As a sales rep, I’m sure you’ve been thrown multiple curveballs on a discovery or demo call. Maybe your prospect asked you about a new offer or raised an objection you weren’t prepared to handle. In those moments, sales battlecards can make all the difference.
Next thing you know, your mind’s racing to search for the correct response—but to no avail. Sounds familiar?
That’s what sales battlecards help with.
How you handle yourself and the call is key as it impacts whether you’ll close the deal or lose a potential customer. But you can’t do that if you’re not armed with the correct information at the right time.
In this guide, we’ll explain what a battlecard is, how to create one, and how to ensure your sales team uses it to its advantage.
What are sales battlecards?
Sales battlecards are reference documents that help sales reps with the key information they need during prospect or customer conversations. They include data on the company’s offer, selling proposition, potential objections, and related information.
In short, battlecards are cheat sheets that sales reps use to get immediate access to critical information when they need it.
Here are a few benefits of battlecards:
- Increased confidence: Your reps won’t stutter or panic when they no longer know how to tackle an objection. All they have to do is pull up the right battlecards and extract the data they need.
- Better response times: Instead of telling prospects they’ll get back to them after the call, reps can provide accurate answers immediately—while maintaining momentum.
- Improved product/service knowledge: Your sales reps will know everything they need to about your products or services because they’ll always use these cards to keep up with this information.
- Ability to articulate your value proposition: Too often, your sales teams might confuse your capabilities with the actual value you deliver. This happens because no documentation specifies this—leaving it up to interpretation. With battlecards, you can avoid this issue altogether.
What are the types of sales battlecards?
You can create several kinds of battlecards to equip your sales team. Here are a few types to take advantage of today:
1. Use case battlecards
Use case battlecards to focus on how to communicate a product or service’s capabilities to solve a specific customer problem. For example, if you’re selling project management software, here are a few use cases:
- Ability to assign tasks and see who’s responsible for specific projects
- Ability to communicate with different stakeholders on one platform
- Ability to map dependencies and plan resources effectively
- Ability to store assets and conversations in one place
- Ability to integrate ChatGPT or other large language models
Not every prospect may care about all these use cases, so having documented talking points for common challenges helps. It could include information like:
- Relevant features/services
- How the product solves it
- Potential objections
- Prospect challenge
- Potential outcomes
- Success stories
2. Competitor battlecards
Competitive battlecards are straightforward. They focus on how you differ from your direct and indirect competitors. They provide a snapshot of your competitors’ offers and your differentiators.
For example, SoFi, a loan provider, shows prospects how their mortgage loans are better than competitors, and dives deeper into different loan types on the landing page. You can use this data to easily tackle objections.
Image via SoFi
You can tackle objections and common questions easily if you have the data. Here’s what it includes:
- Success stories (based on migration or alternatives)
- Benefits and outcomes
- Your value proposition
- Features/Capabilities
- Competing offer
Image via SmartBug
3. Value proposition battlecards
Value proposition battle cards tell prospects the value you bring to the table. It could be anything—for example, your product’s core value, benefit, or differentiators. As long as it’s unique to your brand and customers love that about you, you can use it.
Image via divbyzero
For example, Cruise America’s partner network is a strong value proposition as it has helped them capture 52% of the RV rental market. Suppose any prospect is looking for RV rentals in California. In that case, they know they’ll get best-in-class service through accessible rental options and campgrounds—which sets them apart from competitors offering RV rentals.
These battlecards include the following:
- Differentiators (supporting evidence for the value proposition)
- How it’s relative to a specific market/competitor
- Testimonials or customer reviews.
- Your value proposition
4. Objection handling battlecards
Every sales rep should have a list of potential objections a prospect might raise. It’s a natural part of the sales process as you instill confidence in your solution while giving them the right reasons to choose your offer. That’s what objection handling battlecards helps with.
Here are the different types of objections you can expect to face:
- Lack of industry-specific customers
- Pace of innovation (roadmap)
- Training and support requests
- Competitor comparisons
- Features or capabilities
- Perceived value
- Popular logos
- Pricing
- Timing
If you have a battle card that addresses these concerns relative to the market and economy, your reps will be better prepared for future sales calls.
5. ICP-specific battlecards
Your ideal client profile (ICP) decides your conversation’s talking points. Every ICP has its own:
- Budget constraints
- Characteristics
- Unique needs
- Pain points
- Workflows
Image via Tubular
If you include specifics tailored to these prospects in your battle card, your reps can effectively personalize the sales pitch. After all, 82 % of consumers say personalized experiences influence the brand they end up buying from. It’ll also show prospects that they understand their industry and challenges well, increasing the likelihood of a conversion.
For instance, an ICP-specific battle card for a supply chain management software targeting mid-sized manufacturing companies would include data like:
- Industry-specific metrics (reduction in stock-outs or increased timely deliveries)
- Pain points (lack of inventory management systems)
- Testimonials from manufacturing leaders
6. Product-specific battlecards
A product battle card helps reps explain what the product does and how it does it. This is key, no matter how simple or complex your product is, because different prospects have different needs—and you never know which feature or capability they’ll bring up.
