We are often asked in whether Social Selling & Influence really works for small service companies and whether it actually makes a difference to their visibility and opportunity pipeline…

The answer is a resounding yes. 

Here’s how and why…

Most people in Sales have ‘little black book’ of contacts.  

Without doubt you are going to need that but, how do you add new names into that book these days..?

How do you position your team where they are all able to make connections with people they’ve never met and that are important to your business? 

If you look on LinkedIn today you will see that many think the answer is throwing up corporate brochures onto their feeds in the hope that someone will be amazing and lift the phone. Or the classic “pleased to announce we’ve just landed another contract…”

Picture a small company who specialise in a particular product or service. 

They compete with much larger organisations who have a similar service line included with a range of services. 

The small company is completely focussed on the service, the larger companies see that service as one of a series of divisions or departments.

The small company may come across the larger company when bidding for work. The large company have more people, more resources and, in many cases can apply more flexibility to pricing to win the work. 

How many times have you seen a larger competitor buy the work?

What chance would a small company have over a larger company on Social….?

The foundation block is the Strategy…

A strategy that sets out the plans and activities that will build your digital dominance. This isn’t about making a video and suddenly POs come flying in the window….this is about digitally dominating your sector. 

This is about you and your team becoming the answers to the question you want to be the answer to, when Google is asked.

Outline the barriers and the levers, highlight the assets, and create a Social Media mission for the team.

Then optimise the profiles of the team. 

Buyers are checking you out on Social so, your profiles need to be at least better than your competitors.

This means your team’s profiles will be buyer centric and digitally optimised, they will have profiles that are working for them when they are asleep.

Then start growing your network. 

Connecting and building relationships with key people. Do this at scale…another step up.

Then start to build influence. 

Creating rich and diverse content which educates, inspires, challenges and entertain our growing network and engage in conversation with key people.  

Then start to really focus on bringing your digital identity to life.

You start to receive inbound from the new activity and interaction

Then build in Multichannel networks

This boosts your profiles and content across different platforms. You start to achieve digital dominance over your competition.

You take control of the digital narrative in your chosen sectors.

It all starts to build: 

Visibility - Your marketplace recognises and your team.

Trusted advisor status - You are recognised as experts.

Pipeline, growth & inbound - More opportunities.

Recruitment opportunities – People want to work with Social organisations.

One of the main differences we see with smaller companies who are Social Selling is the whole team approach, you are all in this together.  

Some larger companies will restrict this to their Sales teams, you are different. 

You will have your board members, your management team, you operations people, your technical people and your sales and marketing people…all of these brilliant, talented people growing networks, creating engaging content and engaging with your prospects. 

The whole team active on Social, bringing the conversation to you.

Smaller companies are quicker to act and more internally connected. 

With just a few things, done regularly and at scale on Social, your small company can overtake the larger, less flexible competition who wrap themselves in red tape.

In the roaring 2020’s its important you give your team all the digital skill and the environment they need to network, prospect and close business on Social Media.

You may have doubts about whether this is relevant to your sector, we can show you that it is and, that its crucial you

Live Social '21

Eric Doyle

Crux / DLA Ignite