If you were stranded on a desert island, but luckily had a strong Wi-Fi signal and all your basic needs met, which five essential sales enablement tools would you want with you?
It’s a playful scenario, but it gets to the heart of an important question: What’s absolutely essential when building a successful sales enablement strategy? With the explosion of sales-related technology over the past few years, it’s easy to get lost in a sea of software. But you only need a few tools to supercharge your sales process, streamline workflows and close more deals.
So grab your snorkel — we’re diving into the foundational tools every modern B2B sales team needs to thrive: CRM platforms, content management systems, analytics tools and more.
Why does tech deserve the spotlight in sales enablement efforts? “Inadequate or ineffective tools/technology” is listed as the fifth-biggest sales challenge facing 5,500 sales professionals, according to a 2024 survey by Salesforce. In case you’re curious, the top four sales challenges are:
While the first four challenges are out of one’s control, technology is something sales teams can actively choose and implement. And the right technology makes addressing all the other challenges easier.
Sales enablement has evolved from ad hoc processes and PDFs to integrated, tech-powered systems that support the entire buyer journey. Today, the sales enablement process demands scalable, repeatable and data-informed approaches — and that’s only possible with the right tools in place.
Whether it’s surfacing the right content, coaching reps in real time or tracking performance across the funnel, sales enablement software is all about automation enhanced with AI. If you’re thinking of automation, you’re in good company. 75% of B2B automation decision-makers expect their companies to invest in sales automation in the next 18 months, according to Forrester’s Automation Survey (2024).
Let’s break down the five top sales enablement tools that should anchor your sales enablement strategy.
Before we talk about our favorites, here’s a handy checklist for evaluating these tools. Comparing their features will help you make the right choice for you. Look for:
If you’re searching for “CRM for sales enablement,” you’re looking for more than a contact management system with data storage. You want to understand how a CRM actively supports sales productivity, shortens deal cycles and enables reps with the right tools, data and content.
A CRM is the operational backbone of your sales enablement strategy. It houses contact data, tracks every customer interaction, automates sales workflows and gives teams near-real-time visibility into the sales pipeline.
In sales enablement, CRMs serve a dual purpose: they organize your sales data and then activate it. With the right CRM, reps can spend less time digging for information and more time closing deals. That’s a big deal, especially given that reps spend 70% of their time on non-selling tasks, according to Salesforce’s State of Sales, 6th Edition report. Many of these tasks, like prioritizing leads or generating quotes, can be automated by a CRM.
Here’s an overview of three CRMs to consider based on the size and complexity of your sales team. Each made the list of the top 12 CRMs analyzed in the Forrester Wave for CRM Software 2025.
|
CRM |
Best For |
|
HubSpot |
Medium-sized to enterprise B2B companies |
|
Salesforce |
Large or complex sales organizations |
|
Zoho CRM |
Startups or budget-conscious teams |
For B2B companies that want to scale fast and need smarter, intuitive systems without added complexity, we recommend HubSpot. As a HubSpot Diamond Partner, we’ve seen firsthand how HubSpot CRM empowers sales teams, especially when paired with a strong sales enablement strategy. To cut down on rep busywork, we’ve set up lead routing and assignment workflows, automated post-quote follow-up sequences, internal notifications for deal stage changes, lead nurturing and more.
If you’re looking for a CRM without a steep learning curve or IT overhead, try HubSpot. It gives your team a clear, unified view of every prospect’s activity, so reps know exactly when and how to follow up. Instead of guessing what to send or say next, sales reps can be guided by playbooks, real-time insights and timely automations configured to your needs.
Salesforce remains a top CRM choice for large or complex sales organizations. Its robust customization, automation capabilities and app ecosystem make it a strong fit for enterprise businesses that require deep integrations and multi-layered workflows.
However, it can require more configuration and admin resources. That’s why many companies partner with implementation experts (like the RevOps team here at Kuno) to ensure Salesforce is fully aligned with their enablement strategy.
For startups or the budget-conscious, Zoho CRM offers a more accessible price point for teams that want to dip their toes into sales enablement without overspending. It includes a quoting tool, pipeline dashboard, automated tasks and revenue forecasting, a sales collateral library and a gamification system to motivate sales reps. However, it may lack some of the advanced enablement capabilities of HubSpot or Salesforce.
In the context of sales enablement, a Sales Content Management System is designed to give sales teams fast and organized access to the content they need, whether that’s pricing sheets, one-pagers, pitch decks or email templates. Unlike marketing-focused CMS platforms, these platforms are built to serve up the right materials to sales reps when they need them.
Benefits include:
Players in this space include Seismic, Highspot and Showpad, and when you start comparing services you’ll notice that we’re in the middle of a sales enablement AI transformation. A whopping 75% of B2B automation decision-makers expect their organizations to invest in sales automation within the next 18 months, indicating that more intelligent, automated content delivery is becoming standard, according to Forrester.
