How to Get Started With CompanionLink

Read Time:7 Minute, 18 Second

Companionlink With the 2016 holiday season quickly approaching, you may be wondering how to help your sales associates sell more. After all, without a great deal of time to help customers and limited shelf space, it can be difficult for your sales team to drive sales during peak selling seasons. Fortunately, with the right software, you can help your team drive more sales and get customers out the door faster than ever before. Read on to learn how you can use CompanionLink as part of your Shopify e-commerce strategy to boost your store’s performance in the upcoming holiday season and beyond. With this blog post, we’ll briefly introduce companion selling (and why you should care about it), introduce you to CompanionLink as an example of an excellent companion selling solution for Shopify stores, and outline nine steps for getting started with CompanionLink.

Table of Contents

What is Companion Selling?

Companion selling is a sales strategy where businesses employ multiple sales channels to help their sales associates sell more. This can include the use of online channels (such as an eCommerce website or an online marketplace like Amazon), offline channels (such as a call center), and also in-store channels (such as a sales associate at a brick-and-mortar store). The benefit of companion selling is that it allows you to leverage the strengths of all of these channels to drive sales and increase conversion rates. For example, by using companion selling, you can ensure that your customers have access to sales associates and product information whenever they need it.

Why You Should Care About Companion Selling

As we mentioned earlier, in-store sales have been on the decline for years. As online sales grow, brick-and-mortar sales are dropping. While the decline of in-store sales is nothing new, it has become increasingly clear that businesses will need to adapt to this new environment. For example, during the 2018 holiday shopping season, brick-and-mortar sales dropped by 6.9%. While this is partially due to the fact that more shoppers were shopping online, it shows that fewer people are visiting physical stores. The decline of in-store sales is problematic for several reasons. First, it reduces the number of sales opportunities available to your sales team. If your sales associates sell the same amount of goods in a store with half as many sales opportunities, they will have much fewer chances to close a sale. In-store sales also tend to be less profitable than online sales. While customers can return faulty items purchased online and receive a refund, they can’t do the same in an in-store environment.

What is CompanionLink?

CompanionLink is an all-in-one companion selling software that integrates with Shopify and other eCommerce platforms, helping you sell more by supporting your sales team through a variety of channels. With CompanionLink, you can enable your customers to engage with your sales team from any channel, including the web, mobile app, and their phone. Moreover, you can use CompanionLink to enable your sales team to sell more and work more efficiently. For example, with CompanionLink you can: – Offer your sales team the ability to sell online, on the phone, and in-store. – Automatically sync customer information to each of your sales channels. – Enable your sales team to search for products, create orders, and more from any channel. – Send inventory information and other alerts from your online store to your sales channels.

Step 1: Install the CompanionLink Chrome extension

Installing the CompanionLink Chrome extension will allow you to sync customer data between your website and your sales channels. When a customer visits your website and purchases a product, the customer’s information will automatically be synced to each channel that is connected with CompanionLink. This will allow your sales team to follow up with customers from any channel, including the web, their phone, and in-store. For example, if a customer purchases a product online and doesn’t add the item to their cart, the customer’s information will automatically be synced to your sales channels. When the customer’s information is synced, the customer’s name, phone number, and any other information that you have collected from the customer will be available to your sales team. This will allow you to follow up with customers from any channel and help you sell more.

Step 2: Set up your sales force automation workflow

Sales force automation (SFA) is a sales management strategy where sales representatives use a computer to track their activities and gain insights into their sales process. Many sales force automation solutions will allow you to sync the information that you collect from customers with your sales team’s CRM and enable your team to follow up with customers from any channel. For example, if a customer purchases a product online and doesn’t add the item to their cart, you can automatically send the customer’s information to your CRM and enable your sales team to follow up with the customer from any channel, including the web, their phone, and in-store. This will allow you to follow up with customers from any channel and help you sell more. For example, you can use SFA to allow your sales team to create new sales opportunities in your CRM when they follow up with a customer. You can also use SFA to set up your sales teams’ workflows at every stage of the sales cycle. This will allow you to ensure that your teams are following best practices and selling more efficiently.

Step 3: Set up your email automation workflow

Email is one of the most important and effective channels in your sales team’s arsenal. Email marketing campaigns are an excellent way to grow your sales and generate more leads, and they can be an important part of your sales force automation strategy. For example, when a customer purchases a product online and doesn’t add the item to their cart, you can automatically send the customer an email from your website. This email can contain a call-to-action, encouraging the customer to add the item to their cart and buy the product online. For example, you could include a message like, “Add the name of product> to your cart before it sells out!” This will help you sell more through your website and help your sales team.

Step 4: Set up your sync software

While SFA and email automation are effective ways to sync customer information and data between your website and your sales channels, there are some things that you can’t sync with those tools. For example, inventory data is one piece of information that you’ll want to sync manually between your online store and your sales channels. When a customer purchases an item online and doesn’t add it to their cart, you can manually enter the item’s inventory data into your sales channels. This will allow your sales teams to know when the item will be restocked and help you sell more.

Inventory data is only one piece of information that you’ll want to sync manually between your online store and your sales channels. Other information that you might want to sync manually includes: – Product descriptions: Customers will often purchase products in your sales channels before they have had a chance to visit your website. Thus, it is important to make sure that your sales team has the most up-to-date product descriptions available. – Product prices: When a customer purchases a product in your sales channels, they may not know the price of the item. You can sync the product’s price between your online store and your sales channels so that your sales team knows the price of the item and can help customers with pricing questions.

Step 5: Set up your phone companion – link to windows

If you have an in-store sales team, you will also want to add an in-store companion to your sales process. This will allow your in-store sales associates to access your online store and help customers with product information and purchasing decisions. By adding a companion to your sales process, you can help your in-store sales team sell more, get more customer engagement, and educate customers about your products. You can add an in-store companion to your sales process by setting up your online store with your phone companion. A phone companion allows you to access your online store from your phone or tablet. By setting up your online store with your phone companion, you will be able to access your eCommerce website from your phone.