Sales enablement: what it is, why implement it and how to do it

Sales enablement is primarily about making salespeople’s work easier and faster for them to achieve sales targets.

How does it work in practice?

It is a bit like the organization of a football club.

Let’s look at Robert Lewandowski.

Before the Bayern star steps out onto the pitch, a lot of preparation work needs to be done. His matchday outfit must be clean and ironed, his team mates and opponents must be ready, and the coach with the team must arrive at the venue.

Of course, Robert doesn’t wash the jersey himself, he doesn’t do statistical analyses of the opponents’ weak points and he certainly doesn’t drive the club bus.

He has a whole staff of people from administration, coaches, physiotherapists and analysts behind him  so that he can focus on the game of football.

And what about the salespeople?

They are often the ones who search for potential customers, analyze their situation, make appointments, conduct meetings and work out the details of the contract.

Because of this, salespeople are less productive than they could be.

Just as a football player won’t reach his full potential if he’s a washerwoman, match analyst and coach driver, a salesperson won’t make as many sales calls as he could if he’s a pre-sales person, sales analyst and blogger.

With sales enablement, salespeople can – like football players – have a staff that allows them to focus on the most important task: selling.

And it works. HubSpot’s report shows that companies with sales enablement teams perform up to 41% better than teams without such departments.
So in a nutshell, sales enablement is about equipping salespeople with everything they need to work:

  • faster (shorter deal closing time);
  • bigger (deal value);
  • more effective (% of deals closed) selling.

 

The following text addresses three questions:

1. When can implementing sales enablement pay off the most for a company?

2. In what areas can sales enablement be implemented and what specifically can it do?

3. Finally, some practical advice on how to implement sales enablement in your company.

 

Let’s move on to part one.

 

When are companies most likely to consider sales enablement?

 

 1) The company is dependent on one-star performer

This is a very uncomfortable situation for the company because such an employee can leave to a competitor, along with 40% of the customers.

In this situation, sales enablement helps reduce risk and levels the playing field between salespeople. This is done by standardizing sales through training, sales scripts, good sales presentations or explainer videos.

Of course, not every salesperson can become a star but most can start selling solidly.

Just like not everyone will become a second Lewandowski, but if they have the right coaching staff and good developmental conditions, they will develop faster than if they were playing in the backyard with their friends.

sales enablement

2) You need to recruit new salespeople and scale your sales department

Let’s assume that your annual turnover rate is 14%. That means that if you have a team of 15 people, you need to recruit two new employees per year.

Every day a salesperson is onboarded is a day they don’t sell so in practice onboarding can cost the company thousands.

Sales enablement helps to accelerate the onboarding and development of salespeople.

This is mainly due to the company having sales resources – the best practices, model sales conversations, content and tool manuals – collected in one place.

It is the same in soccer.

If a player comes to a club, there is always uncertainty about how the player will adapt. If the player’s introduction to the team is well organized, it increases the chances that the player will fit in.

This is especially useful when working remotely, when knowledge sharing between vendors is much less fluid.

sales enablement

 

3) You don’t know if your marketing efforts are translating into sales

“What is marketing doing all day?” – thinks many a salesperson.

If you don’t know what they’re doing and you’re concerned that their activities may be disconnected from reality, consider involving the marketing staff in sales enablement.

This will ensure that the company is focusing on what drives results.

 

4) The company has a lot of sales materials and content, but it’s a mess

Five versions of a sales presentation on the company drive.

Dozens of scripts from sales training courses that nobody looks at.

A dozen or so blog articles that salespeople don’t use.

If this sounds familiar, sales enablement would help to clean up this mess and arrange materials and processes for better productivity.

 

5) There is no synergy between marketing and sales departments

If a customer sees one thing in advertisements, then during a meeting a salesperson says something different, and in the offer receives something again, the customer may lose trust in the company.

And lack of trust delays or may kill the sale.

Therefore, message consistency often increases a company’s performance.

This, of course, requires marketing and sales to work together. When there is such cooperation, you can build a common sales narrative and prepare a set of clear rules for both departments to follow.

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Such rules may involve, for example:

  • What we say: i.e. how we tell about the offer, and how we don’t and why;
  • What is the process: i.e. in what order do we unveil the next stage to guide the customer down the sales funnel;
  • How we position our offering: i.e. how it relates to the competition.

 

sales and marketing

When the narrative is ready, you can base materials on it.

Examples of cold emails, cold call scripts, excerpts from ads, landing pages, and explainer videos can be developed by the company.

