To Drive Growth, CSOs Must Harness Digitally Enabled Sales Strategies

n the rapidly evolving landscape of B2B sales, chief sales officers (CSOs) are at a crossroads. The traditional sales channels that have long been the backbone of revenue generation are failing to meet the expectations of buyers, whose preferences now lean toward rep-free digital experi ences. In fact, by 2028, Gartner predicts that a staggering 75 percent of organizations will complete their highest-revenue deals via digital channels. And yet, CSOs’ perception of dig ital commerce as nothing more than a shopping cart means they continue to prioritize seller-led channels in their sales strategies. CSOs must choose to embrace digital commerce as an enabler of their strategic goals or else put revenue at risk.

Understanding Digital Commerce Beyond the Shopping Cart

The view held by CSOs that digital commerce is nothing more than a self-service tool for buyers to make simple, transactional purchases overlooks its multifaceted nature as a critical touchpoint that supports commercial goals across all sales channels. Supplier websites, for example, are not just transactional platforms; they are vital sources of information and engagement throughout a buyer's purchase journey. Digital content, capabilities, and tools accessed through supplier websites educate buyers, facilitate evaluations, streamline negotiations, and offer seamless onboarding post-sale.

Ignoring the potential of digital commerce leads to missed opportunities. Gartner data reveals that 76 percent of buyers avoid doing business with suppliers if they have a poor website experience. Furthermore, 66 percent of buyers prefer using a combination of online self-service tools and seller interactions throughout their customer journey. It’s clear that digital commerce is not just an ancillary tool but a fundamental component and powerful enabler of strategic sales goals.

Transforming Perspectives: Digital Commerce as a Strategic Partner

To fully leverage digital commerce, CSOs must transform their perspective and recognize its role as a strategic partner. This involves understanding the four main ways its capabilities can help CSOs achieve their commercial objectives:

Digital commerce can self-generate high-quality leads. Digital commerce platforms can capture first-party buyer data and engagement signals, enabling sellers to identify and prioritize high-potential accounts.

It can streamline deal progression. By integrating digital tools and content, digital commerce can facilitate key activities throughout multithreaded buying journeys, enhancing both self-service and seller-augmented engagements.

It can foster account retention and growth: Digital commerce supports effective customer onboarding and value realization and enables sellers to enhance customer relationships, mitigating churn risks and identifying expansion opportunities.

It can produce rich customer insights. The data collected through digital commerce provides a holistic view of customers throughout their life cycles, allowing sellers to make informed decisions and respond in real time to key customer needs.

Embracing Digital Commerce as a Teammate

CSOs should champion digital commerce, repositioning it as a teammate that complements the sales organization and supports commercial goals. They should collaborate with stakeholders from across the organization to define digital commerce’s role in executing sales engagement strategies:

• Review segmentation and tier exercises to understand customer needs.
• Identify key sales tasks and activities that digital commerce can automate or augment.
• Prioritize these tasks and activities based on their impact on commercial objectives and strategic goals.
• Define and deploy the specific digital commerce capabilities, content,, or tools required to facilitate the prioritized tasks and activities.
• Develop a change management plan to encourage collaboration between sellers and digital commerce.

Regardless of sales strategy or seller role, digital commerce presents opportunities to automate, or augment, key sales tasks. For example, guided selling capabilities supplement inside sales teams by providing a low-touch, self-service-based execution strategy; gated digital content supports sales development representatives by generating high-quality leads; and digital sales rooms augment high-touch key account programs by improving buyer-seller collaboration.

Embracing digital commerce requires a shift in mindset. CSOs must ensure digital commerce capabilities are integrated within the sales function and accepted as a key enabler of strategy. By doing so, they can strengthen revenue growth, seller productivity, and customer relationships.

As digital commerce continues to reshape the B2B sales landscape, CSOs have an opportunity to lead their organizations into the digital frontier. By expanding their perspective and integrating digital commerce into their sales strategies, CSOs can harness its full potential to achieve their revenue goals and drive sustainable growth. The future of sales is digital, and those who embrace it will be well-positioned for success.

Luke Tipping and Aditya Vasudevan are director analysts and Mike Lowndes is a VP analyst in the Gartner Sales Practice.