AiThority Interview with Hendrik Isebaert, CEO at Showpad

As buyers get smarter with more information at their fingertips, sellers will need to leverage AI to keep up. 2023 was undoubtedly the year in which AI entered the mainstream consciousness, but the nuances and the advantages that AI can offer in a business environment, are still being worked out.

To maximize the almost unlimited possibilities that AI can offer, sellers will need to harness it in their sales meetings to drive better buyer interactions, stay one step ahead and be ready to add meaningful value to the conversation.

Whether it's using AI to instantaneously surface the most compelling pitch deck, talk track, or playbook, AI will enable sellers to show up as trusted advisors, earning buyer confidence and becoming indispensable to the customer journey. In addition to sales meetings, AI will also be leveraged to augment the role of the internal sales coach, making sales development programs smarter and more scalable. The latest innovations mean that AI can provide actionable insights on seller skills and behaviors, helping define a baseline for sales readiness, and deliver targeted support to the reps who need it most. And if you're not integrating AI into your sales strategy, you will be opening yourself up to a brief creep from your competitors.

With AI, can we finally expect alignment between Sales and Marketing functions?
Yes, we can finally see a better alignment between Sales and Marketing using AI.
For years businesses have tried and failed [epically] to align sales and marketing teams. In a recent survey, approximately 70% of organizations said their sales-marketing alignment was not very good, leading to frustration and finger-pointing. However, new enablement platforms coupled with AI will finally make this a reality. When sales and marketing teams can better align, they can sustain and nurture relationships with buyers.