Artificial intelligence has an influence on all areas of our daily life and work. Sales training and coaching will not remain unaffected. At the Gartner CSO & Sales Leader Conference 2019 in Las Vegas, experts from the Gartner Research Institute discussed the possibilities that AI can bring to sales training and coaching.
Further training is particularly concerned with individuality. The more tailor-made the training is, the more promising my experience from my own workshops, trainings and consultations will be. The learning experience increases enormously and the contents get stuck better due to the individual reference. But especially in large sales trainings it becomes difficult to respond to the requirements of each individual. This is where artificial intelligence comes in. In the sales training and coaching of the future, according to Gartner, the learning style of the individual should be taken into account in order to offer the best possible learning experiences.
“By 2020, Gartner predicts that 30% of all B2B companies will employ some kind of AI to augment at least one of their primary sales processes.” – Melissa Hilbert, senior research director at Gartner
Especially the individual learning styles, such as visual, auditory and kinaesthetic influence, how sales staff receive training and coaching information. To meet the preferences of the individual sales manager, complex learning algorithms and AIs are needed to provide learners with recommendations for training and coaching based on their unique learning style. Based on the interaction of the salesperson with the system, the salesperson learns continuously and uses the input during training and coaching to adapt the learning experience to the user.
In a recent Gartner survey, 61% of the companies surveyed who were already testing or using artificial intelligence stated that the resulting added value was significant. When using AI in sales training, respondents expect greater efficiency, cost reductions and improved revenue streams.
Especially the time saving is a significant factor, because the learning time can be drastically shortened after first experiences due to the tailor-made learning contents. As a result, the productivity of the sales staff also increases, as they can directly understand and apply the learning content thanks to AI support.
