ConnectionSphere
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- Jun 14, 2013
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Ultimate Guide to Sales Prospecting on LinkedIn: Tips, Techniques and Tools
What is Sales Prospecting?
Sales prospecting is what it sounds like: Sifting through a mountain of businesses and individuals to uncover the prospects who are most likely to convert into paying customers with a little effort, like a miner panning for gold.
Like prospecting for gold, it takes a lot of time. But first it also relies on knowing where to look.
Complicating the process is the changing way businesses and individuals find vendors, qualify them and make the decision to strike a deal.
In the digital world of today, where roughly two-thirds of the B2B buyers make their decision via online content, the rules of sales prospecting have changed.
LinkedIn for Sales Prospecting
With over 450M members, LinkedIn is at the forefront of connecting B2B buyers and sellers. One of the most important sales techniques is to understand how buyer behaves – making prospecting easier with greater success. A recent IDC social buying study has shown:
- 75% of the B2B buyers use Social Media to make buying decisions.
- 50% of B2B buyers use LinkedIn as a source for making purchase decisions.
- 76% of B2B buyers prefer to work with recommendations from their professional network.
Forbes says the sales process has shifted as the Age of the Seller is replaced by the Age of the Customer.
"The buying decision and access to information about how to make that decision are now controlled by the customer, leaving sellers with control of just the product," Forbes said:
"After 10,000 years of needing a salesperson to provide information to make a decision, buyers are acquiring much of that information on their own online.
"Prospects are now self-qualifying themselves, and then pre-qualify prospective vendors they choose to meet with, perhaps as few as two, or even just one.
"Prospects are essentially ruling competitors in or out before first contact, often before the business knows the prospect even exists."
How does this work?
According to LinkedIn:
75 percent of the business-to-business buyers use social media to make buying decisions.
50 percent of B2B buyers use LinkedIn as a source for making purchase decisions.
76 percent of B2B buyers prefer to work with recommendations from their professional network.
Sales Prospecting Techniques
1. Create a strong professional brand
Be an active participant in your industry. Join LinkedIn groups and engage in discussions.
2. Ask insightful questions
Follow news about your prospect’s business. Join LinkedIn groups so that you are in-tune with any relevant discussions. Connect with prospects to understand their LinkedIn activity and what they care about. Find and share interesting industry publications with your prospects.
3. Build trusted relationships
Get introduced through referrals or common connections. Meet the needs of the prospect first, selling second. Sell the problem and the solution, not the product.
What does this mean for your company's sales prospecting techniques?
Let's take a closer look at some proven sales prospecting techniques and approaches.
Build a strong personal brand
A strong personal brand shows you are an active participant in your industry. It leads to more inquiries from prospects. It leads to more responses to your communications.
In an age when sales prospects are pre-qualifying prospective vendors and sales reps online, you can’t afford to let your personal brand disqualify you from the buying process.
To stay on top of your game, your personal brand needs consistent attention because an unattended online presence can grow stale quickly.
Always Be Connecting
Networking has always contributed to sales success, but today networking is absolutely essential for finding high-quality prospects and gaining access to the buying process.
People buy from people they like and trust, and there’s no easier way to become liked and trusted than having a mutual connection vouch for you.
By expanding your network and staying engaged with the key connections, you are creating warm paths to reach prospects and opportunities to earn referrals.
Lead with insights or trail those who do
Today’s buyers expect more from sales reps and the best way to capture the attention of demanding buyers is to lead with insights.
Give your prospect a clear, compelling reason to meet with you to learn more. It shows you’ve done your homework, and it establishes the all-important relevance factor at the outset.
As the saying goes, you only get one chance to make a first impression. Make it count. Do your homework and wow sales prospects with specifics. Anything less is forgettable.
Prospect smarter, not harder
The ability to focus on the right people and companies daily is what separates those who prospect smarter.
Find the right people efficiently
Keep track of leads and existing relationships
Prioritize the right companies, prospects and sales activities
LinkedIn automated Sales Prospecting Tools
Various automated sales prospecting tools, enables sales professionals to prospect smarter, not harder. These key features will enhance your sales prospecting techniques:
- Get relevant insights on your accounts and leads & new potential leads.
- Quickly discover more people through sniper targeting.
- connect with prospects and close sales directly.
- Contact decision makers in a credible way, even if you're not connected.
Conclusion
If you take one thing away from this article it should be that when done right, LinkedIn automated marketing is one of the best marketing strategies for any business. Just imagine having hundreds of warm leads sending you direct message inquiries every month. That’s what strategic automation can achieve.
