zendesk as a solution to handling complex customer service and support flows. As a market leader in chat support and help center software, Zendesk gives your team a comprehensive overview of your customer and prospect pain points so you can tailor your outreach strategy to better land a sale.
Tableau
Tableau helps your team visualize your customer base and their behaviors. It transforms complex sales data into intuitive, interactive dashboards, making it easier to identify trends, forecast outcomes, and uncover insights. With real-time data analysis, sales teams can make informed decisions quickly and adjust their strategies as needed.
Buyer Intent Tools
Timing is everything in sales. And if you know when your prospects are primed to buy your products or services, you can ensure your outreach hits their inbox at just the right time, with just the right messaging to seal the deal. There are countless ways in which you can measure your buyers’ intent, but consider adopting a tool like DemandBase to find and engage the right accounts, or N.rich to get a clearer idea of the intent signals meaning your targets are ready to buy.
Data Enrichment
Built your perfect lead list? Finally geared yourself up to get cold calling? Number disconnected… Every SDR knows the pain of out-of-date, incorrect contact details in your CRM. Enrichment tools are designed to verify the contact information you source, so you know your outreach efforts aren’t in vain. So, what are your options?
Single enrichment tools
Looking for the right email address or phone number to add to your contact records? You might have already taken a look at tools like Apollo, RocketReach or DropContact, and the various databases they use to source verified contact information. You’ll know your customer profiles and your target industries best, so whichever tool (or mix of tools) you choose will depend on your own sales strategy. But paying for multiple tools can be expensive, and add extra admin time to your prospecting. If only there was a better way…
Combined enrichment capabilities with Surfe
Surfe combines the power of up to 15 databases in one tool to find you exactly the details you need, without having to leave LinkedIn. In just one click, get up-to-date email addresses and phone numbers for your prospects. And with a 93% hit rate, there’s no wonder why Surfe is trusted by companies like Bolt and AWS.
Need to enrich data at scale? Surfe can do that, too. Find contact data for up to 20 contacts directly in LinkedIn Sales Navigator, or enrich thousands of records in one go with Lighthouse by Surfe.
Email Outreach
In 2024, email outreach tools like Outreach.io and Instantly.ai can transform your email outreach capabilities. Automating repetitive tasks such as follow-ups can free up time for your team to focus on high-value activities such as demo and discovery calls. Tools like this offer advanced analytics and tracking features, providing insights into email performance and customer engagement. This data-driven approach helps in refining outreach strategies and improving response rates.
Additionally, the personalization capabilities ensure that messages resonate with prospects, increasing the likelihood of conversions and building stronger customer relationships. Keen to tailor your outreach even further? With Surfe, you can create customized message templates for LinkedIn and InMail. So every touch in the sales journey is specifically designed to address your prospects’ specific pain points and buying needs.
Cold Calling Tools
Cold calling tools like Aircall and Cloudtalk are undoubtedly essential additions to your B2B sales tech stack, with features like automated dialing, call recording, and real-time analytics enabling sales teams to manage and optimize their outreach efforts. The analytics and reporting capabilities provide valuable insights into call performance and customer interactions, so you can get a clearer idea of how your cold calling strategy is cutting through.
Most of these tools will also integrate with your CRM so you can track your touches and see where prospects are dropping off in the sales cycle.
Streamlining Your Stack with Surfe
Surfe helps your tech stack work in harmony. Offering comprehensive analytics that empower managers to monitor team performance effectively, with Surfe you can get a better idea of the gaps and strengths of your sales funnel.
And imagine that you could add LinkedIn contacts to every cadence of your outreach with tools like Salesloft, Outreach.io, or Lemlist. With Surfe, you can do just that. Plus, Surfe’s CRM integration revolutionizes your cold calling by integrating Aircall with LinkedIn, all while syncing every interaction in your CRM, so you have a clearer picture of every touch in the sales journey.
Let’s Wrap it Up!
Getting your sales tech stack to work for you can be a balancing act. But with the right tools in your arsenal, you can supercharge your acquisition strategy, streamline your outreach efforts and ultimately land more sales and drive more revenue. With so many solutions on the market to refine each stage of your sales funnel, knowing what your organization and team wants to achieve is critical to making informed choices about your tech stack. And, remember, with Surfe, you can optimize how each component of your tech stack works for your business goals.
Want to make your sales tech stack work for you?
Surfe helps your sales tools work in harmony to improve your outreach efforts (and help you make more sales).
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
What types of tools should I be using for B2B sales in 2024?
In 2024, your sales tech stack should include a CRM system, analytics and insight tools, data enrichment tools and email outreach tools. Sounds like a lot to get your head around? Surfe helps each tool work together to get you better results.
Can I streamline my tech stack for B2B sales?
Yes! Tools like Surfe help you pull together each part of your tech stack so that all of your outreach efforts are logged in your CRM – pretty neat, huh?
How can I use tools to improve my B2B sales outreach?
Tools such as your CRM and your data analytics platforms can give you invaluable insight into how your prospects and customers are buying, and the pain points they’re facing. Consider integrating your CRM with LinkedIn using Surfe to seamlessly track your sales touches.
Why should I engage prospects across multiple channels?
Not all prospects are in one place at one time. Some might use emails to send and receive client information, Slack to keep in contact with their teams and social channels like LinkedIn to read thought leadership and stay on top of industry trends. You should consider how you show up in each of these channels to have the best chance of converting your prospects into loyal customers.