Enablement

What is an enablement cloud?

By Seismic — On 13 November 2023

An enablement cloud is a unified platform that provides customer-facing teams with the right skills, content, and insights to effectively engage buyers and drive growth.

Summary

If organizations want an advantage where they can win in today's competitive landscape, they need to focus on a number of key factors. Not only do they need to invest in their people and customers, they also have to invest in the right processes, and technologies that drive revenue. When you combine all of these things together, it's clear that go-to-market (GTM) teams need an enablement program that's unlike anything they've had before. After all, effective enablement goes beyond using a sales enablement platform or creating new sales content week after week. Now, forward-thinking companies must adapt to a new era of digital selling and embrace a solution that gives their team everything they need in one place. That's why it's time for an enablement cloud.

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Features to look for in an enablement cloud

If you search for enablement vendors in G2, you'll find that there are more than 300 sales enablement tools to choose from. However, many of these vendors only address one or two areas of enablement such as sales enablement AI, coaching, or content management. An enablement cloud is a single platform that creates an end-to-end solution for customer-facing teams. That's because it features the tools and features a GTM team needs to engage buyers effectively. These include:

Sales content management
Sales training and coaching
Strategy and planning
Sales content automation
Buyer engagement
Sales enablement analytics and data

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What is enablement?

Before we dive into the ins and outs of an enablement cloud, it's important to understand the definition of enablement. Enablement has become a strategic priority over the past few years, and its usage is rapidly growing in two distinct areas: sales enablement and marketing. Let's break down what each term means.

What is sales enablement?

Sales enablement focuses on the buyer and the experience that sellers provide to prospects and customers throughout the engagement process. That's why we define sales enablement as the strategic use of people, processes, and technology to improve sales productivity and increase revenue. It's important to remember that it's not just about one sales enablement platform or technology, but instead about creating a strategy that maximizes effectiveness of the selling process.

What is marketing enablement?

Marketing enablement is all about improving a marketing team's processes by measuring the impact of the work they do. It also includes technology and practices to improve alignment with sellers. By tapping into insights and data, they can create and deliver content that resonates with buyers and motivates them to take action.

Why is enablement important?

If companies want to succeed, it's important for them to enable sales and marketing teams. After all, buyers are more informed than ever and there are more stakeholders involved with every buying decision. These buyers can also review product info, reviews, and pricing information before they even speak to a sales rep. This means that they're more educated, and therefore, expect sellers to provide an experience that's tailored to their business and their needs. And marketers need to be able to create engaging content that's effective. Organizations who don't do this run the risk of client disengagement, with studies showing 5x lower revenue growth.

But just as buyers are more informed, sellers are busier than ever. Not only do they need to meet buyers where they are and at the right time, they also need to show value in a clear, concise, and engaging way. This means they need to understand the ins and outs of their company's products and services while also keeping their sales skills sharp. It's no small feat. The good news is that an enablement solution can help teams do all of these things and so much more.

What is an enablement cloud?

When you compare the two enablement definitions that we shared earlier, you'll notice that both focus on creating processes and using tools that can ultimately drive better business outcomes by improving the overall selling experience. So, an enablement cloud is the overarching term for the comprehensive set of capabilities and underlying platform that customer-facing teams use to develop their skills, engage more effectively with buyers, and improve their efforts to grow revenue. These powerful tools provide a collective view of data and insights that empower GTM teams to make informed and intelligent decisions throughout the entire sales cycle.

Why is it time to invest in an enablement cloud?

As with any software investment, you might be wondering if, or why, it might be the right time to make the shift to an enablement cloud. It's no secret that the sales industry is ever-evolving, buyer preferences are more demanding, and competition is fierce. Today's reps have fewer opportunities to make an impression on buyers who are already informed on products or services. Additionally, when they have to work across multiple systems and juggle numerous processes it's difficult for them to make the most of these limited opportunities. We've entered a new era of selling that requires companies to create a more holistic and strategic approach that enables customer-facing teams with the right skills, content, tools, and insights to accelerate sales growth.

Still wondering if now is the right time for an enablement cloud? Investing in an enablement cloud might be right for your organization if it…

Who is an enablement cloud for?

Now that you know what an enablement cloud is, you're probably wondering who it is for. The beauty of an enablement cloud is that it's built for numerous teams since the overall goal is to create a unified and streamlined process across all customer-facing teams. Let's take a look at how the following teams can use an enablement cloud.

Enablement leaders and teams

With more organizations building enablement teams and hiring more sales enablement specialists, it only makes sense for an enablement cloud to align with the work they're responsible for. After all, enablement teams have to align GTM teams, ensure reps are using content correctly, and generally know what works and what doesn't when it comes to improving productivity. An enablement cloud gives this team the visibility it needs to see what content is being used, deliver up-to-date content, enable sellers on new launches and campaigns, and so much more.

Sales leaders

Sales leaders have to retain top sellers, deliver ongoing sales coaching, identify sellers who may need additional training, and motivate their teams to hit goals. Additionally, they have to keep pace with shifting customer and buyer preferences over time. An enablement cloud empowers individuals and entire teams with data-driven training and coaching that gives them the skills they need to become confident sellers. It also provides them with content recommendations so they can build meaningful and engaging relationships with customers. This one-two punch helps sales teams focus on closing deals and hitting revenue targets time and time again.

Marketing departments

Marketing teams spend so much time and effort crafting messages, branding, and content that typically goes unused by customer-facing teams. And when sellers create their own collateral or deliver off-brand messaging, it can be difficult to understand what truly works and what doesn't. An enablement cloud ensures overall alignment between marketing and sales teams. This gives everyone clear insights into what is being used and more importantly, what's helping deals move forward.

What are the benefits of all-in-one enablement?

Organizations that tap into the power of a total and complete enablement cloud will generate lasting results. That's because an enablement cloud provides organizations with a holistic view of critical activities that teams rely on to succeed. Instead of pulling disparate data and insights from multiple tools, an enablement cloud makes it easier to collect and review insights to identify what's working, what isn't, and make educated decisions about how to improve efforts. This can include everything from pinpointing useful marketing collateral to identifying knowledge and skill gaps across the team.

Additionally, organizations that leverage an enablement cloud will be able to:

Enable customer-facing teams with the right skills, content, and context to win deals and create loyal customers.
Engage with clients at the right time and place across all interactions in every channel.
Improve performance and revenue growth by doing more of what works across teams, content, and processes.

Productivity will soar for organizations that streamline workflows and give teammates ongoing access to the skills, content, and knowledge they need. When GTM teams also improve buyer engagement, they'll experience greater conversion across the sales funnel that positively impacts their bottom line and revenue.

Ready to learn more about the Seismic Enablement Cloud™?

The Seismic Enablement Cloud™ helps organizations like yours empower customer-facing teams with the right skills, content, and insights to engage customers like never before. The Enablement Cloud features six essential capabilities across sales content management, learning & coaching, strategy & planning, content automation, buyer engagement, and enablement intelligence for an all-in-one unified platform. This helps the world's largest enterprises and rapidly growing organizations create a seamless end-to-end workflow that accelerates sales and ignites revenue growth. Ready to learn more? Check out all of the benefits and capabilities of the Seismic Enablement Cloud™ here.

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