BY Tim Londergan
Continuing to develop selling and negotiation skills is crucial to your B2B sales future. So, it’s now time to realize how smart technology can help you better perform these important tasks. Specifically, using artificial intelligence.
Just as selling is less about pitching and more about consulting, negotiation is less about opposition and more about strategy. Starting today, consider that leveraging machine learning to streamline the sales process is your new superpower.
Your Selling and Negotiation Skills Will Be Supercharged
Citing an unconstrained future, McKinsey explains how generative AI could reshape B2B sales. In earlier research, they estimated AI could uncover $0.8 trillion to $1.2 trillion in productivity across sales and marketing.
The “next productivity frontier” is how McKinsey views the deployment of generative AI for your industry. The potential benefits of generative AI in B2B sales are described as:
- Improved efficiency
- Increased market share via sales
- Enhanced customer experience
- Improved margins
- Inspired new products
Unquestionably, spending more time tending to customers and less time on back-office duties, your relationships will improve. Important responsibilities like data entry to your CRM can be automated. With the right mindset and continuous learning, AI can be a tool that boosts your sales and negotiation skills.
AI’s Potential to Enhance Your Negotiation Skills.
Billed as “The Business School for the World,” INSEAD offers an example of how AI can shape negotiations. While embryonic, the authors cite the emergence of sophisticated systems that will contribute to the evolution of negotiations.
The possibilities
To create this negotiating robot, developers use AI to emulate human behavior on social science techniques. Then, large language models (LLMs) implant economics and game theory methods. During negotiation each side shares their preferences and interests in an AI “black box,” or mediator.
Finally, AI crunches all this data. The goal is to juggle an enormous number of issues simultaneously to identify trade-offs and produce optimal results. Allegedly, this will produce solutions that humans would be unlikely to achieve.
Since AI does not feel fear, retribution or revenge, it can concentrate on collaboration and teaching its opponent. And, according to developers, it resists bias, exploitation, power moves, and manipulation. Still, AI is viewed purely as an assistant in the sales and negotiation skills arena.
The problems
As expected, this small-value, few-issue experiment fails at building trust. Aside from expected glitches, the models may also fall victim to hackers or exploitation. “Even if not deliberate, AI-powered negotiation agents are likely to develop biases and create unfair deals or unethical interactions.”
Plus, developers caution that AI agents “can also hallucinate or be too sensitive.” Perceived ethical violations may abruptly stop the dealings. Further, data privacy, confidentiality or legal concerns may bring everything to a screeching halt.
The potential
Believing that the reliability of technology-based solutions tends to increase with time, developers are optimistic. This reinvention of sales and negotiation skills compensates for human shortcomings and provides efficiency. Eventually, this exciting collaboration can harness AI’s advantages while mitigating the risks.
The Promise of AI vs. What You Can Do Today
While AI can provide information and efficiency, you must continue to create value through strong relationships and strategic guidance. Here are just a few ideas:
Account research
Your AI prompting can be directed to analyze annual reports, public sentiment and other data sources. This provides a comprehensive understanding of potential target accounts.
Identify buyers
Editors at LinkedIn say there are up to 11 people involved in a B2B buying decision. AI can help you seek out, profile and address each member of the buying committee.
CRM integration
AI can automate data entry and compliance tasks within CRMs, reducing manual effort and ensuring accuracy.
Advance training
Training, such as simulating sales calls or negotiation scenarios, is available. HubSpot’s Flori Needle reports that 19% of professionals use AI in this manner. “An automated analysis program will effectively identify what a sales rep did well and where they may have room for improvement,” she writes.
Photo by cottonbro studio on Pexels.com.
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