It is then easier for salespeople and marketers to translate abstract guidelines into concrete, everyday actions.

Of course, sales enablement does not have to be limited to these situations.

The entirety of sales enablement activities can be summed up in four areas. Then from each area, the company can choose what to implement and what not.

 

Four areas of sales enablement

The easiest way to think about sales enablement is in these four areas.

 

1) Gathering and organizing information

A big part of a salesperson’s job is research. Sales enablement relieves the salesperson of much of this.

Sales enablement has two roles:

 

Firstly, it is like an intelligence agency that gathers information about customers.

Secondly, it is like librarians who organize the knowledge that is already in the company.

 

Examples of sales enablement responsibilities:

 

Competitor analysis

Checking prices, sales methods and positioning against your products.

 

Customer research

Learning about their problems, analyzing what they say on LinkedIn and reading articles about the company.

Compiling in one place the most important information a salesperson can refer to during a prospecting or sales call.

 

Best Sales Practices

– A collection of the best articles, books or newsletters,

– Organizing training scripts and uploading them online so they are easily accessible,

– Collecting in one place clever, unconventional methods of convincing customers,

– Record model video calls or sales conversations,

– Listing elements of sales conversations in Excel, so salespeople know what they need to work on. This will enable salespeople to implement the knowledge from the training.

– Compile the best methods of explaining the power of the company’s solution – in the form of a text, presentation, or explainer video.
 

Answer templates

Ready-made answers to the most frequently asked questions. Paste or copy into TextExpander.

Pricing and discount policy rules

It’s much more convenient to discuss pricing when you have a concise Excel or text file that shows what concessions you can make. It’s also easier to keep track of margins.

2) Content creation and management

When it comes to sales enablement, content has three roles:

Stress reliever – A salesperson can submit an article or video instead of explaining the same thing to every customer from scratch. This saves time.

Convincing – articles, case studies or testimonials help convince clients that the company knows is an expert in the field.

Giving an excuse for a conversation –

A salesperson, instead of writing an e-mail saying: “Have you made up your mind yet? Have you made a decision?”

can send an email saying:

I’ve been thinking about your project and we recently created a case study that you might be interested in. I am providing the link below. By the way, how is your project going?”

Depending on the stage of the funnel, you will need different content. Something different is interesting for a customer who is “just looking around”, and something different for a customer who is facing the final decision of choosing the supplier.with random material!

Types of content created by sales enablement and marketing:

– Articles about the customer’s problems and the company’s products,

– Sales presentations,

– Explainer videos about the company’s services,

– Infographics,

– Tutorials,

– Testimonials, segmented by industry and customer type,

– Case Studies, segmented by industry and client type.

– Reports,

– Webinars,

– Podcasts.

 

The relationship between a salesperson and a client can resemble that between a professor and a student. The salesperson advises the customer on what they should read/listen/watch to better understand the product. The marketing and sales materials provided should be prepared according to the company’s style guide.

Gartner’s research shows that if a salesperson helps to answers specific questions raised by the potential customer, the salesperson will be more effective.

 

 

What else is worth remembering?

Remember to make the content multimedia.

One client may prefer to listen to a podcast, another may prefer to read an article, and a third may prefer to watch a video. If you have all these forms of content covered, you increase the chances of effectively reaching more customers.

Inform marketers about new materials.

Just because marketing has produced new materials doesn’t mean sales will know about it and start using it.

We have bitterly learned this ourselves. Even though we are a fairly small company, when new materials came out, not everyone would know about them.

That’s why we now have an Excel file, where all staff can see exactly what texts can be found on the website and what they are about.

 3) Selecting tools and training in their use

There are lots of tools available to make a salesperson’s job easier and CRM is just one of them.

Sales enablement’s job is to monitor, test, and train on the tools that will make salespeople’s jobs easier. Below you will find a small selection of tools that can be useful.

Several of the links provided are affiliate links. This means that if you click on the link and buy the tool, we get a small percentage of the sale. This in no way changes the price you will pay – the commission is covered by the creator of the tool.

 

Tools useful in prospecting:

 

LinkedIn Sales Navigator

Sales Navigator helps salespeople find and observe potential customers. This makes prospecting much more precise than using a mailing database.

Tool page: LinkedIn

Albacross

An app that shows you what company the people who come to your site are from.

The application analyzes the IP address of the person on the page and if the customer accesses the site from their office it can obtain information about the location. If the website is accessed from home, you will not get much information.

