Short answer. YES.

If you have woken up to the news that business interactions are happening daily/weekly/monthly/quarterly on social media and digital first, then welcome to the party.

2020 was a tough year. Businesses had to batten down the hatches and navigate the tricky COVID terrain, the economic shake-up, furlough and the restructuring of the business. not an easy task for any company, any employee or any leadership or HR team to go through.

Whether you are in Sales, Marketing, HR, Operations, Technical or Leadership you will have been challenged with the above pandemic global scenario. People are still hurting.

But wait, I also sat on a call this week and listened to some leaders of talent, and some talented young individuals that have managed to adapt and move forward, taking ownership and accountability of what they had to do, get there heads round and stay strong. This is great to see, but not the end of the road or the subject in mind.

As we move back into some form of face to face or office work, the same lines will be drawn on how we navigate the sales process and customer acquisition in this new digital terrain we now stand in. It was always coming. The pandemic just accelerated the process.

If you think going back to the office will put all your working from home issues aside, the water cooler, the engagement, the banter and chit chat, it won't. Your role will still require you to communicate and develop existing and new relationships with your customers and prospects.

If you want to read this, and sit there and tell me nothing has changed in what I do and how I perform it, then I have to say you are either very lucky or telling me porkies.

I have sat in the HOT-SEAT of Sales for 15 years and I felt various changes over the last 16 months in the way I interacted, the way the people I contacted sounded, and how I found a better way to do something that I wish I had seen 5 years ago. But now I have found it.

TRUST and EMOTIONS have been tested. we know this. How do I regain this TRUST.

You get it by wanting change, understanding where you can change and developing the skills required to tap into a strategic presence where your buyers and prospects hang out.

You get this by asking questions internally about what that looks like, and finding the best people in this discipline to work with and be coached towards your digital and social being.

But why do I need to change? Read these Gartner, McKinsey or Forrester articles.

The B2B landscape has shifted so fast, it happened while you were holding onto your hats in a whirlwind pandemic and the disruption that was coming as come faster than planned.

Your buyers are on social. They are looking for you and for businesses to partner with.

How do I get my team onto this social and digital first landscape?

Well here is what doesn't work and you can save your time right now and STOP.

• Corporate posting - Marketing collateral in brochure form but online.
• Posting about your gin, wine, hill, dog or cat and doing nothing else.
• Pushing your product or service onto a platform that is not designed for advertising.
• InMailing people with your product or service offering without a request or ask.

If you are going to take this seriously and want actual change within your team and business, which includes most of the above disciplines then you need to work out what you want from your active social time that will become part of your daily routine for building strong trusted relationships, generating engagement across your prospects and delivering revenue from the activity your team have on this and other digital platforms.

It looks like this:

• Strategy Phase - Who are we. What do we want to be know for. How do we get there?
• Profile Phase - What do we look like. Are we creating the right image and message?
• Engagement Phase - How do we get involved and speak to the right people?
• Influence Phase - How will people lean into me and engage with me and my team?
• Media & Content Phase - What do we want share insights about. Personal & Business?

This is what working with a strategic social selling coach and team delivers for you and your business by mapping out the areas of the social that make up the commercial puzzle.

So:

• Just blasting out posts will not work.
• Just posting a pic about the dog and the hill and the gin will not work.
• Just posting about the product or service will not work.
• Just sending a message to someone will not work.

The start line is your profile and the profiles of all the team you send onto the social table.

Without Phase 1, the rest is irrelevant and will not make your time on social a success. We don't do tips and trick here, nor do we do webinars or a masterclass or training.

We are the 'high watermark' strategic social selling and business transformation and the coaching and programme we deliver makes sure that when you make the move to the digital and social b2b landscape where deals happen every minute, we take you into the middle of those deals and conversations and allow you do have your spot, your say and the discussions that you want to get involved in.

You know, the ones you never hear or see or get near over the phone or email or campaign.

DIGTIAL FIRST. Front and Centre. Dominate your Sector.

So, I ask... have a think about what you want to be and where you want your team to be, and who they want to talk to, and how they are going to get there... I can show you. TODAY.

Enjoy Monday.

Kev