Dell Inc. is an American privately owned, multinational computer technology company based in Round Rock, TX. The company is one of the largest technological corporations in the world, employing more than 100,000 people worldwide.

Though best known as a hardware vendor, Dell is also well known for its innovations in supply chain management and e-commerce supply chain management and electronic commerce, particularly its direct-sales model and its "build-to-order" or "configure to order" approach to manufacturing, and for IT services and storage and networking systems.

Challenge: Salesforce efficiency

Dell had decided to implement Salesforce as a unified CRM to coordinate the sales activities of a 20,000 member sales organization, including inside sales, field sales, channel sales and specialists. Dell recognized the difficulty of this project and identified two critical elements to drive Salesforce adoption:

  • Field buy in - to get reps to use Salesforce and the new sales process, Dell used a combination of training provided by Baker Communications, "field evangelists" and monthly webcasts to share best practices, updates and the key metrics in the adoption strategy and the scorecard.
  • Executive buy in - to increase the value for its executives, Dell interviewed leadership to identify specific performance gaps and built dashboards and programs for the global executives around issues such as pipeline management, win/loss, and activity management.

Dell also identified three important best practices for driving adoption:

  • Communication - In order for adoption to spread throughout the organization, messaging that referenced expectations and processes surrounding the implementation and operations were centralized to ensure consistency and relevancy.
  • Support Process - To give users access to timely and knowledgeable support at all times, Dell provided in-house support and made use of Salesforce Premier Support as a second option.
  • Finally, Dell determined that in order to drive maximum salesforce proficiency and adoption, they needed a targeted Sales Enablement training process.

The Training Solution

To create a targeted sales training program, Dell contracted with Baker Communications, a leading provider of sales transformation services, to include both sales skills, management skills, and the effective use of salesforce.com. Baker's unique program provided "day-in-the-life" practical sales skills training focused on generating revenue while accelerating adoption of salesforce.com and generating significant, measurable ROI.

The Results

The initial pilot program deployed with a team of 15 inside sales reps in Canada focused on selling solutions to the governmental agencies in eastern Canada. Inside of 12 weeks, the pilot team generated $10 million of pipeline and $5 million in new orders while simultaneously achieving the number 2 global ranking for salesforce.com adoption. As a result of the success of the pilot, 6 additional teams of approximately 60 inside sales reps went through the same process and were able to increase revenues 19% over the same period the previous year, increased lead follow up rates by 36%, and increased account planning by 76%. In order to further test the success of these programs, Dell decided to put 10 additional teams through the process and compare the results of 10 identical teams that did not. The results were that the teams that experienced the training produced 124% more pipeline, 24% more wins, and 19% fewer losses than the control team.