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The Center for Sales Strategy Blog

Three Simple Steps to Start Social Selling

Three Simple Steps to Start Social Selling

Social media gives salespeople opportunities they just didn't have several years ago — even three years ago!

It's much easier to connect with prospects now, and as long as you do it right, you can see significant results (i.e. landing more appointments with target prospects).

Here are three simple steps to get started with social selling.

Topics: Social Media social selling

How To Social Sell Across These Different Platforms

How To Social Sell Across These Different Platforms

Social selling is the process of leveraging your social network to sell products or services.

In fact, 78% of social sellers outsell competitors who don't use social media. The most important thing to remember when doing social selling is that each platform is different. What works on one platform may not work on another. It’s important to understand how each platform works before trying to sell on it.

Topics: Social Media social selling

A Social Media Strategy for Recruitment

Social Media Recruitment

The pandemic has made the job search for both the candidate and the recruiter challenging.

Never has a tight labor market had a deluge of resources in the talent search coupled with savvy job seekers. Online recruiting is not new. In fact, in the mid-1990s, the first online job boards changed the way candidates applied for jobs.  Goodbye cotton resume paper, and hello to the digital CV.   

There's no question that organizations worldwide are searching for talent, and that net is wider than ever with work from home and work from anywhere.

Topics: Social Media recruitment

How Social Selling Can Damage Your Professional Brand

strengthen your personal brand with social sellingSocial selling is a powerful part of the approach in our now transparent sales landscape.

By now, every salesperson should be embracing LinkedIn, Twitter, and even Facebook, as they plan to approach and attempt to engage with new business prospects.

Whether you choose to use paid services or choose to navigate social media on your own, it’s a platform where you can earn trust and establish credibility with your very best prospects.

It’s also a platform that if used incorrectly, could damage your credibility with your very best prospects.

Topics: Social Media personal brand social selling

Why Thought Leadership Works in Sales + How to Get Started

why thought leadership works in sales

In uncertain times, prospects and clients conduct even more online research before working with a vendor or purchasing a product. Thought leadership is vital to brand differentiation, but when done right, it greatly improves sales performance.

The thought leadership position is certainly an advantageous position to have, as it helps with generating sales, lead generation, recruitment and retention, and new business opportunities. Sometimes this thought leadership position comes completely organically, but many times it's part of an overall sales strategy.

Topics: Social Media thought leadership sales strategy

Statistics to Prove B2B Sales Can Benefit from Social Selling

Statistics to Prove B2B Sales Can Benefit from Social Selling

Even though using social media to sell has been widely adopted in many industries, the 2019 Media Sales Report revealed that social selling is currently more hype than reality. Only 12% of sales managers surveyed saying their salespeople are using social media effectively to set appointments with prospects.

Research indicates that sales leaders still aren't convinced of social selling's value. And many salespeople simply don't know how to go about becoming a social seller. If you still need some encouragement when it comes to your social selling initiative, use these statistics for inspiration.

Topics: Social Media media sales report social selling

6 Ways Sellers Can Improve Engagement When Utilizing LinkedIn for Social Selling

LinkedIn is the most popular professional social networking site out there, which means if you have a B2B business or cater to other professionals in a specific industry, it could be the ideal platform for growing your business.

By now, you’ve updated your LinkedIn profile using the Ultimate LinkedIn Profile Checklist. Now you want more engagement, you want your LinkedIn posts to attract more viewers and increase shares—but where do you even start?

Topics: Social Media sales strategy prospecting social selling

The Ultimate LinkedIn Profile Checklist for Sales Professionals

linkedin checklist for sales pros From personal branding and thought leadership to prospecting, lead nurturing, and recruiting—there are many benefits to using LinkedIn as a sales professional. The problem is that sales professionals don't have time to set up or update the basics of their LinkedIn accounts to best represent them and their company. 

You can't build a great building on a weak foundation, and the LinkedIn profile is just that: the foundation that could affect the success of your social efforts. Use this checklist to ensure your profile is updated and the best representation of your personal brand, the products you sell, and what you have to offer a prospect.

Topics: Social Media sales strategy prospecting

Social Selling: 10 Social Media Best Practices for Salespeople

salespeople social sellingIn an ever-changing sales landscape, maintaining a healthy personal brand on social media has become a necessary tool for sales professionals to build and maintain relationships with prospects. According to a Forrester Consulting study, Social Selling: A New B2B Imperative, “49% of B2B enterprises have developed a formal social selling program, and 28 percent are in the process of doing so.”

Even though using social media to sell has been widely adopted in many industries, our 2019 Media Sales Report found that only 12% of sales managers said their salespeople are using social media effectively to set appointments with prospects.

If you aren’t utilizing social selling as part of your sales strategy, you could be losing sales to more social-savvy salespeople. 

Topics: Social Media Sales personal brand

How to be a Thought Leader on LinkedIn

establish thought leadership on linkedinThe starting point of being a thought leader on LinkedIn is to use social selling as a way to connect with high potential prospects. Through social selling, you can illustrate empathy, expertise, and problem-solving ability which helps you build trust and create value for those who want to engage with you.

I am still surprised by the number of salespeople I meet who don’t use social selling as part of their attempts to connect with a high-potential account. Many tell me they are connected with current customers, but not with prospects.

I tell every salesperson who doesn’t attempt to connect with prospects on LinkedIn that they are missing out. For every seller I talk to who doesn’t use social selling, I know of one who is, and who is successful at generating new business. So why wouldn’t a salesperson add social selling to their approach?

Topics: Social Media