Landing conversions is a challenge in the digital age.
Rather than following up with leads or making cold calls, the modern sales process has even more barriers that make it hard to work through and develop meaningful client relationships. This is especially true with marketing strategies from countless businesses flooding someone’s inbox or social media feed. With these challenges in mind, you may be asking yourself, “How can I stand out from the crowd and make the sale?”
The answer boils down to personalization, and if you’re not sure where to start, here are 3 ways to use it in the sales process:
1. Request a Meeting, Not a Sale
The biggest trap that overzealous salespeople find themselves in is leading off with their pitch too soon.
Keep in mind that your potential clients receive tons of emails every day, and the last thing they want is another pitch asking them to spend money on services they may not need. Instead, use your cold calls or cold emails to request a meeting, not a sale.
By taking the time to research your prospect and get a sense of what their pain points may be, you can easily structure a message that explains how your product or service may make their life easier.
Once you have their attention, it is important that you make it easy for them to accept the meeting. If setting up a call or in-person meeting takes too long or requires too many emails back-and-forth you may lose the meeting. One of the best ways to make meeting scheduling easy is to use a once click scheduling application like Mixmax.
Using these types of tools allows you to send an email asking for a meeting, as well as, including times that work for your team without all the back and forth emailing. The software integrates with your Google calendar to see when you are free, then includes those times as options in the meeting request email to the client. The client can then simply choose a time that works for them instantly.
This will save time back-and-forth with the client and create a better experience for everyone. Once you schedule the call or meeting, then you can move forward with your pitch. This also shows your prospect that you respect their time and gives them a perception that you will be easy to do work with.
2. Know Your Customer Beforehand
Even before you connect with a client, it’s important for you to know who they are and what their business is.
For example, visit a prospect’s LinkedIn page to see where they went to school, what their career trajectory has been over the years, what their current role is now, and look for ways to connect your products or services to their overall mission. Most importantly, find a way to give them value before you reach out. This may mean finding content your prospect or their company as published about a problem they or their industry has that’s relevant to your solution. This way when you reach out you can reference the article and create a clear picture on how you can be the solution.
With a foundation of information to build from, you can take several routes to make connections, such as…
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Introduce a proposal according to a recent post they made
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Follow-up with them from a previous conversation you had that relates to your product or services
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Interact with them in a friendly way by liking and commenting on their activity to generate trust as a business contact.
In fact, many social media platforms offer insight into who your potential clients are, so why not use them to your advantage to tailor personal sales experiences and expand your network? Using platforms like Crunchbase and LinkedIn can be incredible resources to identify prospects and research the companies and their employees.
Once you get a sense of who your prospect is as a person, you can move past being a stranger and position yourself as an industry asset.
3. Maintain Regular Communication
Lastly, nobody responds well to a contact that only reaches out every quarter with a deadline to fill.
You want to eliminate your personae as a salesperson and maintain regular communication with a personal touch. This means embedding yourself as a resource for the prospect, as well as showing a genuine interest in their day-to-day operations. If you are able to show them that you have the knowledge and expertise to help them solve the problem you are 10x more likely to get a response when you reach out.
Think about it. Are you more likely to respond to an email that says, “Hey! My name is Steve Smith, and I provide sales training and consulting in New York. I would love to introduce my services. Is there a time this week that works for you?”
OR…
“Hi [name], I got you live on my first call, and when you hire me, I’ll train your sales team how to do the exact same thing.”
The second message is much more engaging and shows how effective the service is. Once you make contact with a prospect you need to stay engaged.
For instance, you could do any of the following to keep lines of communication open, while making a good impression:
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Send a handwritten letter to a prospect that congratulates them on a recent promotion or birthday
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Reshare their articles or posts online to show interest and enhance their engagements
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Extend recommendations to your prospect from other clients who may benefit from the connection
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Send a small gift like tickets to their favorite sports team’s game or a free round of golf at a course they like
Whatever route you choose, just be sure to make your presence known. People like to do business with people they know, so if you’re trying to land a huge client, you first have to connect yourself with their network.
