5 Best Sales Prospecting Techniques to Use in 2022
Tried and True Sales Prospecting Techniques
Sales prospecting is an essential part of any business. It is how a salesperson identifies, reaches out, and builds relationships with leads and potential clients.
Effective prospecting methods have evolved throughout the years. Keeping up with the latest techniques in today's hyper-connected and digitally-driven world can be challenging.
Cold calls alone are no longer enough. A robust mix of inbound and outbound prospecting efforts such as email and social media outreach, social selling, and networking at events is deemed more effective than a standalone phone call.
Regular outreach and having an updated Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system remain helpful. Many companies have been using automation such as email drip campaigns to nurture warm leads.
Social media has been an important channel for sales prospecting and social selling over the last decade. Social media influences the purchasing choices of almost 85% of decision-makers and executives.
Platforms like LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook have become treasure troves of information about company information and key contact persons, serving as reliable sources of leads. Many companies have started using platforms that give them business information and insights about organizations they care about.
It is essential to know and deploy tried-and-true prospecting strategies that work.
Though we’ve already talked a bit about sales prospecting, this article aims to teach you five of the best sales prospecting techniques that you can use immediately. We'll also discuss why these prospecting efforts work!
Sales Prospecting Techniques Best Practices
Sales prospecting is one of the most important aspects of any business, yet it can be one of the most daunting tasks. Over 40% of salespeople find prospecting the most challenging part of sales.
Luckily, best practices exist. Here are five sales prospecting techniques that have been proven to work:
Performing outreach through social media
More cold calling and cold emailing
Encouraging referrals from clients
Creating videos for your ideal customers
Hosting webinars for new lead automation
1. Perform Outreach Through Social Media
Social networks play a vital role in social selling and sales prospecting. They are practical and accessible marketing channels to find leads, tap relevant prospects, strengthen brand awareness, and build relationships with potential customers.
LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook are rich sources of information for customers' online behaviors, purchasing habits, feedback on products and services, and even contact information. With direct messaging features, leads have also become more accessible and easy to reach out to.
By using content marketing—posting to social media with stories and insights that relate to your target audience, it’s easier to build the credibility of your thought leaders and experts on social media. By regularly producing and posting content that addresses your customers’ pain points, your company can build its brand, pack the sales pipeline, and highlight its value proposition.
Joining LinkedIn/Facebook groups and creating Twitter threads enable your company and your salespeople to meet your customers where they are in the sales funnel by:
Engaging with followers
Answering frequently asked questions (FAQs)
Addressing customer pain points and issues
Getting involved in industry discussions
Sharing insights, how-to’s, and free resources
Building relationships with customers through social media makes your sales process more organic and trust-based, warming up prospecting efforts such as cold calls and emails.
Owler lets you see a company’s social media profiles, enabling you to quickly assess its presence and performance on social media.
2. More Cold Calling and Cold Emailing
Some people think that cold outreach is dead. However, cold calling and cold emailing have always been an essential part of the sales process—and they always will be.
Cold outreach uses email or phone calls to reach out to prospects for the first time.
Cold calling and emailing are essential in sales prospecting. They happen at the beginning of the sales cycle and allow you to get off on the right foot with cold prospects. Done well, they can define customer needs, establish rapport, and build confidence in your company from the beginning.
As cold calling and emailing happen at the top of the sales funnel, they may not always yield results or conversion. The primary goal of cold outreach is to kickstart customer relationships while introducing your company name, brand, and your offerings.
Cold calling and emailing are also effective ways to learn more about your market and potential customers, which will allow you to define better customer personas, gain valuable market insight, and refine your sales process.
You can warm up your prospecting approach by doing the following:
Know sufficient information about your prospect and align your messages according to their unique needs.
Research their pain points—know their feedback on products and services.
Find a shared connection and explore the potential for introductions.
Engage with their social content by liking their tweets, responding to Facebook posts, or congratulating them on a new job on LinkedIn.
Stay in the loop with the companies and contacts you are following. Owler Max instantly sends real-time news alerts and pushes newly published content to you.
