MAGAZINE NO. 21 A trend that smacks of opportunity: what is Smart Selling

The digitization of information has brought about profound changes not only in our daily lives but also, and especially, within organizations, whether small, medium or large. Giving an incredible boost to digital transformation was, without a shadow of a doubt, the advent of Covid-19, which completely disrupted the traditional paradigms of society to the point of changing (probably forever) the habits and certainties of a world that seemed to be master of its own destiny.

In this difficult situation, many companies had to undergo change and quickly revise the roles and ways in which different business functions operated in order to align them with the new requirements and stay in step with a market that, despite the abrupt and unexpected slowdown, could not stop altogether.

This is well known by salespeople who, used to interfacing with their customers, have had to revolutionize their modus operandi and, in some cases, slow down important negotiations by increasing the use of traditional Smart Working tools to stay connected with potential buyers.

But there is one aspect that several business functions have not yet metabolized, even before the pandemic, and which all the more reason they may need to take back into consideration in order not to disappoint the expectations of prospects and customers. It is not enough, in fact, to simply maintain contacts and good relations (given the impossibility of face-to-face), we need a business strategy that puts the customer increasingly at the center of the process by making his or her experience personalized and satisfying for the benefit of the company (now more than ever).

And it is at this level that the concept of Smart Selling takes over, an approach that if well integrated into the roots of a business process enables the organization to have the right technical/practical support for its activities and negotiations with a particularly attractive increase in salespeople's performance and customer satisfaction.

A seemingly obvious concept but one that judging by the numbers reveals the need for a step change; in fact, a study conducted by Vantage Point Performance and the Sales Management Association found that 44 percent of executives believe their organization does not manage the sales pipeline effectively by making it an asset for the entire organization.

Remodeling processes from a Smart Selling perspective means not only devising a more flexible sales model, but also simplifying activities and rethinking the relationship with the customer, zeroing in on space and time constraints in order to digitize not only certain moments of the sales cycle but an entire process from A to Z with benefits that also embrace the competitive sphere of one's business.

Smart selling, in fact, is not just about the individual salesperson but involves the entire complexity of the organization as it is aimed at enhancing the experience of the customer and his or her relationship with the brand; therefore, in the era where everyone does everything, the real differential factor of a company lies precisely in the quality/quickness of the service offered in all its declinations.

However, the digitization of the entire sales process is by no means an easy matter, and not all tools allow to manage its complexity, especially in SMEs where the adoption of a CRM is less obvious.
It becomes necessary, therefore, to put the sales area (and the company in general) in a position to be able to keep under control all those activities and information that are essential to interact quickly with customers, manage documentation, dispense orders/offers in an automated and personalized way, as well as have a clear and timely picture of the pipeline with trends and forecasts on the business.

Although this transition seems difficult to implement, there are technologies that can encompass all this in a single environment. This is the case with the Jamio openwork cloud platform, a BPM platform (business process management platform) developed to govern information, documents and processes from a collaborative perspective and which precisely because of its versatility enables medium and large organizations to take a Smart Selling approach.

Jamio has recently introduced a new concept: that of QuickStart i.e., ready-to-use solutions that through simple configuration address even in the SMB a given business issue. One of the QuickStarts already available is the QuickSales, a solution that makes it possible to introduce the topic of Smart Selling by allowing to interact with leads and customers in a short time, get insights on specific tasks, manage documents and price lists, automate offers, as well as build a scalable sales process, all in one environment.

A kind of ecosystem that can streamline the complexity and respond perfectly to the smart principles of selling with an added value, that of the cloud, which allows data and information to be available anywhere and from any mobile device without ever worrying about the security and privacy aspects (the cloud provider takes care of it, just like a bank manages our savings).

In addition, the QuickSales solution, thanks to the flexibility of the Jamio platform and its low-code approach to building applications, natively prepares for evolutions to manage any type of process within the business organization.

In a market that is advancing at the speed of light and with the events that have marked our time, cloud technologies for business process management can certainly prove to be a valuable ally in supporting organizations in the transition to a Smart Selling-oriented approach , an increasingly topical issue that is necessary to survive the sudden changes and, above all, to compete in the time of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Editorial by:
Ivan Giuliani
Marketing & Digital Coordinator Openwork

New milestone for Apulia in the most advanced digital technologies in health care. The project eHealth Platform, was awarded ex aequo the first prize worth €40,000, to the V edition of the "Digital Innovation Award in Multiple Sclerosis", promoted by Merck, a leading science and technology company, and sponsored by the Italian Society of Neurology (SIN).

The eHealth Platform project, proposed by Dr. Maurizio Angelo Leone, Director of the Neurology OU of the "Casa Sollievo della Sofferenza" IRCCS Foundation in San Giovanni Rotondo, was born from the need of clinicians to constantly monitor and provide telehealth to some young multiple sclerosis patients followed from their homes.

The platform, created by a network of Apulian companies coordinated by Openwork, was awarded based on its ability to "facilitate adaptation and living with the disease of Multiple Sclerosis through Digital Technology," as well as its applicability in clinical practice and the possibility of being implemented nationwide.

eHealth Platform makes it possible to model a diagnostic therapeutic care plan (PDTA) in digital format and customized to the health conditions of the patient taken in charge by the healthcare facility. At the heart of the system's technological architecture is Jamio openwork, the cloud and "zero-code" BPM platform built by Apulian IT company Openwork, which can manage and monitor the progress of the PDTA, integrate telehealth features through the use of various multi-parameter devices and a fitbit for sleep quality with which patients are equipped in order to check the therapeutic adherence of patients with chronic diseases such as multiple sclerosis.

"Thepatient is often forced to reschedule his or her life because of the clinical variability and unpredictability of the disease course. Helping people with multiple sclerosis manage their activities becomes, therefore, of paramount importance. Technology in this plays a key role in often becoming a basic support in improving the quality of life of people with multiple sclerosis and also of their caregivers," commented Prof. Gioacchino Tedeschi, president of the Italian Society of Neurology and chairman of the award committee.

"We are really very pleased with the quality of the projects that participated in this fifth edition of the Digital Innovation in Multiple Sclerosis Award," said Andrea Paolillo, Medical Affairs Director of Merck in Italy. Our wish is that the selected proposals can be quickly developed and made available to people with MS, so that they can have a positive impact on their lives as soon as possible."

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