Tools page: Link

 

LiveChat

For some businesses, on-page chats can significantly increase conversions.

With on-page chats, pre-sales people can warm and qualify leads and then pass them on to the salesperson.

Tool page: Link

 

WoodPecker

Cold mailing tool that is easy to use. It allows you to send mass emails from your business address. Your clients will receive messages as if you wrote them individually.

Website of the tool: Link

 

Making appointments:

This is where one app reigns supreme.

 

Calendly

Allows you to easily schedule a meeting.

Tools page: Link

Content management:

Excel

This tool –allows you to group your content into different categories and let sales reps search for it in a simple and friendly way.

The tool page: no joke, everyone knows where to find it 🙂

 

Digital Assets Management

Here the tools include.

 

Adobe Experience Manager

Tool page: Link

Sitecore

Tool page: Link

Aprimo

Tools page: Link

 

Conversation Analysis:

Gong

This is an amazing product. Gong records and breaks down salespeople’s conversations to see what really sells.

It analyzes data on the words used in the conversation, the length of the conversation, and customer engagement. It then compares it with sales effectiveness and presents what works best in sales conversations.

Gong is only available in English at this time.

Tool page: Link

 

Contract Signing:

HelloSign

Until you have a signed contract, there is no sale. To speed up this last step, you can use a remote contract signing solution.

Tool page: Link

Response Templates

In sales, a lot of time is spent writing the same thing over and over again. To speed this up, you can use a tool that helps you store different response templates and customize them.

 

TextExpander

A tool to quickly respond to customers based on email templates.

Tool page: Link

 

Measuring NPS

 

Wootric

A simple tool to measure NPS. You can easily send surveys to customers.

Knowing the level of customer satisfaction will help you to optimize the sales process and improve customer service.

Website of the tool: Link

 

 

Database Tools

 

CRM

I’m a fan of Pipedrive, but it’s not the best solution for every company.

 

Marketing/Customer Service Automation

 

HubSpot

A tool best known for content marketing but it has many other options – CRM, chatbots, content management, and online courses that help with onboarding.

Website of the tool: Link

 

Zendesk

Zendesk has a built-in CRM that connects sales with customer support. If an existing customer asks support about new product features, it can be smoothly passed on to sales.

Tool page: Link

 

SalesMANAGO

Here the offering looks similar to HubSpot, but it is our Polish solution, which for some may be an advantage.

Tool page: Link

 

Sales Enablement

 

Highspot

A tool specializing in sales support. It contains everything in one – from content management through onboarding and sales force training to analytics.

Tools page: Link

 

Remember about training

It’s important for salespeople to gather know-how from using the tool. Often salespeople are given a new tool to use, but they are not provided with training to use  it. Then it often ends up that nobody uses it.

The sales enablement team can collate the best practices on how to use CRM, prospecting tools or Sales Navigator. These can be in the form of descriptions, YouTube tutorials, or self-recorded.

 

comic, men and women talking, red stand

We showed salespeople how to persuade store managers
to put up a rack using cartoons. 

4) Analytics: sales, content and tool usage

The sales enablement department can take a sideways look at salespeople’s activities and sales analytics and come up with suggestions for improvements.

 

Sales analytics:

Consider:

1) Where do sales bottlenecks occur?

At our company, we used to send customers a short form during every sales call to collect the information needed for a quote.

After analyzing the CRM, it turned out that more than 40% of projects stopped at this stage for a week or more.  So we started asking questions from the form during a phone call, which accelerated the sales process.

 

2) Where results are worse than expected

A few months ago, we did a cleanup of the CRM, breaking down funnels into different types. One of them was a funnel coming from Referrals.

It turned out that we had an effectiveness of just over 50% for referrals. We checked why. It turned out that we were taking a nonchalant approach to these leads. “Because if someone is from a referral, they’re going to decide to work together anyway.”

We started paying more attention to referrals and since then we’ve been closing a lot more referral leads.

 

3) Which clients to deal with at any given time of the year

In our case, SME contracts are on average about 30-40% smaller than corporate contracts. But they close on average three times faster.

So if you want to close quickly at the end of the quarter, it makes much more sense to focus on SMEs.

With a large number of leads and a regular check of what’s going on in your CRM, you will be able to find brilliant ways to unclog the funnel and boost your results.

Content analytics:

The purpose of content is to take the pressure off salespeople.

If salespeople constantly have to explain the same something to customers, it might be worth creating a text, video or infographic about it.

