What kind of visibility do you have in regards to what pieces of content your reps use most often or which pieces are actually closing deals?

Our sales team are always asking us for 3 things:

• A kick ass product intro/ overview deck - generally used for reps to go over with prospects
• Competitive battlecards - how we stack up against our competition and where we win
• Case studies - tangible upside that customers have gotten by using our products

These are the foundations in my opinion.

The best thing you can do is go out and listen to reps pitch the product and how customers respond. After 12-20 calls or meetings you'll start to get a pretty good idea of what content is getting used most (and what isn't getting used at all). This is where I'd start.

If your organization has budget, there are also tech tools that can help give you better visibility. Content Management Systems like Seismic can track rep and client engagement with every piece of content at each step of the sales funnel -- but this only works if everyone in the organization consistently uses the platform. Tools like gong.io can give you transcriptions of customer calls which you can then Ctrl + F to see if key messaging terms or collateral assets are being used. I'm sure there are others as well, but nothing will substitute for actually getting out in the field.

I'd echo what Stephen said at the end there. Often times, I'll find that we have created a fantastic piece of content, only to realize that nobody on sales has used it becuase they don't know where to find it or at what stage in the sales cycle it is appropriate to use. Therefore, I spend a lot time thinking about how each piece of content should be used, when and whether it is easily discoverable or not. 

To get better visibility into what content the team uses most frequently and what content closes deals, I spend a lot of time talking to sales reps about specific deal cycles. I ask them what they shared and when and whether they felt they had what they needed to win the deal. This tells me what they find effective and where our content strategy may have gaps. Additionally, I look in our CRM to see what pieces of content have been shared with the prospect. Pairing these two together gives me a good idea of what content the sales team likes and what appears to have the biggest impact in a sales cycle. 

Carrie's answer is spot-on. I would add that our reps also ask for data sheets, model RFPs and, increasingly, for explanatory videos. In my role today, I don't get any visibility to usage beyond download volumes and the questions I get directly from the field, so it's directional.

Almost every company I've seen has more content than they actually need for selling.

It depends which stage and how large is the enterprise one is targeting. 

1. 30sec pitch/ 3 min pitch deck/ 30 min pitch deck - all are required 

2. Kill sheets/ Cheat sheets/ (battle cards as Carrie mentions above)

3. If the customer is at lead stage - they need to know the content of emails, if the customer is at a discover stage (how can you arm them with industry data that excites them about your solution). Content that guides them in giving an interesting demo with perspective of the audience. How to close and sign up on the product - the path needs to be drawn up. Documents that accelerate contracts and negotiations