Building Industry Expertise in Sales Teams

A practical guide to getting sellers up the industry learning curve and maximizing the impact of a verticalized go-to-market strategy

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Higher

year-on-year revenue growth

Higher

year-on-year revenue growth

20% increase

in win rates + faster sales cycles

Verticalization promises big gains for SaaS companies

Verticalization positively correlates with higher year-on-year growth. In a BCG study of verticalized sales teams, smaller companies saw a 20% improvement in win rates and faster sales cycles, while larger companies saw a 20% boost in consumption, cross-sell, and retention.*

*Boston Consulting Group

Unlock the Power of Verticalization with Industry Learning

Bottom line: verticalization is about customer centricity - aligning your go-to-market (GTM) with specific industries. A verticalized sales team understands the customer, operates with empathy, and responds to their unique needs, driving growth.

More than 40% of companies are increasing their verticalization efforts. But the value of a vertical GTM is often left on the table.

To unlock the full potential of a verticalized GTM, Sales Enablement leaders need to empower their sales teams to "speak the customer's language." That means developing a robust Industry Learning Program and making it accessible to sellers.

How to Develop a High-Impact Industry Learning Program

An effective Industry Learning Program (ILP) equips sellers with critical industry knowledge, driving growth. Unlike typical sales enablement, ILPs face unique challenges: catering to diverse audiences, managing vast industry scope, ensuring constant updates, and addressing limited SME availability. Our approach helps you build, promote, and measure ILPs that make a measurable impact on sales performance.

Step 1

Build

Learn how to scope and build a scalable program tailored to your audience

Step 2

Promote

Drive engagement through tried and tested internal marketing tactics

Step 3

Measure

Use industry best practice to track impact and continually improve your ILP through key metrics

Build

Define learning needs using the Industry Learning Ladder

Use our Industry Learning Ladder to assess learning needs across sales and non-sales teams. Newcomers benefit from structured onboarding that builds industry fundamentals, while experienced sellers need self-serve resources to stay updated on the latest trends and developments.

Build

Segment the audience

Identify the teams and roles that need industry knowledge (including sales and non-sales teams!), creating segments based on their alignment with specific industries and depth of knowledge required.

Learn how to segment and select resources

Sales Teams

Account Executives

Business/Sales Development

Value Engineers

Non-Sales Team

Customer Success

Product Marketers

Product Managers

Recruiters

Build

Assemble resources that align with learning needs

Select resources that best support the learning goals for each segment and evaluate the cost-effectiveness of in-house versus outsourced options. Different needs on the Industry Learning Ladder are best fulfilled by certain types of resources.

Promote

Focus on promoting the ILP as a unified brand rather than individual resources to avoid spreading efforts thin. A well-established ILP brand and centralized hub will create awareness and train learners to view it as their go-to resource for any industry learning needs - improving user experience and maximizing marketing ROI by concentrating promotion efforts in one place.

Get 10x Engagement with Effective Promotion!

Learn how to promote

Push

Outbound Tactics

Run email campaigns

Use strong subject lines, clear calls to action, and include multimedia like videos and leadership endorsements to drive engagement.

Embed with other programs

Integrate industry learning into existing programs to increase relevance and impact, like using primers as prework for SKOs.

Add to manager trainings

Make managers aware so that they can become program advocates. The number one reason people take trainings a manager’s recommendation.

Create promotional videos

Video is the most engaging (and fastest growing) content format. Use it. Include user testimonials and leader endorsements.

Pull

Inbound Tactics

Run Showcase Hub in high-traffic areas email campaigns

Promote the learning hub in both physical spaces (e.g., signboards in offices) and digital spaces.

Add to email signatures

Include the learning hub link in email signatures from SMEs and leadership to boost visibility.

Increase content discoverability

Optimize tags, descriptions, and titles to make learning content easy to find when sellers need it.

Surface content in other platforms

Meet sellers where they already are. Put your content wherever sellers spend most of their digital time.

Competitions

Create a worthy challenge (not a chore) and a worthy prize. Goals are more motivating than tasks.

Surface content in other platforms

Tie certifications to real benefits, like increased visibility with peers or leadership, or priority access to scarce resources like SMEs.

Measure

Prove and Improve the value of your ILP

Use the right metrics to make your case. Prove value by connecting learning outcomes with relevant business outcomes. Improve value by measuring efficacy of promotional efforts as well as the resources themselves.

Prove Value

Learning Outcomes

Is the ILP helping sellers? Capture indicators of seller effectiveness and industry expertise

Confidence Surveys

Knowledge Assessments

Conversation Intelligence Scores

Business Outcomes

Is the ILP helping the business? Connect ILP usage and seller effectiveness with key business metrics to demonstrate ROI

ROI of resource

ROI of program

Cohort Analysis

Self-Reporting

Deal Influence Attribution

Improve Value

Consider both the resources themselves as well as promotional efforts when measuring ILP performance

Build Metrics

How to improve the quality of the ILP?

Completion rates

Downloads

User feedback

Repeat Usage

Promotion Metrics

How to improve the effectiveness of promotional activity?

Email CTR

Hub CTR

Search term analysis

Module starts

Start building an ILP that unlocks the full potential of industry-aligned selling

Download the full guide