The purpose of analytics can be to answer questions such as:

 

1) What content is missing?

Most often, salespeople know what questions recur in conversations with customers.

That’s why it’s a good idea for them to write these questions down. Then the sales enablement department can create content that responds to the questions most often raised.

The method of creating content based on customer questions is  described well in Marcus Sheridan’s book “They Ask You Answer”.

 

2) What are salespeople using and not using?

Check which text are useful to salespeople and with the most popular ones consider a paid campaign to reach even more clients.

 

3) How much does content accelerate sales?

This is something that can be measured once you have enough salespeople and content sent. ,You can see if customers buy more after viewing your content and if they decide to buy faster.

Tool usage analytics:

 

1) What do salespeople waste the most time on?

Is it researching customers? Or is it answering emails?

If you can determine the answer to this question, you can start looking for tools that will save this time.

 

2) What are the most common problems in using current tools?

Maybe salespeople don’t fill out the CRM? Or maybe they don’t know how to select content for the customer?

The role of sales enablement is to train salespeople or provide tutorials to help deal with this.

 

3) Which tools are being used and which are not?

If a company has bought a new prospecting tool that no one is using, the sales enablement team can propose solutions such as additional training, changing tools or giving up.

How to implement sales enablement?

Everything sounds great, but how do you implement sales enablement in a company?

First of all, Marketing and Sales need to find a thread of agreement. Although we write here about the Sales Enablement Department, in practice it often means the Marketing Department.

What steps are worth taking?

 1) Set a goal

It’s important to have a specific sales goal.

Do you want to shorten sales cycles? Increase the average contract size? Or become independent of one salesperson?

There is a lot you can do in sales enablement. A goal like this will help you decide what to focus on.

 

2) Divide responsibilities and tasks

The pushback between marketing and sales is almost legendary. That’s why it’s crucial to figure out who’s responsible for what, so there’s no confusion.

Especially since marketing often ventures into unfamiliar sales territory as part of this effort. However, this has the advantage of marketers better understanding the realities of salespeople’s work.

Example division of responsibility:

1) Research – marketing and partly sales

2) Content – marketing

3) Tools – marketing

4) Sales analytics – sales

Of course, within each area, there are plenty of specific tasks to be done. These tasks can be divided between marketing and sales.

Łukasz Kosuniak (ex-marketing Manager in Samsung and Microsoft) tells about a sample division of roles and cooperation between marketing and sales:

“First, both teams should know that their goal is sales and they will be held accountable for their impact on sales.

Secondly, it is worthwhile to precisely define the roles of individual teams in the sales process.

For example, if marketing’s role is to deliver leads, it’s worth defining precisely what parameters a lead should meet.

On the other hand, if a lead meets the criteria of being passed on to the sales department, salespeople should be obliged to take over the lead in a timely manner, contact the lead and describe the lead’s status in the CRM accordingly, so that it is possible, for example, to calculate the return on investment for marketing activities.

Another area of mutual support is the creation of sales content. It’s clear that marketing is responsible for organizing this process, but without the substantive involvement of salespeople, the content that marketing will produce may be ineffective.

Now that customers first read the content and then get to know the salesperson, it makes sense to ensure that the salespeople’s image is evident in the content early on in the decision-making process.

In the teams that boast good collaboration between sales and marketing, several characteristics are common:

– both teams understand the specifics of their work and know what to expect from each other (SLA of marketing and sales)

– the criteria of cooperation are clearly defined – e.g. parameters of a lead on the marketing side and a standard of servicing a lead on the sales side

– have tools that monitor the flow of data (e.g. leads) between marketing and sales

– regularly discuss the status of the lead funnel at each stage and make necessary changes (e.g. tighten or loosen qualification criteria)

– jointly define the subject matter of sales enablement content and participate in its creation and distribution

– share knowledge about customer needs and preferences – salespeople based on 1:1 communication, marketing based on surveys, research, content consumption analysis and, for example, analysis of mentions of the company or discussions in social channels.”

3) Plan the implementation and how to analyze progress

At this stage, you need a RoadMap, i.e. the steps you need to take to get to your goal (i.e. faster sales, for example).

You will need KPIs to serve as a compass that will tell you if you are going off course.

 

Examples of KPIs:

– Length of sales cycles

– Average deal size

– Average % of closed sales

– Number of salespeople achieving their goals.

 

It is also necessary to have a clear division of responsibilities between the work of the two departments.