Here’s what this battle card will include:
- Comparisons to previous versions
- Technical specifications
- Product overview
- Recent updates
- Future roadmap
- Pricing models
- Key features
- Integrations
- Benefits
How do you create a battle card for your sales reps?
Here’s a step-by-step process to create effective battlecards:
Step 1: Talk to your entire go-to-market (GTM) team
You can’t create a battle card that serves your customers unless you know what they want in the first place. You can only get this data from your GTM team, as they’re responsible for the different pieces that contribute to revenue.
Talk to team members from the following teams:
- Customer success (CS) team
- Marketing team
- Product team
- Sales team
Ask them about the more prominent trends they’re noticing and what problems target customers want to solve with your product. For example, a product leader could tell you which capabilities are most used. In contrast, your CS team could tell you more about customer questions during onboarding or implementation.
Conduct one-on-one meetings with respective teams to gather in-depth and contextual data. This will make creating a better foundation for your battlecards easier.
Step 2: Gather competitive intelligence data
Everything you do is relative to the market and your competitors. This means you also need to deeply understand your key competitors. Mature competitive intelligence programs are more likely to collect this data. So, do this research regularly to win in the long term.
Analyze your competitors’:
- Product features and capabilities
- Unique value proposition
- Product Documentation
- Marketing materials
- Customer reviews
- Customer service
Use this data to see where you win and fall short. Lay this out in your competitor battle card with talk tracks on how to handle related questions.
Step 3: Analyze your findings and categorize them
Start reviewing the collected data and looking for patterns or key themes. Group those into different categories, such as pricing strategy, target market, or common objections.
Look for gaps in competitors’ offerings that your product fills. If there are specific features or benefits customers love, highlight those, as that’s what your reps should focus on.
For example, StudioSuits’ competitive advantage is selling custom, affordable business cocktail attire for men. Unlike most competitors, their products aren’t off-the-rack, making it easier for them to stand out. Having personalized products is an excellent talking point during sales conversations.
Also, consider creating sub-categories aligning with different sales process stages or customer concerns. For example, a prospect who wants to see a demo would need more product-specific data, while a post-demo prospect might have questions about implementation.
Step 4: Draft your battlecards and get internal sign-off
Create a sales battlecard template with sections like:
- How to handle objections
- General customer rating
- Competitor claims
- Competitor name
- Product Features
- Integrations
- Objections
As you draft, constantly ask yourself: “How will this information help a sales rep in a real conversation?” This will help you decide what to include and remove from an impact perspective.
After you’ve drafted the battle card, get sign-off from stakeholders within your GTM team. This will prevent any misalignment issues later.
How do you make sure your sales team actually uses these cards?
Recent reports indicate that competitive intelligence professionals agree that their sales reps don’t use their battlecards as often as they’d like. This means all your efforts go to waste—and your reps are not supported enough to do their job well.
Here are a few ways to increase battle card usage internally:
Tell your reps these assets exist
The first thing you need to do is tell your reps these assets exist. You’ll be surprised how often an asset is created and not handed off to the right people on your team.
This is why you need to send an official email blast or run a 1:1 session to tell reps these assets are available now. Take it one step further by recording detailed videos on how to use them. The goal is to increase usage, and you can’t do that if your reps don’t know how to use them and when.
If adoption is still challenging, ask your top sales performers to explain how battlecards have helped them.
Make sure the battle card is easy to skim and understand
When was the last time you read an incredibly dense content asset and went through all of it? Our guess: never.
Similarly, you need to think about the person on the receiving end of the battle card. Make sure your design is top-notch; by that, we don’t mean branding. Follow these design tips to make it easy to read:
- Categorize topics or themes into tables
- Add bullet points when necessary
- Use short sentences if needed
- Include enough whitespace
Here’s an example of a structure you can use:
Image via Goodmeetings
Give reps more context on the battle card
Another reason your sales team might not be using it is that they’re overwhelmed by the number of battlecards and don’t know how to use them.
So, to increase usage, you need to give your reps more context. This context helps them understand what to say and why and how to say it.
For example, include sections like “If a customer says X, respond with Y.”
That said, remember your battle card is not a script. It’s a tool to help reps find the right words during a call.
Continuously monitor usage and update these cards
Creating and distributing battlecards is not a one-time task. You must continuously monitor internal usage to see if it helps.
Here are a few ways to do that:
- Use a sales enablement tool to review metrics like views and usage
- Talk to your sales team and ask them if they use it
- Track leading metrics like win rates, quota attainment, and sales performance
Image via HubSpot
You might’ve missed something if these are not positive, even after creating the battlecards. Maybe it misses a critical detail, or reps lack the necessary information.
You can use that data to strike up customer feedback surveys or conversations and update these cards in the future.
Arm your reps with the right sales tools
Your sales reps need the right tools to do their job—and that’s where a battle card comes in handy. You must ensure it has everything your rep needs to do a better job, including guidance on CRM software, call tracking tools, or sales automation.
As a result, you’ll have a team of confident sellers who consistently hit their quotas and increase win rates.
Remember: your battlecards are not static documents but living tools that evolve as your product, market, and competitors evolve. So, make sure you invest enough time in updating them regularly.
Want more strategies to strengthen your sales enablement and competitive positioning? Browse more insights from BarnRaisers.
