The Nine things you need to know about Social Selling in 2017
… and the six action steps all professional salespeople
need to take right now.
I
t’s common these days to hear the emerging,
constantly evolving discipline of social selling
dismissed or minimized – usually by people who
aren’t particularly proficient at it. Among the
critiques is that social selling is not a stand-alone
panacea and that it doesn’t replace, and can’t be
expected to replace, voice-to-voice or face-to-face
interactions. True! But it’s also true that social
selling is now firmly entrenched as part of the
professional sales process. We ignore it at our peril.
Below, our list of nine essential facts about the ins
and outs of selling in the virtual, digital realm for
2017’s sales leaders. According to Convince and Convert, 80 percent of
business-to-business buyers now expect real-time
interaction from sellers throughout the buying
process.
Ÿ Social selling is not going away. It is a
permanent and increasingly important part of the
professional salesperson’s job description.
Everyone in sales needs to develop this skill set.
Ÿ We define social selling as: Leveraging your
professional brand to fill your pipeline with the
right people, insights, and relationships.
Ÿ Our experience is that that you will enjoy a
substantially higher close rate when you engage
with prospective buyers via social selling. Five
to seven “drips” from your side (meaningful
updates, with or without a response from the
person who gets your message) to a well-targeted
buyer will significantly increase the chances they
buy from you rather than from a competitor.
Ÿ Social selling gives you better information up
front when you finally do get voice-to-voice or
face-to-face with the buyer.
Ÿ Salespeople who are skilled at leading face-to-
face and voice-to-voice conversations with
buyers, but who haven’t yet become skilled at
launching and leading conversations via
platforms like LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, and
Facebook, put their companies at a steep
competitive disadvantage. Ÿ The highest-performing salespeople are now
using Twitter as a search engine. They are
harnessing the power of this extraordinary
platform to identify and follow key decision
makers, add them to lists, and engage them
with relevant updates. They also listen to and
participate in the conversations surrounding
their products, company or industry.
Ÿ Salespeople who are extremely effective social
sellers tend to be younger than salespeople who
aren’t. Yet, salespeople of any age can and do
become proficient at social selling. Success is
a matter of being open to best practices, moving
beyond your comfort zone, and noticing what
works and what doesn’t.
Ÿ Training bridges the gap between social
selling and voice-to-voice, face-to-face selling.
Social selling presents a constantly evolving,
adapting a set of skills for salespeople of all ages
to adopt and personalize. However, the Sandler
selling principles, which have helped
salespeople succeed for the last 50 years, are just
as effective as they have always been. They just
need to be applied to the new medium of social
networks and digital technology.
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Strictly Marketing Magazine May/June 2017