Inside sales used to mean the junior end of a sales team: smaller deals, phone only, while the senior people travelled. That picture is out of date. Harvard Business Review documented the shift towards inside sales in 2013 and described the line between the two models blurring in 2019. Today most outbound teams are inside sales teams, whatever they call themselves.
What is inside sales?
Inside sales is a sales model defined by channel, not by seniority or deal size. In the words of Zoltners, Sinha and Lorimer in HBR, inside sales is selling done over the telephone and the web, while field sales is done face to face. An inside seller might prospect, run discovery calls, give demos and close, all without meeting the customer.
The model covers several roles. SDRs and BDRs open conversations, account executives run and close deals, and account managers grow existing customers. What they share is the way they reach people, not the stage they work on.
The model suits most B2B products sold today. Buyers are used to video meetings, software can be shown on a shared screen, and contracts are signed electronically. The cases that still need a visit are usually large, complex purchases where trust is built over several meetings, or products that have to be seen on site.
How does inside sales differ from field sales?
The two models differ in how a seller spends time. A field seller spends much of the week travelling, which limits meetings per day but builds depth with each account. An inside seller can hold many more conversations in the same week, at a lower cost per conversation, but each one has less physical presence.
| Inside sales | Field sales | |
|---|---|---|
| Main channel | Phone, email, video, messaging | In-person meetings |
| Conversations per week | Many | Few, limited by travel |
| Cost per contact | Lower: no travel | Higher: travel and time |
| Typical deal | Small to large, increasingly large | Large and complex |
| Sales cycle | Shorter on average | Longer on average |
| Typical metrics | Activities, conversations, meetings, pipeline | Meetings held, deal size, win rate |
Qualitative comparison based on HBR (Martin, 2013; Zoltners, Sinha and Lorimer, 2019). No figures are given because the sources do not give comparable numbers for every row.
The line keeps moving. Steve W. Martin, writing in HBR in 2013, described sales leaders shifting resources from field to inside teams, while noting their own bias towards field selling. Six years later, Zoltners and colleagues described a hybrid where field sellers do much of their work remotely and inside sellers handle larger deals than before.
Harvard Business Review is the main reference for the shift between models. Steve W. Martin's The Trend That Is Changing Sales (2013) documented the move from field to inside sales, and his Twelve Sales Metrics that Matter Most (2013) compared how the two models measure success. Zoltners, Sinha and Lorimer's Technology Is Blurring the Line Between Field Sales and Inside Sales (2019) gives the working definition used on this page.
Which tools does an inside sales team run on?
An inside sales team runs on a small stack that replaces the car and the meeting room. Each tool covers one part of the remote conversation.
- A list with verified contacts: companies that fit the ideal customer profile, with working email addresses and direct phone numbers.
- Sequences: planned emails and follow-ups that run while reps are on calls.
- A phone and video setup: a dialler or calling app and a video meeting tool.
- One inbox for replies: so answers from several mailboxes and channels reach the right person.
- A CRM: the record of every account, conversation and next step.
Martin's survey of more than 100 sales leaders found that inside and field teams prioritise different metrics. Inside teams lean on activity and conversion numbers that this stack records automatically.
The stack only works if the list is right. A dialler and a sequence tool make it easy to contact many people quickly, which also makes it easy to contact many wrong people quickly. Inside teams that do well spend real time on who goes into the list before anyone starts sending.
Is outbound the same as inside sales?
No, but they overlap heavily. Inside sales describes how a team sells: remotely. Outbound sales describes who starts the conversation: the seller, not the buyer. An inside team can work inbound leads only, and a field team can prospect outbound by visiting companies.
In practice, most outbound work today is done by inside teams. Cold email, cold calling and messages on a social network are all remote channels. If your team prospects outbound and does not travel to first meetings, it is an inside sales team, even if no one uses the term.
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between inside sales and outside sales?
Inside sales is done remotely, by phone, email and video. Outside sales, also called field sales, is done in person at the customer's site. Many teams now mix both.
Is inside sales the same as telemarketing?
No. Telemarketing usually means scripted, high-volume calls, often to consumers. Inside sales is consultative B2B selling over remote channels, including discovery, demos and closing.
Can inside sales close large deals?
Yes, increasingly so. HBR's 2019 analysis described inside sellers handling larger deals than before, as buyers grew comfortable buying remotely.
- Harvard Business Review, Steve W. Martin: The Trend That Is Changing Sales (2013)
- Harvard Business Review, Zoltners, Sinha and Lorimer: Technology Is Blurring the Line Between Field Sales and Inside Sales (2019)
- Harvard Business Review, Steve W. Martin: The Twelve Sales Metrics that Matter Most (2013)
