Sales may be the business realm where AI adoption has happened the most—not least because international sales tech giants like Salesforce have thrown their weight behind the tech. And if you think about it the idea makes sense: a lot of the ways that sellers try to connect with buyers can be automated, and much of it already has been (yes, even those annoying robocalls). AI is presented as the next step in this process, though much more sophisticated than earlier sales automation steps. But a new report from Seattle-based AI sales tech platform Highspot throws icy cold water on the idea that AI is already benefitting sales teams. That finding may make you reconsider deploying the tech to help your own company’s sales efforts.
The survey of nearly 500 sales and revenue leaders across the U.S., Europe and the Asia Pacific region found only 28 percent of respondents said AI was actually boosting their company’s sales performance. That low result may not seem too bad, especially since AI sales tech is relatively new, but the next statistic is more concerning: 96 percent of respondents said they felt strain from “shifting priorities” and stalled-out deals. That’s essentially everyone in the survey reporting that the rapidly changing sales landscape is unsettling team leaders worldwide. Perhaps that’s why 80 percent of respondents said that their sales teams were experiencing burnout and stress, even to the point of people quitting.
What’s driving this gap between expectation and performance in AI sales?
Highspot’s CEO Robert Wahbe explained in the report that many of the companies trying to use AI to boost sales are actually “AI Leapers,” as he calls them. Essentially this means a company has invested in AI tools for their sales effort, but “lack the systems to act with precision,” and aren’t following through with aligning the tools properly to their staff needs, or to their existing sales processes. Companies that do this are “flying blind and burning out your teams in the process,” Wahbe says.
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What may be going on here is simple over-enthusiasm for the latest, greatest, buzziest new tech innovation. The promise by AI evangelists that revolutionary new tech will turbocharge your sales funnel by bringing in new leads faster than ever, and drive up your revenues and profits, means there’s a strong temptation to leap and adopt it as fast as possible, if only because you may fear your rivals could use AI to gain a competitive advantage.
The great flaw may be that applying AI to sales processes is being done badly, without using the correct tool, not training staff effectively, and failing to manage expectations about prospective benefits. In June a survey underlined some of this, noting that among workers whose companies had adopted AI tools, only 31 percent of respondents said their company had provided training.
On social sites like Reddit, sales experts debating the benefit of AI have varying points of view. Some are extremely pro-AI, arguing it’s transforming their jobs, while others are less effusive, suggesting that for now it’s only useful in discrete parts of the sales process, like helping to draft emails.
One user summed it up neatly, noting that while “there’s definitely some usefulness in AI when it comes to sales” they think “the way it’s often hyped up feels pretty disconnected from what actually works.
“Like, yes, in theory, having instant replies or context from past interactions sounds great… but in practice? I still usually end up asking for a human too. Especially if I have even a slightly complex question — the bot just doesn’t get it,” they wrote.
What does this mean for your business?
If you want to reap the benefits promised by AI sales tools, choose and refine ones that align with the actual type of sales your company does. Then train your staff, and manage your expectations. Highspot’s report suggests defining the success of an AI sales rollout in operational terms, not hard sales numbers, and also to embed it into the flow of work of your sales team, rather than using disconnected tools that may or may not be useful.