10 Actionable Sales Productivity Tips to Close More Deals

Boosting sales productivity isn’t about helping salespeople do more of the same thing—but freeing reps up to do the higher value tasks that can’t be automated: like building relationships and talking to customers.  

Increasing productivity means salespeople have more customer-facing time to do what they do best: sell. 

We sell to salespeople, so we know sales productivity results from a strong sales acceleration process. But, how do you increase sales productivity and where do you start?

An abundance of manual or repetitive tasks resulting in time challenges

A ton of manual or repetitive tasks can suck the time and productivity right out of your day. 

When reps are bogged down with tedious tasks, their ability to prioritize pipeline-generating activities like talking and selling to prospects decreases. 

If reps can’t prioritize tasks due to the sheer volume of them, good prospects are likely to slip through the cracks.  

Lack of quality prospects in their pipeline

A lack of sales acceleration strategies and an emphasis on random sales activities (like hitting activity quotas) can distract reps from booking meetings and filling their pipeline with quality prospects that convert. 

This impacts productivity by demotivating reps (commission, anyone?) and slowing down the sales cycle.

Lack of engagement insights 

To get ahead in the world of sales, sales teams need to know what’s working and what’s not so they can adjust and adapt processes and messaging. 

A lack of insights into prospect or client engagement can deter salespeople from tweaking their tactics for better results ending in fewer sales and overall limits to productivity. 

Getting attention/responses from leads

The more bombarded prospects are with sales emails, the savvier they are when it comes to responding to and engaging with outreach. 

Not getting attention or responses from leads due to a lack of personalization or content variance is detrimental to sales productivity and filling a sustainable pipeline. 

Getting new sales reps to ramp up quicker 

Having the right internal processes in place, and enabling reps with tools, training, and support, let them speed up their onboarding process and ramp up quicker. 

Poor sales enablement can prevent reps from reaching and maximizing their full potential, and the possibility of a productive environment. 

Unable to access the right content at the right time

Sales teams rely on easily accessible sales collateral to counter objections and educate prospects throughout all stages of the sales process. 

Without quick access to key sales content, reps can’t reach a level of productivity that drives impact due to constantly needing to source information, and switch between various web apps and tools.

Use Mixmax to set and streamline Salesforce tasks and triggers directly from Gmail

Tip # 3. Track engagement insights 

Keeping track of reporting or engagement insights can shed light on what parts of your prospecting sequences or processes are effective, and which need to be evaluated. 

If you know how much time it takes to do the required action, and correlate that action to the desired outcome, then you can look for ways to refine that process or keep doing more of what works. 

So, if you need X amount of contacts and a sequence to get X amount of meetings booked, then you can use that to make the workaround more productive and focus on the communication or messaging that historically drives impact.

With Mixmax, you can measure sales productivity by tracking impressions across templates, sequences, and recipients with actionable insights that tell you which messages get the most replies, opens, content downloads, bounces, and link clicks. Use these insights to see what’s working, or where you could be more productive. 

Mixmax dashboard displaying outreach metrics like customer meetings booked and emails sent

Tip # 4. Automate wherever possible 

There’s no bigger time suck than doing the same tedious thing over and over again. 

Find a sales engagement or sales automation solution that automates manual or repetitive tasks to give your reps more customer-facing and selling time. 

Mixmax’s sales automation tools let you easily automate email sequences and set task rules—for example, if an email is opened X amount of times, it automatically generates a task for the rep to take action when action is needed without manually digging through metrics. 

If it’s a qualified prospect, set up automated emails to send an immediate response to a demo request with your calendar link to make it easy for them to book a time. 

If it’s an unqualified prospect, automate emails to respond with a qualification email such as a Mixmax survey for specific prospecting-based information. 

Mixmax qualification survey example

With Mixmax, you can also automate bounced email alerts (specifically for outbound SDR teams) to trigger updated contact data in Salesforce, so CRM data stays clean and reliable. 

Or, automate call tasks to call prospects after they engage with your email so you’re always reaching prospects at key moments—for a significant increase in prospect interest and call relevance. 

Suppose you want to easily log and execute call tasks within Gmail. In that case, use Mixmax’s sidebar feature to easily integrate calls into your existing workflow, without switching tools, tabs, and interfaces.

