2015 CCS® Index Reveals Dramatic Trend: Corporate America’s Sales Teams Are “Winging It” More Than Ever

News provided by

CustomerCentric Selling(R)

Oct 05, 2015, 03:00 ET

Boston, Massachusetts (PRWEB) October 05, 2015 -- Boston, October 5, 2015 – Over half of all salespeople do not meet their quarterly numbers and only a paltry 1.2 percent consider social media to be effective in prospecting. This is according to the results of the latest annual CustomerCentric Selling® (CCS®) index survey, referred to as the “CCS® Index,” showing key sales trends across sales organizations.

In addition to missing sales goals and a growing number of sellers admitting to “winging it” with buyers rather than following a sales process, optimism remains as sales organizations look towards year-end and 2016. Key findings of the 2015 CCS® Index include:

  • 57 percent of those surveyed admit that they do not consistently make their quarterly top-line revenue numbers, as compared to 58 percent last year.
  • 25.6 percent say their cycles are longer than six months, compared to 39 percent in 2014.
  • 59.3 percent of sellers actually admit to just “winging it,” compared to 39 percent last year.
  • 51.2 percent do not believe they will make their year-end numbers, but 62.8 percent still believe their company will make or exceed its revenue target in 2016.
  • 24.4 percent are never selected as the vendor of choice from unsolicited RFP’s, as compared to just 6 percent in 2014.
  • 22.1 percent almost always use discounting to close business, compared to 17 percent last year.
  • 22.1 percent lose over 50 percent of opportunities to No Decision, compared to 18 percent in 2014.
  • 25.6 percent say leads are almost always inbound, but 27.9 percent consider those inbound leads to be very low quality with little to no chance of closing.
  • 50 percent indicate cold calling as the least effective method of prospecting.

One notable shift reveals that the biggest difficulty or challenge for today’s seller has changed from gaining access to executives to establishing value with buyers. What has not changed is that the biggest concern going into the new year remains the worry of not having enough prospects in the pipeline to start the year.

“The results of this year’s CCS® Index are a bit disturbing. Sales teams’ biggest concerns right now are the ability to establish value and the lack of prospects in the pipeline, yet an alarming number of them admit they are not preparing properly for sales calls,” says Frank Visgatis, President and COO of CustomerCentric Selling®. “For business to succeed, corporations need to take a hard look at their teams’ sales process. If it’s not being followed, or is proving to be ineffective, the revenue numbers are bound to reflect that in 2016.”

The CCS® Index gathered a significant amount of data from primarily sales and sales leaders across several industries, the majority including software, high technology and manufacturing. The full report of this year’s findings is available here:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/ap4o25iujzalt2d/2015-CCS-Index-Full-Report-FINAL.pdf?dl=0

A visual overview of this year’s key findings compared to last year’s is presented in an infographic form here:

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/bk8ruo65t1p6q6f/AAAi5NjyB_xwjkkh07rMdJC9a?dl=0

About CustomerCentric Selling® - The Sales Training Company
CustomerCentric Selling® (CCS®) specializes in world-class sales training.
CustomerCentric Selling® (CCS®) is a proven methodology for predictably improving revenue growth and sales performance. Founded in 2002, CCS® helps clients worldwide to implement repeatable, auditable and scalable sales processes that, when combined with CustomerCentric Messaging® (Sales Ready Messaging®), guides marketing and sales to have meaningful conversations with customers and prospects. This results in winning high-value deals, retaining and growing client relationships and improving the predictability and accuracy of sales forecasts.

CustomerCentric Selling® is regularly named to Training Industry’s list of Top Sales Training Companies. Stay connected to CustomerCentric Selling® via Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Google+, Vimeo and YouTube. For more information, visit http://www.customercentric.com, email Jill Perez jperez(at)customercentric(dot)com or call +1.800.993.1228, ext 706.

Jill Perez, CustomerCentric Selling(R), http://www.customercentric.com, +1 6782305491, [email protected]