 

Example of division of responsibility:

– CRM implementation – Janek, sales director;

– Creation of sales content – Marek, marketing manager;

– Training and preparation of materials – Zbyszek, our best salesperson.

 

If you take care of these three steps, you will significantly increase the chance that your program will be successful.

 

Conclusion:

Sales support is about creating an environment in which salespeople can be most effective.

 

In practice, this means relieving them of most tasks that are not selling.

Sales enablement itself can be broken down into four areas:

1) Gathering and organizing information about customers, competitors, and sales methods;

2) Producing content that accelerates sales;

3) Implementing tools that make the work easier; and

4) Analyzing sales, content and tools.

 

The marketing department in cooperation with the sales department is most often responsible for the implementation of such programs.

 

To implement sales enablement, you need to set:

– Goals;

– The methods for measuring progress (KPIs); and

– Scopes of responsibility.

 

If you’re looking for help in the area of producing sales enablement content, let us know.

For years we’ve been creating explainer videos, sales presentations and OnePagers that help salespeople make more appointments and close more deals.

You can see examples of our case studies here.

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About the author

Oscar Krysik

With over 10 years of experience working with renowned brands such as Lipton, Listerine, and Ben & Jerry’s, I have developed comprehensive communication plans, executed brand launches, and devised effective brand strategies. I am committed to understanding key messages and ensuring they reach the right audience. My experience also includes brand creation, exemplified by the launch of Benji’s Planet, a premium dog food brand. As a brand and marketing consultant, I help businesses craft their brand identity and communicate their value propositions effectively. I regularly update my skills with new certifications and stay abreast of marketing trends to ensure my strategies are cutting-edge. Outside of work, I am passionate about design, graphic arts, and enjoy bouldering in my free time. Contact me for expert brand and marketing consultation.

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About the Client: European Rover Challenge (ERC) is the largest robotics and space event in Europe, organized since 2014. The multi-day event attracts students from universities, professionals working in the space sector and space enthusiasts from around the world...

How to write a script for an animation? 16 practical tips

Explaining how to write an animation script can take up a whole book! But if you are here, it means that you do not have time to go so deep into the topic. Therefore, in this text, I have compiled 16 practical tips on how to write an effective animation script. All...

Animation for Winaico that helped save salespeople time

About the company: Winaico is a German photovoltaic module manufacturer, that has been in existence since 2008. The company operates in Europe, USA, Japan and Australia. Company size: up to 100 people Company departments involved in the project: Country Manager...

How did we help Santander educate employees about the new way of designing the product?

About the company Santander Bank - the largest bank in the Eurozone Company size: Poland (11,000 employees), worldwide (190,000 employees) Company departments and people involved in the project: Service Design & Design Research Department: Head of Service Design,...

Animated video: 6 application examples

Animated video can serve various purposes. For example, it can advertise a new product of a company, help it enter the market, explain regulations to potential customers, or explain socially important issues to an illiterate population. This type of video is becoming...

Promotional Video Production: How to prepare to work with a studio to make your film a success

The stakes are high because the video will be shown at a trade show, a company event or during a video campaign. If the project doesn't make it to the clients, the money will go down the drain and the person responsible for the production may end up without a job!...

6 animation trends that will capture the market in 2022

When we compare animations from a dozen or so years ago with those created today, you can see the difference in the degree of advancement, and also in the style and graphics. This is largely a matter of fashion. Below I will list a few trends that I think will conquer...

How to choose an animation studio? 9 tips

Wybór studia animacji może przesądzić o sukcesie końcowego video. I choć tekst na ten temat pisany przez studio animacji z pewnością nie jest w pełni obiektywny, przykłady własne służą tylko zilustrowaniu poszczególnych kwestii. Niezależnie od tego, na jakie studio...

Brand videos: how they differ from other videos and how to make them… with examples

Perhaps you are wondering how to reach your customers effectively? How to make them see your brand's potential and answer their needs? A brand video may help. It is a video or animation that will:   Build brand awareness Include your logo and other distinctive...

16 interesting animations from 16 countries

The following list of animations from 16 countries worldwide is highly subjective. Each is interesting and unique for different reasons, which we write about in the text.England An animation released in 2018 by the British cookie company McVitie. The campaign...

Promotional videos for businesses – 6 types you need to know

Promotional videos are usually short advertising videos. They are designed to convince customers to buy a particular product or use a company's service. There are many types of promotional videos, but we present six of the most popular. Each can be filmed using either...

