Fortunately—or unfortunately—there’s still no AI tool that can fully replace the B2B sales department. However, there are AI-enhanced tools that can support various stages of the sales process, helping businesses use their resources more strategically. These tools not only optimize workflows but also provide valuable insights, allowing sales teams to focus on what they do best—building relationships and closing deals.
Below are a few proven tools and strategies tailored to different deal stages to help build stronger business cases and close deals faster. By integrating these tools into your sales process, you can unlock new efficiencies and drive better results.
Prospecting Stage
- 6sense
Helps to identify companies starting to research solutions but might not be ready to raise their hand just yet. Having a tool like 6sense or a similar alternative helps you to proactively reach out, start providing value early on, and potentially even influence the evaluation process. With a high level of personalization when reaching out to these prospects, your team can significantly improve engagement rates and ensure your messaging resonates with their specific needs.
- Lusha
One of several powerful data drilling tools, now enhanced with AI to prioritize leads based on predictive scoring and fit. Lusha also provides enriched contact data, helping sales teams bypass the tedious process of finding the right decision-makers and instead focus on meaningful conversations that drive progress.
Investing in business intelligence tools helps to focus efforts on accounts with the most potential and build a solid pipeline. These tools not only save time but also enhance the precision of your targeting, ensuring that your team’s efforts are directed where they matter most.
Discovery Stage
- Gong
Records meetings, takes notes and analyzes talk ratio and sentiments. This tool or similar alternatives are especially valuable for deals with more complex requirements. Use it to go back to the recording take more thorough notes and build it into the business case. Additionally, Gong is valuable for larger meetings with multiple stakeholders, allowing you to review individual reactions and engagement and identify potential skeptics. These insights can help refine your approach and ensure you’re addressing concerns before they become barriers.
In the discovery stage, the ability to revisit and analyze conversations can make a significant difference. Tools like Gong ensure no detail is overlooked, providing a comprehensive view of where each stakeholder stands and helping you craft a more tailored and compelling proposal.
Solution Stage
- Loom
Helps to easily record video messages and screen recordings with or without narration. Sharing quick how-to videos or demo walk-throughs can be incredibly helpful when clarification is needed immediately instead of waiting to set up a full meeting. Use the face-to-face time for strategic and continuous discovery, ensuring you’re maximizing every interaction with your prospect. - Seismic
Building a solid business case requires tailoring the collateral to a specific customer’s needs in order to demonstrate the best possible ROI. Seismic helps to make the process agile and efficient, ensuring it is easy to stand out from generic competition. Especially useful for an SMB playbook with a high volume of deals, where taking the time to customize resources can be challenging. Luckily, there is a solution now! Seismic automates much of the customization process, making it easier for reps to focus on strategic selling rather than administrative tasks. - Slack
For larger and more complex deals, try to engage the prospect and other stakeholders in the process early and suggest a direct line of communication via Slack. Ideal for sharing files, pinning messages, demonstrating fast responses, and offering a tailored approach. Having a Slack channel with your most strategic prospects helps to unblock issues and define the next steps at a much more accelerated rate. It also fosters a sense of partnership, as the collaboration feels seamless and responsive.
The solution stage is often where deals are won or lost, making it critical to deliver value with clarity and speed. These tools enable sales teams to keep the momentum going while ensuring the prospect’s confidence in their decision-making process.
Legal and Closing Stage
Contractual back-and-forth can drag out for weeks or months, thus streamlining the process by implementing an efficient sign-up and offer acceptance process within the platform is key to closing business much faster. This requires collaboration from Legal, Development, and Design teams, which is quite an investment. However, the effect on close times is astonishing. Prospects are often more willing to move forward when the final steps are straightforward and don’t involve unnecessary delays.
Simplifying the closing stage not only accelerates deal cycles but also enhances the overall customer experience. By eliminating common roadblocks, you can ensure a smoother transition from prospect to customer, setting the stage for a successful long-term relationship.
Final Thoughts
Sales teams are nowhere close to being replaced by AI. However, it is more important than ever to stay curious and adaptable. Testing and implementing new AI-enhanced tools is crucial to demonstrate value and stay ahead of the competition. These tools are not just about efficiency—they empower sales teams to engage more effectively, build stronger connections, and deliver exceptional results.
By combining human expertise with the power of AI, sales teams can unlock new opportunities and elevate their performance. Embracing these technologies is no longer optional in today’s fast-paced market—it’s the key to sustained success and growth.
