Some businesspeople believe that manual outbound operations can avoid many business costs. This is partly true because the salespeople who do it don’t contribute much to the company’s software costs. But the truth is that in the long run, manual mailings are actually much more expensive.
According to a Forrester study, many salespeople spend approximately 14 to 51 hours per week on administrative tasks. Basically, they were losing about two full work days per week. Additionally, based on Saleforce 2023 data, only 28% of these reps’ time is spent selling. Most of them focus primarily on data entry, research, list building, and other non-sales tasks.
If you want to improve parts of your outreach that are taking up a lot of your time, using an outbound sales tool could be a good decision. This is a tool that can help you improve how you find leads, clean data, personalize outreach, and automate follow-up.
Keep reading to learn the steps you can take to optimize your outreach workflows using an outbound sales tool.
Map your current workflow before automating it
One of the reasons why some sales managers or companies prefer to do manual outbound operations is that they sometimes blame the outbound tool first. When workflow seems slow, the real problem usually lies in the entire process around it.
For example, if no one really has a sense of who is responsible for tracking, the workflow will seem inefficient and ineffective even if the outgoing tool works as expected. Use a AI-powered outbound sales tool for startups has a positive long-term return on investment. But the tool doesn’t do much if the process is not defined beforehand.
Therefore, to prevent this from happening, be sure to follow these steps first to better understand how the workflow actually works:
Document your current workflow
When you document your workflow, you create a baseline for automation. The most useful approach here is to capture what’s actually happening. Observe the actual work and record the actual steps. Also be sure to consider tools, time gaps, objections, and decision points.
For this specifically, you can collect call notes, screenshots, email snippets, or maybe even short templates so that the process is based on hard evidence rather than just memories. Also consider mapping the customer journey backwards. This helps you understand what really moved the prospect forward.
Identify bottlenecks and friction points
What makes this documentation useful is that your team can spot inefficiencies such as unclear follow-up and inconsistent lead qualification. Once you’ve finished mapping out the current workflow, be sure to look for any part where it’s slowing down or creating extra steps that just add extra hassle for your team.
But what exactly are these bottlenecks? They can appear in different forms. They can appear in the form of repeated delays or tasks that remain “in progress” for too long. It’s a major red flag when the wait takes longer than the actual execution. This usually means that the process is held hostage by delays in the review or decision.
Decide which parts are worth automating first
Simply focusing on what seems boring doesn’t help you decide which part of the workflow is best to automate first. A practical way to determine what is worth prioritizing is to rate each process based on its ease of automation and business value. Then, automate the step or item with the highest score.
There are also some things to avoid. Make sure you don’t automate anything that relies too heavily on frequent judgments or something that keeps changing every week. Ask yourself a few questions that serve as filters. How often does this process occur? How long does it take? High-frequency tasks are generally the most profitable.
Automate lead research, enrichment and routing
On average, conducting manual lead research costs businesses 47 minutes per lead. Salespeople can spend up to 37% of their time browsing LinkedIn and other company sites. Their main task is to generate meetings. However, administration or research spends the majority of their salary. In fact, it is a financial drain.
For this reason, here are the three aspects of outbound sales that are worth automating to reduce hours spent on manual research:
Source dynamically using intent signals
Based on some industry reports, those companies that use AI can increase their sales-ready leads by approximately 50%. This can also reduce their acquisition cost by up to 60%. Static contact lists age quickly. Instead of buying predefined lists, automate your sourcing.
This allows you to monitor certain purchasing intent signals in real time. Namely, these signals are website activities, funding announcements, and job changes. These will tell you who is currently active in the market and therefore very likely to buy.
Enrich with a waterfall approach to create actionable context
Collecting raw data, like a person’s name and company, is almost useless. It’s not enough to move forward. So, once a lead is identified, the next thing to do is to automate the enrichment through a waterfall setup.
This is called the “cascade” approach because the enrichment occurs in sequence. You stack multiple data sources sequentially to extract direct numbers, firmographic and technology data. With this process, you can label leads such as “Enterprise – uses AWS – decision maker” for better date accuracy. You will know if they match your ideal customer profile.
Itinerary based on behavior and enriched attributes
Default routing simply means leaving money on the table. It ignores the skills and abilities of the reps as well as the quality of the leads. If an enterprise prospect is worth $5 million, they might land on a junior sales rep who only deals with SMBs.
To avoid this, the prospect’s behavior and its enriched attributes are the two essential elements here. Who are they and the size of their company? Have they visited your page multiple times? Did they ask for a demo? Make sure you’re routing that matches leads to the sales reps who are most likely to close them.
Create smarter multi-channel outreach sequences
Using a single channel is now a dying strategy. It is no longer enough to rely on a single medium to interact with prospects. Instead of just email, a better approach today is to also use channels like LinkedIn, phone calls, and sometimes even direct email or video. Some research-based sales guides indicate that this strategy can generate response rates two to three times higher than a simple single-channel strategy.
With an outbound sales tool, you can design multichannel sequences. First, design the ideal sequence plan. Be sure to define the order of channels you use before you begin outreach. Next, use channel stacking strategically.
For example, you might send an email first, then LinkedIn, then call, then send a follow-up email. Each touchpoint should reference the last one. You can then let the tool automate certain repetitive steps. It can handle scheduling, reminders, and even repeat sends for you.
Here is an example of a sequence template you can create:
- Day 1: Email 1 and LinkedIn profile view.
- Day 2: LinkedIn connection request with a note.
- Day 5: Call and voicemail.
- Day 7: Email 2 (you can either use relevant social proof or a case study here).
- Day 10: Call and InMail.
- Day 14: Breakup email.
Note that this is just an example. Adjust this based on your goals, target audience and awareness channels. With an outbound sales tool, you don’t need spreadsheets. It moves each task to the next step. The sales representative will have an idea on what to do next.
Final Thoughts
Naturally, manual releases seem cheaper on the surface. No subscription or platform fees. But there is a hidden cost, and it could be brutal. Businesses that use an outbound sales tool actually spend smarter. It manages data work so your team can do what they’re actually paid to do, which is sell. So, map out your workflow, automate repetitive tasks, and watch the results improve.