Animated ads – types, examples, prices

Animated ads are one of the most popular forms of video marketing. They are usually much cheaper to produce than a traditional film shot on camera. They also allow for greater creative freedom. Below we discuss the types of animated ads along with examples and prices...

Corporate video production – 7 sins not to commit if you want a boring video

Producing corporate videos often comes with high hopes. The company hopes to enhance its image, build trust among customers and excitement among employees. Unfortunately, the truth is that most corporate films are... boring. Why is this the case? And what can you do...

Visual Thinking in Business: 6 levels you can implement in your company [+Examples]

Myślenie wizualne to - w dużym skrócie - używanie wizualizacji, żeby ułatwić dostrzeżenie, zrozumienie i zapamiętanie informacji. Jego przejawy obserwujemy, gdy widzimy na trasie znaki drogowe, oglądamy infografiki czy projektujemy nowe produkty na warsztatach Design...

Podcast Visual Communication For Storytelling featuring Maciej Budkowski

Maciej Budkowski, Managing Directorof our company, got invited to The Business Storyteller Podcast by Piktochart. As we can read on their website: "this is a series of conversations with inspiring leaders and entrepreneurs to share their knowledge and experience in...

Visual thinking in business – what it is, how it works and how it can help

What is visual thinking? Imagine this situation... You get up in the morning. You reach for your cell phone and there is a black and white screen and a wall of text. You walk over to your desk and check your planner. A wall of text again! Even the division into days...

Corporate videos – 9 examples to help you create the best video for your company

You want to create a corporate video. You probably have a lot of questions. What to pay attention to? What is involved in the production of a video? How much do corporate films cost? If you type in "corporate films" in Google  over two million results come up. You...

Pictures vs. illustrations vs. instructional video – when to use what to make our instruction effective

Imagine you are sitting comfortably on a plane, reading a book. Suddenly you feel turbulence that is much stronger than usual. You start to get anxious, especially since you see people around you panicking. Then you hear the captain's voice from the speakers: "Please...

Customer Segmentation: The Cornerstone of SaaS Pricing

Most personas are eye-rollingly useless. Product Managers usually create these personas to satisfy Agile’s user story framework, adding nothing (or even causing harm) to the process of creating breakthrough products and offers. The managers who create these useless...

How to get people to follow the recommendations of the Ministry of Health, doctors and pharmacists? [Visual Thinking in Medicine]

You have a fever, you feel weak, and your cough is getting worse. Normally this wouldn't concern you, but there is a coronavirus raging in the world so you have doubts. Just in case, you call the hotline. The lady on the other end of the phone patiently explains what...

How did we help 3S Group generate leads using animation?

About the company: 3S Group - Polish provider of telecommunication services, data center and ICT solutions, and part of PLAY operator since 2019.     3S Group supports the realization of its clients' business visions by designing and implementing ICT solutions....

How we helped Israeli startup to win a 1,000,000$

About the company: Seegnature (now Reach): Israeli startup that creates an application for remote discussion and signing of contracts. Department: Company Founders. Problem: Seegnature entered the competition for the best insurance startup in Israel. The company...

How did Michelin sell tires in a country with no cars? Three examples of big brand content marketing that shows the power of good content

Before 1900, there were only 3,000 cars in France. At that time, brothers André and Édouard Michelin decided to start a company that sold tires.[1] Sound like a recipe for failure? Probably many people thought so, as how do you sell tires to people who don't need...

6 things without which your sales support and sales materials will be ineffective

You know the scenario? The conversation is going well, and the customer is interested. Finally, the potential customer says to the salesperson: "Then please send an offer. I'm having a meeting with my boss/team/partner and I'll let you know what the response is." The...

Content marketing that supports sales – what is a content funnel and how to use it

After publishing an article about content marketing of three global giants: Michelin, Pirelli and Guinness, our subscribers were strongly surprised as not many knew the stories.   The artice has not yet been translated to English, but in a shortcut: - When...

How to maximize ROI of your explainer video (22 non-bullshit practical tips)

These are the insights we got after producing hundreds of explainer videos.  Before you start 1) Check if the ROI numbers add up. Sometimes they don’t.   The easiest formula to calculate ROI is: Predicted Reach (i.e. 10 000 people) x Avg. deal size (i.e. 100$) x...

Animation versus illustration: which is more effective [based on research]

Walt Disney said: "Animation can represent anything the human mind can imagine. This ability makes it the most versatile and direct form of communication. At the same time, it is created to be appreciated by mass audiences."[1] Although this quote comes from one of...

