When you sell, you tend to live from deal to deal. The faster deals come together, the stronger your reputation, the higher your paycheck, and the better your chance of a promotion.

In order to get your conversion rates to all-time record levels, you need to find out what works best for you and your business. Below are some sales efficiency tips and tricks you can implement right away to elevate your selling techniques and win over more clients.

1. Leverage technology.

Every year, new sales technologies come onto the market. The best of the best will help you make sure you’re not wasting time on tedious tasks and are instead focused on the work that will help close. How do you know the right options to add to your tech stack? Explore the latest sales tools and determine which ones would work best for your situation. 

For instance, you might be in need of a faster, more secure platform to send out and receive proposals and agreements. In that case, a safe, encrypted cloud-based site might be perfect. Just take your time and investigate all the choices on the market, reading their reviews to decide which ones to try.

2. Develop and follow sales scripts.

If you’re part of a sales team that’s grown organically, you might address prospects quite differently from your colleagues. In other words, you probably don’t have a sales script, even though shared scripts are used by some of the top businesses. Streamlining your sales scripts across the board will help formalize your process. Plus, you’ll be able to start seeing which pitches work best with which customers. 

For ease of use, always house your sales scripts in a centralized corporate wiki or internal database so any member of the team can find them. Over time, you may want to switch up your sales scripts to better fit changing customer behaviors.

3. Know your product or service better than anyone.

The best salespeople know all the nuances of their products. Not only have they used them personally, but they can answer any questions about them without hesitation. 

Until you’ve test-driven whatever it is you’re selling, you won’t be as knowledgeable as prospects would like you to be. Therefore, make it your business to become the guru of your goods or services. Who knows? You may discover some friction points that, when fixed, could lead to much-needed improvements—and more satisfied clients.

4. Collect and analyze sales data.

You’re probably already analyzing some of the incoming data related to your team’s sales. Now, it’s time to take your collection process up a notch. For instance, instead of simply looking at your sales from a certain lead source, break the sales down into smaller categories. The deeper you delve into data evaluation, the more you’ll understand about how to improve sales overall.

Though you don’t want to start to become so focused on data that nothing else matters, keep tabs on several key data points. Teams that are data-driven have been known to increase their profitability by as much as 6%. That’s real money in the bank—or in your wallet if you work on commission.

5. Create buyer personas.

You could probably recite a few of your most welcome prospect types off the top of your head. But have you created a work-up of your three to five most “typical” prospects? Crafting formal “buyer persona” sheets helps streamline your selling tactics and find new lead sources.

What should your buyer persona documents look like? Honestly, it’s up to you and your coworkers. You may want to crowdsource this project by drafting up shared documents so everyone on the team can chime in. 

6. Offer omnichannel communications.

One prospect won’t answer your phone calls but willingly responds to texts. Another always wants to Facetime or Zoom, but takes forever to respond to emails. And that really strange prospect? He asks you to contact him through social media private messages. What gives?

The answer isn’t complicated: Many leads want the ability to communicate through different channels. The way to satisfy them all is to be ready to connect via any platform, anytime—even if the platform’s not your cup of tea. The more seamless communication is for prospects, the easier it is to sell to them. 

7. Hone your emotional intelligence and empathy.

The art of listening will get you far in the sales world. Learn to approach prospective customers’ objections from a place of empathy. Don’t try to aggressively strong-arm them into buying. Instead, be a non-judgmental sounding board and problem-solver.

It can be tough to rev up your emotional intelligence if you’re highly competitive or sales have been down for a few weeks and you’re feeling antsy. Still, give it a try. You might see a significant reward. One global brand reported a 12% improvement in sales team performance after encouraging development of sales employees’ emotional intelligence.

8. Schedule follow ups without fail.

You’re busy. Everyone is. That’s no excuse for failing to follow up with all leads, though. You owe it to every lead or client to return phone calls and stay in constant communication. It’s just common courtesy and will boost your professional reputation.

Not following up in a timely fashion can jettison your hopes of landing contracts or working your way up the sales ladder. Therefore, leverage technologies like your online calendar or use your phone alerts to keep you on track. Taking the time to schedule follow ups ahead of time will make your process easier and help you never miss a beat.

9. Lead with passion.

Ask yourself a challenging question: Do you believe in what you’re selling? If the answer’s “no,” you may want to seek out a new position. Why? Salespeople who are passionate are more apt to encourage people to make purchases and deals. And salespeople who aren’t have trouble convincing others to buy.

Don’t worry: You don’t have to be ridiculously high energy or off-the-wall fanatical to have an authentic passion for your offerings. You just have to believe that what you’re providing prospects will honestly help them. That way, you’ll always sound genuine instead of pushy. Dive into what makes you excited about your product and educate prospective sales on that.

Becoming an outstanding salesperson takes perseverance and practice. Nevertheless, it’s a doable goal and one you’ll want to consider undertaking soon. Spend each month changing some aspect of your selling and by this time next year, you’ll be a more self-assured, radically efficient sales superstar.