Instead of the efficient methods that may generate a greater number of highly qualified leads (and make reps more inclined to prospecting), the majority of sales representatives, unfortunately, still rely on antiquated and unsuccessful sales prospecting strategies.
You must exert the necessary effort and concentration, just like with every other part of the sales process. This is the only effective technique to prospect so that you don't waste time on leads that aren't qualified or appropriate for your goods or services.
Use these contemporary sales prospecting strategies to uncover prospects you can engage with, serve, and ultimately turn into customers.
Methods For Sales Prospecting
Any approach a salesperson takes to generate new leads or communicate with current leads is referred to as sales prospecting. Depending on the sales organization and the industry, effective prospecting techniques may include warm phone calls, social selling, email outreach, and event networking.
Outbound and inbound prospecting were two very distinct sorts of prospecting in the past. With an outbound strategy, the salesman had to make "cold" calls and send emails to potential customers who had not expressed an interest in speaking with them.
In contrast, inbound sales encouraged salespeople to cultivate connections with their prospects and to only contact or email individuals who had shown interest in their goods or service.
Today, the majority of sales professionals concur that a mix of inbound and outbound selling is the ideal strategy for sales prospecting.
Prospecting Strategies For Sales
1. Place Affable Calls
Your first interactions with potential customers don't have to be utterly chilly; in fact, they shouldn't be. Warming up your prospects before making the first contact can be tremendously helpful.
Before you make the initial call or send the first email, familiarize the prospect with your name or your company affiliation to boost your chances of a more positive response.
Here are some suggestions for how to do it: get acquainted through a mutual connection, discuss a post the buyer made on social media, or "like" a LinkedIn status update or job change announcement
2. Take The Lead In Thought
You can create your reputation and trust before contacting new prospects by establishing yourself as a thought leader or subject matter expert in your business.
You can become a thought leader by launching a blog, contributing guest pieces to trade publications, and giving presentations at conferences and trade events.
This aids in introducing your name to leads prior to the first contact, which was covered in the first strategy.
3. Act As A Reliable Source
You need to do more than just sell if you want to succeed as a salesperson. After the transaction is complete, you must continue to be your client's go-to resource and offer assistance.
You can improve your chances of receiving referrals from satisfied clients by shifting your role from salesperson of goods and services to solution provider.
When the time comes for you to introduce yourself to a potential prospect, lean on these recommendations. Before and after the transaction, when you become a resource for your customers, they will remember you and be eager to assist you in return.
4. Make A Script Reference
Referencing a simple script when prospecting can help novice salespeople avoid awkward pauses, utilize the appropriate terminology, and address typical objections.
Sales professionals with years of experience frequently advise against utilizing a script in order to appear more natural during conversations.
However, some people still follow a script since it is so ingrained in their heads that it sounds authentic and improvised. However, whether you follow a script or not, be sure to pay attention to your prospects' needs and adjust your conversation accordingly.
5. Avoid Selling
Although prospecting is the first stage of selling, it is not selling in and of itself. Finding prospects that can be qualified and added to the sales funnel is the goal. These procedures must be followed before selling may start.
In order to succeed in the sales environment of today, you must put an emphasis on developing relationships when prospecting. If you start selling too soon, the prospect will feel unnecessary pressure.
Building a foundation of trust can make you and the prospect more at ease with one another, making the use of selling strategies more effective later on.
6. Continue
Follow up at every stage of the deal and keep the prospect informed. A call or email helps you establish a relationship with your point of contact, whether you're passing over new resources or confirming the time for your next meeting.
Additionally, rather than just "checking in," it allows you the chance to strengthen your position as the prospect's go-to resource.
7. Employ Video
By integrating a video into your outreach, you can further pique prospects' interest. Use it to introduce yourself, offer extra content, or summarize your qualifying, connect, or discovery call.
Add "video" to the subject line to get the prospects' attention, and attach a thumbnail image linking to the video.
8. A Time Slot Set Aside For Prospecting
Schedule time each day specifically for prospecting. Prospecting is difficult; according to more than 40% of salespeople, it is the most difficult step in the sales process.
You'll benefit in the long term by scheduling time to prospect because you'll be actively building your pipeline, which frequently leads to more talks and higher win rates.
9. Spend Some Time Online
Utilize social selling techniques to reach prospects wherever they are. A sizable portion of those who have looked at your product are probably active on social networking sites like Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, etc. Respond to their inquiries and distribute information that is pertinent to their research.
And the social selling activities you engage in can increase your sales. In actuality, organizations with a regular social selling procedure are 40% more likely to achieve their revenue targets than those without one.
10. Organize A Webinar
Because you can see that the attendees are interested in the subject, webinars are an ideal area to find leads. Join forces with other businesses in your sector to hold a webinar on a subject that will benefit both parties.
Ask your audience a question after the webinar to determine who is interested in learning more about your offering. Think about creating a survey where respondents are asked "Yes" or "No" questions such as "I'm ready for a demo" or "I'd like to learn more about [Your company name]."
Within 24 hours, get in touch with individuals who gave a favorable response to your poll or post-webinar survey and arrange a time for them to learn more. As for those who claimed they weren't yet ready to buy, don't give up on them.
Put them in nurturing campaigns, and monitor their buying position over the following few months by keeping in touch.
11. Request Suggestions
If you don't ask for recommendations, you're not using your most effective prospecting resource. Ask your prospect or champion if they know of someone in their professional network you might be able to contact after you've successfully completed a new deal.
It's also a good idea to ask for new connections again during the subsequent follow-up emails throughout the coming months.
12. Make Contacts At Events
Find the appropriate events to attend first. Determine the reasons for people's attendance at conferences, if the issues on the program are relevant to your ideal client, the size of the community, and the overall goal of the event.
You might want to stay away from conferences geared toward design leaders or creative directors who aren't intimately familiar with the software their designers are using if you offer project management software to entry- and mid-level designers.
Plan which seminars you'll attend, which happy hours or networking events you'll work on, and whether or not your company will have a booth or a speaking presence at the events you've determined will provide you the most ROI.
13. Provide Responses To Queries On Forums
Find ways to inform your audience about the trends and best practices in your sector so that they can eventually be informed about your product.
Like-minded people can post questions to online forums like LinkedIn Groups and Quora and receive responses from subject-matter experts. Participate on these platforms, and begin by listening.
Before responding to queries, familiarize yourself with how inquiries are made, study the acceptable and unacceptable, and join in on a few dialogues. Once you've established some influence in the community, start looking for questions you can objectively respond to.
For instance, if you sell equipment for huge agricultural operations, you might respond to a query about how AI is affecting farming.
14. Participate In Twitter Discussions
Twitter chats are a powerful social marketing strategy and a terrific method to establish relationships with prospects. Meg Prater, managing blog editor at HubSpot, explains Twitter chats in a recent piece on finding B2B sales leads: "Twitter chats are when a group of individuals meets on Twitter to discuss a specific topic, trend, or interest area using an agreed-upon hashtag.
If you sell PPC tools, for instance, you might participate in the weekly #PPCChat, where industry professionals express their opinions and questions and chat runners or guest hosts provide a discussion topic in advance.
The chat host asks a question, and participants respond by using the hashtag for the conversation.
Prater advises participants to attend the talks frequently and to know when to speak and when to listen. You'll meet new individuals every week, and if you've established a foundation of trust, you can ask whether it's okay to follow up with a couple of them offline.
Instead of simply following your tried-and-true sales prospecting plan, try something new. Practice various approaches until you find the ideal blend of current and successful sales strategies that will support your prospecting efforts and your sales objectives.