Whiteboard animation: Best Business Cases

Whiteboard animation videos are special animated films, which educate customers about a company, a brand or its products. They have been used by marketing, sales and HR departments of the biggest companies for 10 years, but only just starting to gain popularity in...

13 ideas for using animation in business – practical videomarketing

Well-crafted animation can help in many elements of business. Most often, it supports companies in acquiring leads, training employees, presenting a product or service to customers, implementing procedures, or increasing conversions. Since you've already invested in...

How to sell when your product is not much different from the competition?

"If there is no difference, there is only indifference" said Louis Nizer Customers may think the same when your products are not much different from the competition. Of course you can lower the price but this may start a price war. Thousands of companies have faced a...

Vegan food market in Poland

Imagine that you go to Facebook and there are pictures of sausages, kabanos to be exact, everywhere. They are posted by your friends, the fan pages you like, and strangers on groups you belong to. Sounds like science fiction? Meanwhile, it is reality as kabanos are...

Veganism, vegetarianism and marketing: how to advertise and sell vegan products?

Veganism is on the rise. There is no question about it. To give you just a few recent examples... New vegan product a sales hit The first example is the British bakery chain Gregg. I first heard of its existence when it released vegan sausage rolls and I read about it...

How our animation helped the „Wiecej niż LEK” website earn their first 100 000 EUR

About the project:  “Więcej niż LEK” is a Medical Information Portal which is used to run high quality e-learning courses for students and graduates of medical colleges, which prepare them for, among other things, for the Final Medical Examination and the Final...

How to calculate if the explainer video will pay off?

As we wrote earlier in the text about explainer video, the production of such an animation usually costs from 2 000 to 7 000 EUR. How to calculate whether this expense will pay off? And how to estimate the explainer video's possible results?   In this text, we...

7 examples of explainer video, which provided companies with leads and increased sales

Rypple, which provides cloud services, wanted to show that its solution increases the efficiency of managers and employees. The B2B business was showing more and more interest in modern ways of storing data, but the competition was not idle and more and more similar...

Product videos—types, prices, advantages and disadvantages (classic film, whiteboard animation, vector animation, and 3D animation)

Product videos are becoming more and more popular because they help to tell about the product in a few minutes. Thanks to them, the customer does not have to read a wall of text on the website or in the brochure. Sellers also feel relieved because they don't have to...

11 tips and tricks that will make it easier for you to make an explainer video

You want to commission a explainer video production. It is an important project because you need to talk about a strategic initiative, generate more leads, or implement a new procedure. You gave the company a general idea and...wait until they hit your vision? This is...

Our Team

Claudia Together with the late Michael (my fiancé at the time), I am a co-founder of ExplainVisually. At the beginning of the company's existence, I was a creative 3-in-1: I wrote scripts, storyboards, and drew films. This was the case with the first 84 films, but in...

The cooperation between TESCO and ExplainVisually has been extended to the Czech Republic and Slovakia

The shelves of supermarkets bend under the food. But what happens to food that is not bought? The last project in cooperation with TESCO brought us the answer to this question. We got a call from Gosia Tokarz, who asked us if we can prepare 7 by 2 meters infographics...

How did Millenium Bank educate its employees on standards of customer service? [Case Study]

About the company: Millenium Bank – one of the main banks in Poland, part of Banco Commercial Portuges. Department: Department of Quality–responsible for providing equal and high level of customer and sales service in the bank’s facilities.   Problem: Keeping the...

4 unobvious reasons that make your offer land in the basket

Thank you for the offer, we have decided to cooperate with another supplier;At this point we have suspended the project, we will contact you when we get back to it;Unfortunately, we are not interested. Every salesperson has heard these answers. Often, the reason for...

Our video telling a story about the most creative Polish School

Among dozens of projects that we have carried out this year, the film for the Kornel Makuszyński Elementary School in Radowo Małe is one of our favourites. And not only our favourite: the video scored over 1300 shares on Facebook. Why this project is so important to...

How did Orange tell their employees about the Continuous Improvement? [Case Study]

About the company: Orange – the biggest telecommunication operator in Poland and one of the main companies in the world, made it to the Fortune Global 500 list. Department: Customer Experience, trying to design the ideal customer experience and supporting the...

What is Graphic Recording (and Graphic Facilitation)?

When the lecturer starts his speech on the stage, the atmosphere of concentration fills the lecture hall. It is his name that brought the crowd to this conference. The slides complete his words, and hundreds of people are focused on him and try to remember as much as...