3. Encourage Referrals from Clients
Asking for referrals— a form of word–of–mouth (WOM)—is one of the best types of outreach and sales prospecting techniques.
64% of marketers agree that WOM is the most effective form of marketing. It is the most trusted information source, resulting in five times more sales than paid ads.
Referrals are not just an excellent prospecting strategy; they also serve as social proof and testimonials. Consider satisfied customers as your best brand ambassadors. Prospective customers like hearing from their peers and like-minded individuals before making purchasing decisions.
Tap into the power of WOM by encouraging referrals from satisfied clients—both past and existing. When reaching out to your clients for referrals, remember the following:
Be referable by providing excellent products/services and customer support.
Ensure that you have a solid, trust-based relationship with clients built through time and reciprocity.
Consider the timing. It is better to ask for a referral when the client is delighted with your products or services and has achieved something great by using them. You can also time it around regular check-ins or follow-ups, such as after product onboarding.
Have an email template ready and personalize it for each client.
Regularly tap into your clientele and be proactive about asking for referrals.
4. Create Videos for Your Ideal Customers
Boost and personalize your outreach by creating videos for your ideal customers.
Videos create high-quality engagement, whether used in individual outreach or social selling. 94% of marketers believe that videos increase understanding of their offerings. 81% of them agree that video directly and positively impacts sales.
Film short and snappy videos to introduce your company, onboard your customers, maintain a constant and engaging presence online, and recap your discovery calls.
5. Host Webinars for New Lead Automation
Many companies have started to use webinars to promote their products or services.
Webinars increase brand awareness, meet customer demands, and increase sales. They are an excellent way to get your product noticed by more people worldwide.
They can also be recorded, so if you have a cold prospect who can't make it at a specific time, they can always watch the recording at their convenience. This serves as both marketing and an opportunity to establish and improve relationships with potential clients, leading to sales opportunities in the future.
Webinars are an effective sales prospective strategy. They effectively qualify leads and identify potential customers who are already interested in knowing more about your offerings.
Many businesses incorporate a sales feature into their webinars, usually at the end of each presentation. They typically show a link for an in-depth product demo and sales page to encourage conversion.
When rolling out webinars, don’t forget to follow up with a thank you message for attending the webinar, a link to the replay, free resources, or a post-webinar survey to schedule a demo or discovery call.
Ensure that you link your webinars to an automated email campaign to nurture your qualified leads until they are in the position to buy. Send them relevant insights, free resources like how-to’s and templates, updates, and information about your product regularly.
Other Sales Prospecting Methods You Can Work On
If you want to make sure that your sales process turns cold prospects into warm, qualified leads, then here are two sales prospecting methods you can start doing today:
Doing more follow-ups
Upgrading your sales prospecting tools
Do More Follow-ups
Selling is not just about prospecting. It’s also about clinching the deal. Follow-ups will help you achieve this.
When you conduct a cold outreach, ensure that you follow up with the next steps. End each phone call with a quick summary of what was discussed and what you and the new prospect can do next.
For instance, you can schedule a time to connect or check in with the customer, followed shortly by a calendar invite. You can also send the prospect a free resource to supplement the initial conversation.
Follow-ups help you keep the prospect updated with your offerings while establishing yourself as a reliable and trustworthy brand that addresses their pain points.
Upgrade Your Sales Prospecting Tools
B2B sales prospecting tools can elevate your sales process and lead generation and save you a lot of time by doing the following:
Providing thorough research on your new prospects
Personalizing your cold outreach
Enabling social selling and engagement
Helping you understand your customer and their needs
Owler helps sales teams save time and stay ahead of their competition. Owler consistently provides accurate and real-time data on companies and prospects that matter to you.
Apply Your Sales Prospecting Techniques with Help from Owler
Knowing the best practices in prospecting can help you stay ahead of the competition. Using the right tools empowers your sales process and enables you to deploy various prospecting techniques.
Owler is a business information and insights platform that empowers your sales prospecting by providing dynamic data and real-time news updates on the companies you care about.
Sign up for free or contact us and let us know how we can best support your business.