In the eCommerce era, enterprise sales are increasingly conducted at arm’s length. Customers are going online to do their own research and figure out the exact products they need, and as a result, sellers are spending far less time dealing with buyers directly. Sellers, meanwhile, leverage digital tools to operate at an unprecedented scale and serve far more customers than they once did. Those two trends mean there’s far less scope for personal interactions. In fact, Gartner estimates that sales reps now accompany enterprise buyers for just 5% of their total customer journey. That’s a major challenge for sellers who are used to cultivating personal relationships and really getting to know the needs of individual high-value customers.