What is whiteboard animation (and how your business can benefit from it)?

Whiteboard animation is becoming more and more popular in business because of the clear and transparent way it provides information. Research shows that it has an advantage over text messages, and often also over static images and ordinary films. That is why it is...

What is explainer video (and how your business can benefit from it)?

  Explainer videos are short movies which explain complicated issues in an easy way. Typically they deliver information about companies, products and services. Today, explainer videos are used by thousands of companies around the world, including the largest...

The curse of knowledge: How it affects managers & marketers

Klątwa wiedzy jest efektem psychologicznym, który w ogromnym stopniu wpływa na naszą pracę oraz życie osobiste. W wielu wypadkach niestety negatywnie. Szczególnie narażone na jego skutki są osoby odpowiedzialne za komunikację w firmie – managerowanie, marketerzy,...

Goodbye to the best boss I’ve ever had

“I heard that you quit your job,” the words echoed in my ears. It was a call from Michał. How on earth did he already know?, I thought. It must have been our Lebanese friend who told him. He was the only person who knew. “Yes, that’s true. The message was being...

Klaudia Tolman of ExplainVisually in the jury of 50 Top Creative list

Klaudia Tolman, our Creative Director, is going to be one of the jurors in the 9th edition of the ranking of 50 Top Creative in Business. The ranking aims to honour companies and people: put their money on innovations and out-of-the-box solutions in their businesses,...

We got the results of the first nationwide research on Visual Thinking

Last year we co-created the very first nationwide research on Visual Thinking. Why did we decide to take part in reliable research on the effectiveness of visual thinking? For years now we have been hearing from our clients, that what we do, works. But it’s one thing...

Maciej Budkowski and Klaudia Tolman to host an “Expert” cycle meeting for Brief.pl

For the last 5 years, we have been building and developing our know-how. During that time we’ve carried out over 200 projects in 19 languages for dozens of corporations, startups and GOs. But never before have we publicly spoken about our agency experiences. This time...

Maciej Budkowski and Klaudia Tolman in the #agencja podcast

Just released, there’s an #agencja podcast featuring our managing team, Klaudia and Maciek. In the podcast we’re telling about our daily work. Link to the podcast –...

ExplainVisually’s film about European Funds submitted to Camerimage

In 2015 we made a film with the Mazovian Unit of EU Programmes Implementation in Warsaw. Its aim was to tell in a simple way how to gain European Funds. The project went very well and many organisations associated with European Funds considered it to set a good...

ExplainVisually’s infographics to support Polish Football Association

Maciek, our Managing Director, has been a huge fan of football for over 20 years and he’s always been dreaming about cooperation with the Polish Football Association. So when they actually called us to say that they needed to explain to football coaches complex...

ExplainVisually a laureate of the competition 50 Most Creative in Polish Business!

We are a laureate of this year’s ranking of 50 Most Creative in Business. 50 Creative is the biggest competition in its field in Poland. The ranking is carried out each year by Brief.pl. Amongst former laureates are CD Project, Brand24, iTaxi, LifeTube, Booksy or...

How to spend money to be happy? Our infographic in “Głos Mordoru” (“Voice of Mordor”)

“Money doesn’t bring happiness” or “You cannot have too much of a good thing”? Turns out, it depends on what you do with it. Those are the conclusions of Elizabeth Dunn and Michael Norton, Professors of British Columbia University and Harvard University. In their book...

Summary 2017

Christmas time has passed, so it’s time for some summary. We can’t describe this year with one word. 2017 was demanding, tragic, developing, successful, sad and joyful. In the period of 12 months we made over 70 films, which means we scored almost 200 total since the...

Our video helped to win 1,000,000$ in a Israeli’s startup competition

A week ago Seegnature, an Israeli InsurTech start-up, used our whiteboard animation during a pitch - presentation to the investors. The stake was high. Pitch is a key moment for a start-up. Several minutes of presentation may determine the company’s future. Especially...

HR Case Study: recruitment video

It was the end of May 2016, when we realized we could not put it off any longer. Everybody took their place, and we started the meeting. “We have to recruit new drawing artists! I can’t do it by myself any longer! We won’t manage when the new projects come…!” Klaudia...

Explainer video production process

Explainer video production process typically takes a few weeks (3-8). The production time depends on the film's duration, its complexity, the flow of works, communication between both parties (or three parties if an Agency also takes part in the discussion), work...