When you're evaluating content management solutions for your enablement strategy, prioritize the following capabilities. If you’re already using HubSpot and want to stay in the same ecosystem, upgrading to HubSpot’s Sales Hub gives you all of these features.
|
Feature |
Why It Matters |
|
Advanced Search & Tagging |
Enables reps to quickly filter content by buyer persona, deal stage, product line or keyword. |
|
Granular Access Control |
Allows admins to manage who sees what, ensuring sensitivity, compliance and messaging consistency. |
|
Real-Time Updates & Analytics |
Keeps content fresh with instant publishing and tracks what sales materials are being used (and how much they're helping). |
|
AI-Powered Recommendations |
Suggests the most relevant materials based on buyer behavior or deal stage, making enablement smarter and more proactive. |
|
Version History & Rollback |
Tracks edits over time and provides the ability to revert to previous versions when needed. |
The ability to spot shifting buying behaviors quickly can be a dealmaker or breaker. In fact, 37% of sales professionals say slow adaptation to evolving buyer behaviors is a key barrier to revenue growth (Forrester B2B Sales Survey, 2024). Sales enablement strategies must be anchored in good data so you can meet buyers where they’re at.
Sales analytics tools bridge the gap between activity and outcome, tracking not just what reps do, but giving valuable insights on how actions translate into closed-won deals. They help surface insights tied to outcomes like:
With smarter visibility into these areas, sales enablement managers can tailor coaching, reps can prioritize hotter opportunities and organizations close more consistently.
While most CRMs like HubSpot and Salesforce have built-in sales analytics platforms, there are a few standalone sales enablement platforms worth a look that help enterprise-level sales and marketing teams identify and remedy pain points in sales pipeline processes.
Gong helps teams understand what’s working (and what’s not) by analyzing sales calls, emails and meetings. It uses AI to show the winning behaviors and identify risks so managers are able to coach with greater precision.
Clari gives revenue teams visibility into pipeline health and sales forecasting. Its predictive analytics show which deals are on track, and which need attention, so leaders can move proactively.
|
Analytics Objective |
Tool |
Why It Works |
|
Identify winning conversation habits |
Gong |
Surfaces insights from real buyer-seller interactions to improve coaching. |
|
Improve forecasting and pipeline visibility |
Clari |
Tracks deal momentum to guide strategic planning and revenue goals. |
In a well-tuned sales tech stack, collaboration tools like Slack, Microsoft Teams and Zoom address gaps between marketing, sales and customer success teams. All three can be integrated with HubSpot to maintain seamless, consistent communication, which is a service we offer for clients.
AI-powered chatbots have become a must-have in the modern sales tech stack. Instead of making buyers dig for answers, these tools instantly engage visitors with personalized responses, guiding them toward the right resource or rep. This leads to faster sales cycles and more satisfied customers.
HubSpot offers an easy entry point with a free chatbot builder, while platforms like Drift (now part of Salesloft, currently merging with Clari) and Intercom deliver standalone, AI-powered solutions.
Over the past decade, video prospecting tools like Vidyard and BombBomb have changed the way sales reps connect with buyers. Sending a quick, personalized video helps humanize outreach and cut through crowded inboxes. These platforms include analytics so reps can see who watched, how long they engaged and which messages landed best.
A tech stack only works if your tools actually talk to each other. Most sales platforms on the market today offer native integrations, APIs or third-party connectors to help with seamless data flow.
Here’s a straightforward way to approach your integration. If you need support, our RevOps team is standing by.
Even with the best and most thorough planning, integration may come with a few bumps in the road. By addressing these challenges early, you’ll build a stack that drives measurable results.
Data silos – When your tools don’t talk to each other, information gets stuck and outdated and sales teams move slower. Solve this by syncing everything into your CRM as a single source of truth.
User adoption issues – To make the most of your tech stack, it’s important to get a pulse on your sales enablement team's technical knowledge about the tools. An initial, official onboarding is a good start with plenty of time for Q&A.
Training gaps – As playbooks and systems mature, sales managers can offer ongoing coaching, sales training sessions and quick reference guides to ensure sales reps are as confident about the tools as they are about your products.
Investing in sales enablement technology is only half the equation. At Kuno, we know that good sales performance comes from aligning those tools with a strategy, the right content and a process your teams will use.
With decades of experience across B2B and enterprise sales environments, we’ve helped companies modernize their sales operations by designing customized tech stacks that connect marketing and sales teams, streamline workflows and put useful insights directly into the hands of reps.
Whether it’s building out CRM systems, optimizing content delivery or creating analytics dashboards, our goal is always the same: to make selling easier and more effective.
And we don’t stop at implementation. From continuous optimization to ongoing training and support, we’re there to make sure your sales enablement strategy keeps driving results long after launch. Schedule a consultation to start building a sales enablement strategy that truly works.