Organizations are transforming their sales functions with artificial intelligence to stay ahead of the game. If you have not yet embraced the trend, you are missing a crucial competitive edge.

SwissCognitiveThe emergence of vast amounts of data from multiple sources and platforms, generating new information every minute, has gifted companies with more consumer information than they’ve ever had before. Technology is getting smarter as it continues learning and optimizing recommendations. A study published in MIT Sloan Management Review reveals that “76% of early adopters are targeting higher sales growth with machine learning.”

AI and machine learning in sales: An explainer

Artificial intelligence is the broader concept of machines making decisions or performing process as a human would. Machine learning is an application of artificial intelligence that enables computer models to recognize shapes, designs, and patterns in existing data, allowing the machines to then learn for themselves how to take next action or make business predictions.

Each new piece of data received allows the machine to learn even more, update information, look for new patterns and continuously optimize recommendations. For example, every time Alexa doesn’t get the right command, or Netflix misses the movie recommendation, the model learns from this new data and alters its recognition process to adapt and respond better, or provide better suggestions the next time around.

Intelligent sales: From prospect to client, AI will be sales best friend

We are seeing a paradigm shift in sales from being reactive to proactive, and from instinct-driven to insight and data-driven. AI can guide the sales journey from identification to customer retention. Sales applications can pick up each and every signal, in the form of any action, by any customer, community, or partner, while machine learning can continuously improve actions, offers, and processes for your sales organization. […]