I’ll start with the trite and overused message that Covid has changed everything.  We know this well. This article is about what do we need to do in order to thrive in sales in the future despite this unfortunate reality we are all facing. 

I have been a Manchester United fan since I was 13 years old. As an American kid from California in the 1980’s this was quite unusual. But, once I learned about the fanaticism of English Football (soccer) I was hooked.  It was unlike any community of people that I had ever experienced.  Now that English Football is so accessible with TV, the Internet and social media, I have a true community of fellow fans. 

It is like this with our business life especially for sales professionals and sales leaders. The power of your community, especially now, if more important than ever. Marketing departments and sales enablement are not going to solve the sales problems. If you have not watched it already, Gartner published a panel discussion last week called, 8 Questions to Prepare CSO’s for Post-Pandemic Success.  

You can find the entire webinar here,  and it features Steve Herz, Maria Boulden and Dave Egloff from Gartner who talk about companies that have a “digital hope” strategy. I wrote a summary on this panel discussion and highlighted 3 big takeaways from it that you can access here. 

For sales teams to be successful moving into 2022, they need to be trained and equipped differently than ever before. Here are 3 key action steps sales teams MUST do with their digital presence and behavior in social media to increase pipeline and close more deals. There is a bullet point summary below if you prefer. 

To learn more about the FunnelAmplified social selling training program, click here.

1. Publish Consistently

Digital is our platform for communication now. Social media can be fast paced and filled with many many messages per day. Hootsuite published recently there are more than 2 million social posts per day on LinkedIn.  That number seems big but consider there are more than 756 million LinkedIn users in 2021. The data shows that 40% of LinkedIn users login daily. 

What does this mean for you and your team?  Opportunity. 

More than 302 million people login to LinkedIn daily and only 2 million posts are shared.  This means there are a lot of people looking, reading and engaging but not publishing content. When teams begin to post, it is an opportunity to be seen, known and have repetitive messages shared with your digital network. 

2. What Should You Publish

Besides not publishing frequently, the other big mistake newbies to social media make the type of content they publish. I often hear sales and marketing leaders say “we tried social media and it didn’t work.”  Communication works. But, how we communicate and what we communicate is the important. 

Consider a live networking event like the evening cocktail party the night before a conference. It is a night of social activity. It is a night to kick off the conference, the workshops and the sales activity that will take place in the booths. When everyone has a cocktail in their hand and they are being social, is it the right time to start a conversation talking about your product or value proposition?  NO! 

It is a time to be social. It is a time to talk about vacations, family, where people are from and other personal, social topics. Others are drawn into these type of conversations. It is time to be social. Social time creates conversations. A good, social conversation leads to a relationship that is based on familiarity and trust.  Some of my best sales came from relationships established in social environments that lead to business conversations. A good conversation, with a strategic customer during the cocktail time, leads to a better opportunity that person will gladly walk into your booth to have a business conversation. Social media is exactly the same. 

3. The power of the people

Digital and social shifted the power to individuals rather than their brands. Consider this example, how many followers does your business have on social media and their database? 

The average person has 1,000 connections on LinkedIn. Consider a company with 1500 team members, that is 1.5 million connections.  Does your brand have that many followers and email subscribers? Most likely it does not. 

Digital and social have made it quicker and easier for people to connect with people. We have direct access to nearly anyone in your industry. Success in creating influence, large network and being effective with your digital network lies in how you connect and communicate with them. Consider #2 above for insight into how to do this best. 

Summary

• People connect with people better than they connect with businesses

• Buyers look for trusted advisors and experts who can help them solve their business challenges

• Most sales professionals reach out to buyers with a value proposition or copy from their website

• Most buyers ignore sales messages because they don’t want to be sold.

• Buyers do nearly 70% of their research on their own BEFORE they reach out to a sales professional. This is why buyers tend to ignore cold sales messages.

Companies who are training and equipping their team members to use their digital presence and behavior in social media to first create conversations, like in a networking event or cocktail party, are building high quality relationships that lead to highly engaged buyer conversations earlier in their sales journey. The result? More wins. Bigger wins. 

Who can use more wins and bigger wins? 

At FunnelAmplified, this is what we do. We are the only Social Selling Platform for Sales Teams that trains, equips and provides daily social KPI’s that empower sales professionals to use their digital presence and behavior in social media to influence their industry at scale and close more deals.

If your sales are challenging and work-from-home as made it difficult to prospect, let’s talk.