How to get started with social selling

How to get started with social selling
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Are you tired of cold calling? Hoping that after the 8th message a decision maker will finally call you back wanting to do business—Dream on. There’s a different strategy I would like to suggest: social selling. Social selling is when sales people use social media to find and engage with new sales prospects. It’s the practice of leveraging social media to build brand awareness, establishes your expertise, and engage directly with potentials customers. By utilizing social selling you connect, educate, and then you engage directly to build the relationships and then close a sale.

Simply be Found

75% of B2B buyers leverage social media to research in their decision making. Why is this really critical now? A 2014 Google study, showed that 46% of decision makers are now aged between 18 and 34 years old which is the largest social media user demographic. So if your target customer is hanging out on social, you need to be there too.

Three ways to be active on social media

  • Posting updates at least a few times a week: a mix company news and useful articles
  • Target only the social channels your audience frequents
  • Build engagement: Participate in groups, chats and dialogue with your connections

Use social scheduling software such as Sprout Social to build a daily schedule of content to share. Just remember to go back and check your social accounts a 2-3 times a day to be engaging.

Go for the Relationship First

Sales reps are taught to sometimes be aggressive when it comes to closing a sale, but that won’t cut it on social media. The name of the game is adding value through helping content. Consider social media like a giant cocktail party. Be more interested than interesting. Don’t be the guy who’s blasting through the party, handing out his business cards without even talking to people. Don’t push your product directly. Instead, work on building relationships. It will take longer to close a sale, but in the long run, you will have more information to make a strong proposal for business.

How Can You Get the Attention of Potential Leads?

  • Answer questions
  • Share the content of your potential customers
  • Demonstrate your expertise through case studies and online courses

Services like Kajabi can help you sell more

Professional service providers can productize their expertise with online digital products. You can turn popular content into a sellable product; think about launching a group coaching program, a membership site, online courses, or webinar replays.

Leverage Social for Listening

You can learn so much if you just listen. By following people in social media you are targeting to learn valuable insights into how to better reach this audience.

Here’s how to be a better listener and get the right information out of social media:

  • Search for hashtags that your audience uses in social
  • Participate in industry related-FB groups, LinkedIn groups or Twitter chats
  • Follow and listen to your actual customers and competitors

Reward social media connections for sharing

Use a service like chirpify to connect in social and chat to build an online loyalty program. You want to reward customers who engage and share things about your brand across all social channels, not just when they make purchases.

Stay in Touch

It’s important to continue to interact with your leads through social media. If he’s not ready to do business keep, wooing him via social media. You just want to be top of mind. Don’t be aggressive (just like with real dating); instead, be consistent and helpful. Monitor what he’s talking about. Continue to share his content and comment where relevant. Social media provides an excellent platform to stay in touch. If you stay in front of him on social media, he’ll be more likely to come back to you ready to do business at some point.

Learning to drum up business online via social media is a valuable skill for any business owner to learn. Once mastered, it will change your business.

This article with originally published as How to Use Social Media Close Business on www.succeedasyourownboss.com

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