Mixmax’s sidebar feature lets reps view and edit tasks, execute call tasks, track live team feeds, and access contact information without leaving Gmail

Tip # 5. Align sales + marketing strategy

Sales teams can gain productivity by going after the right customer and not wasting time pursuing prospects who are unlikely to convert.  

Align sales and marketing to figure out who your ideal customer profile (ICP) is and make them the key focus of your outreach for new prospect generation. 

The firmographics of your target company/persona will vary depending on each department’s area of focus: marketing teams should concentrate on their BP’s personal and demographic data, as well as where and why they’re looking for you. Sales teams’ BP should be centered around a person’s challenges, role, and how that relates to your value proposition. 

Copy our editable buyer persona template for ideas on how to flesh out your ICP.

Mixmax buyer persona template

Sales teams can use their buyer personas and ICPs to inform prospect research and identify those most suitable for your solution, which saves you from weeding out the rest. 

Tip # 6. Personalize outreach

Finding tools that enable you to do personalized outreach at scale is what makes your sales processes more efficient and scalable. 

Use Mixmax sequences to structure outreach with stages incorporated into it, like LinkedIn connection requests to manual email task stages, so reps can move faster while personalizing their messaging per recipient. You can handpick accounts, or specific contacts you want to send a personalized message to, without manually creating a custom path for each account or recipient.

Mixmax’s sequences are structured and come with stages to easily personalize outreach at scale.

Consistent, personalized outreach boosts your chances of getting a response and converting more prospects, which enhances productivity and saves valuable time by getting more deals in the pipeline, faster. 

Tip # 7. Manage and maintain clear qualification rules, criteria, and guidelines

Set clear guidelines, rules, and criteria for reps to follow before placing new prospects in the pipeline so they don’t waste their time with a ton of unqualified opportunities.

Work with RevOps to build a report to determine whether reps are going after the right personas (who they’re prospecting, why, and from what accounts)—and for a solid overview of what reps are doing and where they’re spending their time. 

Then, use these findings to further streamline processes and qualification steps.  

Tip # 8. Streamline prospecting

There are many things throughout the day that can distract sales reps—like shooting off quick email responses or responding to callbacks—so make sure to schedule and block time according to what pipeline-generating activities you’re trying to accomplish.

Mixmax helps busy sales teams in fast-growing companies streamline prospecting with features like: 

• Calendaring feature for quick scheduling—send prospects a one-click meeting invite, see when people are free, or offer times based on their schedules for more effective prospecting.  
• Salesforce CRM integration so reps can access reliable prospect data right from Gmail for quick and easy prospecting. 
• LinkedIn Sales Navigator integration so reps can easily conduct research for their scheduled tasks with direct access to key prospect information right from their inbox.

Mixmax’s LinkedIn Sales Navigator integration makes prospecting simple and more productive

Tip # 9. Use video to reach prospects faster

Show prospects (rather than tell them) the benefits and value of your product with engaging video content. 

Videos help reps reach and engage prospects faster while getting key messaging across.

Think about it: they’re more attractive and appealing for prospects (or anyone) to click into and engage with, versus receiving an email loaded with text. 

This can save sales teams valuable time and boost productivity by getting more prospects in the pipeline with less turnaround time (like sending them more emails, or engaging as much).  

Tip # 10. Provide the right tools, training, and support

Part of any sales leader’s responsibility is to enable reps with the right tools, training, and support to effectively do their job. 

Proper sales enablement means your internal processes are geared toward helping reps prospect and engage with buyers at each stage of the sales process. 

Make sure cross-departmental (marketing, product) teams are encouraged to develop a feedback loop, so they’re continually improving existing processes and looking for and refining ways to support sales. 

Then, enable sales teams with sales productivity tools like a sales engagement platform that doesn’t disrupt their current workflow, doesn’t require lengthy training, and has all the functionalities they need—while allowing them to scale and improve.  

With Mixmax, reps don’t have to jump between tabs, tools, or interfaces to work at optimum performance. By having everything in one place and not having to switch between web apps, reps can save valuable time sourcing information. 

Mixmax also integrates with Dropbox, giving reps all the content and information they need, right from Gmail.