In this previous blog I wrote about all the things a leader can do with social selling so that they can see if their sales people are contributing or not.  I cover prospecting and territory management and what you can do as a leader to measure the output, other than revenue, of course to see if you salespeople are contributing.  That blog is here.

How do managers get a consistent framework for sales people with social selling?

In this blog, I'm going to discuss a framework you can use within a social selling (digital selling) environment to lead and manage sales people.  

After we have completed our social selling program we offer companies a sales playbook that provide a "3 legged" framework; Sales, Sales leadership and DLA Ignite, should you want our support. 

We work with you so that the salespeople are laser focused as to what they need to do in their territory as to making sure their social profiles reflect who they are, how they will go about building their network and the type of content and the regularity of it.

In this blog, I now cover why you would want a playbook and the structure that gives you.  Expand out the elements of that playbook and then take you through the typical measures. 

Why a playbook?

With a playbook sales leadership know exactly what salespeople are doing and when.

They know that at the end of a week that salespeople will have contributed (what has been agreed).

Importantly we will have worked back from the teams number, so we know, if the sales people completes the activities in the playbook then the number is created and achieved.  (Obviously depends on your salespeople's sales skills.)

Importantly it takes the "thought" out of the process for the salespeople, they know that on Tuesday, they have to do X, Y, Z and on Thursday the answer is A, B, C.  They don't have to worry what they need to, they just have to do it.

Let's break those down.

1. Your social profiles.  Whether it's LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, Clubhouse, we need to go where are prospects hang out and we want them to see us as the expert that is going to help them.

Having a profile copied from the company website that mentions our company and products is a big turn off for buyers.  So how can we have a profile(s) that reflect the needs of buyers?  How can we reflect the needs of buyers within our vertical and territory?  If you are focused on Life Sciences then it should reflect that.  This is something you set up once and then maybe change six monthly or where you change your target audience. 

2. Network.  In one of our presentations we explain how having no contacts in an accounts means the likelyhood you will sell into them is zero.  The playroom provides structure as to where your network should be built and where your engagement efforts should go.  This is something you will daily and weekly.

3. Content. The third strand is to provide the salesperson with a content plan, that matches what they "want to be famous for", the key words they want to be found by and a mixture of content for different days.  This is something you will do daily.

The Measurement

Here at DLA Ignite, we see expected results as follows:-

Each salesperson, if they follow the agreed playbook, they should be able to close an additional meeting a week.  This is a conservative figure, most people do more.

Let's assume that for each 4 meetings you get a proposal (maybe your ratios are better) and that for every 3 proposal you get a sales (again your ratios may be better).

This means, that with social selling your sales team should be able to get an additional sale through social selling every quarter.

With one additional sale every quarter, that is 4 additional sales with social selling every year.

Let's not forget, this is NOT a social media campaign.  As long as the sales people do what they have agreed in the play book (as with any sales methodology) they will get those additional 4 sales per year, every year, forever.

If your average deal size if $100,000 that means each sales person will deliver an additional $400,000 per year and across a team of 10 that's an additional $4,000,000 in revenue.  Not to be sneezed at! 

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