Social Selling allows businesses to hyper-focus on their target audiences in order to build trusting relationships, foster social credibility, and reach or exceed their sales goals. Almost half of the global population is now on social media, so it is paramount that companies use modern sales tactics, such as social selling, in order to increase outreach to drive revenue. As sellers use more sales technology, and not only social media, it has evolved into virtual selling to connect products and services to buyers. Rather than making and closing deals, social selling is pertaining to businesses’ lead generation by nurturing its potential audience.
Social Selling
Gone are the days of traditional selling, which feels impersonal to buyers today. Rather than promotional emails or mass postings, social selling fine tunes a business’ ability to find their customers and develop a relationship with them digitally. Cold-calling and door-to-door practices are no match for the convenience and power of social selling. The benefits of social selling can be seen in the statistics below:
Four Elements of Social Selling
- Create a Professional Brand: It is imperative a company has perceived value to customers for them to put trust into it. Establish your position by staying active in the industry and not pushing sales on the wrong audience.
- Find the Perfect Prospects: Build a rapport with the right prospects, not a contact list. Use social selling methods to find who meets your criteria and create a connection.
- Be Authentic and Engaging: Part of being authentic is finding the leads that are actually interested in what is being sold. Take the time to be personal when reaching out. Engage with topics they are invested in.
- Build Trusting Relationships: Maintain the work that’s been done by staying at the top of mind of consumers when they are finally ready to purchase. Stay in touch, but do not be overbearing. Nurture relationships that create sales.
LinkedIn Will Lead You.
While other social media has tools for social selling, LinkedIn is the best channel for businesses finding leads as it is the business-centric and professional network. With over 590 million users in 200 countries, the connections are endless for your business and sales. Each user’s profile contains essential information other social media does not encourage or provide such as career summaries, professional skills, education, and industry. Sellers can use this information as parameters in order to find prospects fitting to a target market. It can also be used to start a conversation to lead to a connection or relationship with a person or business.
In order for social selling to be effective, LinkedIn suggests that a business:
- Optimizes their social media profiles and feeds
- Join LinkedIn groups and relevant forums
- Enable social listening alerts
- Share content that boosts credibility
- Utilize LinkedIn Sales Navigator
Time to Buy & Utilize LinkedIn Sales Navigator
While simply using LinkedIn can help anyone find and generate leads for selling, prospecting, or making personal, professional connections, LinkedIn has a paid software system in order to social sell at the top level. LinkedIn Sales Navigator is a sales platform designed to make virtual interpersonal selling more efficient by easily connecting to the right people and businesses. Sales navigator integrates with CRM, uses LinkedIn’s vast network to build relationships, and has constantly updating data and tools to create new business.
Investing in LinkedIn Sales Navigator for Business to Business (B2B) relationships is essential in this day and age with social media and the digital marketplace. There are 3 plans offered, starting at $79.99 per month if billed annually. The tiers of the features and pricing are Core, Advanced, and Advanced Plus.
The price tag is worth the value for businesses that want to create relationships through social selling, virtual selling, and social media marketing.
Objectives and Features of LinkedIn Sales Navigator
- Target.
Advanced Lead and Company Search
Lead Recommendations
CRM Integration - Understand.
Real-Time Sales Updates
Notes and Tags
Who’s Viewed Your Profile - Engage.
Inmail Messages
Smart Links Presentations
TeamLink
Target the right buyers, understand key insights, and engage with personalized outreach.
Source: https://business.linkedin.com/sales-solutions/sales-navigator#Engage
Lead Generations and Social Selling Through Sales Navigator
With all the capabilities LinkedIn provides through Sales Navigator, the traditional process of finding leads is becoming more and more obsolete. Everything needed is at your fingertips in the platform. The information and data available is vast compared to having to buy market research which maybe outdated and stale like businesses did 20 to 30 years ago. The process of social selling is even more efficient because a brand is able to fine tune their audience search and find credible, high-quality leads for their business to develop and sell to.
Not only does Sales Navigator help you find leads, the platform keeps you up to date on the lead’s insights through updates and organization tools to file accounts and tag them to then sync into a business’ CRM system. Another feature is Inmail Messaging, which allows you to contact anyone in their 500 million+ network even when you are not connected with them. This ability makes the introduction and pitch connection efficient by eliminating a step in the process. A company is able to have a combined network in Sales Navigator, where all the leads of individuals are seen at once. The implementation strategy of Social Selling in a business can be built by The LinkedIn Sales Navigator. Keeping your image professional, advanced searching your ideal client, filtering the leads list for business, and connecting to them with Social Selling are ways to generate profits from your efforts and time.
Stay Consistent with Relationships Made
When leads and connections are made, make sure not to lose contact because that might entail a missed deal or sale. Use LinkedIn to continue the legwork you have done with Sales Navigator and Social Selling to find your right prospects and audience. Engage with people, businesses, and leads at an appropriate amount to keep you on their mind for buying. Like their posts to show interest, comment when you have something relevant to add, and share content based on what they want to see. This is so that they are more motivated and inclined to make a purchase or connection. Social Selling has the same foundations as traditional methods, but its formula and available counterparts, such as LinkedIn Social Navigator, are changing the sales landscape and lead generation in a big way.
Teaching Social Media 