As an entrepreneur that has grown my business from zero to global, I understand what it's like for entrepreneurs starting out and long standing entrepreneurs to get a handle of what it's like to be social in a digital age.

There are some things you need to get started and to bring you up with your competitors.

1. Buyer centric profile - This is where you position yourself on social media in line with what your buyers are looking for.  This isn't in some way anti-sales it is just that buyers don't like to be sold to.  Don't worry, you will have your chance to sell to people, in time.  Your objective on social media is to have conversations and not to pitch, why?  Because we all hate being pitched to on social media, so don't do it.

Your profile is about you, not your company and products, nobody cares about that.  But they do want to get to know you and you will find, the more authentic and true to the real you are, (and the less salesy) the more people will walk towards you.

2. A digital network - The second thing you need to do is to be connected to the people and companies you want to influence and sell to. If you want to sell to the Ford Motor company, you need to be connected to the people there.  Don't forget, the objective here is not to pitch, but start conversations.  Why because pitching will get you blocked and starting conversations will get you sales.

3. Demonstrate your expertise - We all know that buyers are on social media looking for insight, they are looking for experts who can help them, they are looking to be entertained.  This is what you need to give them, by creating authentic content.

As a business leader and entrepreneur you will be pleased to know that we will teach and coach you in all of the above as part of our social selling and influence course.  

It's worth saying that I am not saying this is anti-sales or fluffy or that you need to sit and wait .... business is about revenue and EBITDA, all of the above is designed to help you sell, be a success and to maximise the revenue and EBITDA.

Everything we teach is directly connected and measured with revenue.

Some words of advice

Post on LinkedIn content everyday, why? because if you are not visible to your prospects and clients you are invisible.  Your job is to get engagement on content, as engagement creates conversations and conversations creates sales.

Posting is simply waving at your clients every day so you are front of mind, but also you have the ability to be the natural choice for your prospects and clients, in fact if you own the digital conversation, you will be the only choice. 

We help with clients so they gain digital dominance, which is where you own the whole of the digital conversations and push your competition so they don't appear.

3 areas of advice

Engage on social - this is not just about content, it's about you joining and starting conversations on social.  No different from walking up to somebody at a networking event and starting a conversation, leave your comments, encouragement, expertise on other people's post on social and watch that turn into conversations.  And, conversations, create sales.

Keep away from ads - Don't pay for ads on social, after-all, ads are ads, they are not social, social is social.  Just because you pay for ads at the side of a football match, does not make you a football player.

Measure - As a business you should be able to measure your activity on social and how much of that is turning to revenue.  Activity on social that will influence sales, but also sales that have a direct impact because of social.  As a business you should be able to measure the direct correlation because key presses on your keyboard while you using social and revenue. 

So who's social selling?

In case you missed it, the Bank of America’s Merrill Lynch have banned cold calling and have moved all their people to social selling. This isn't some trendy tech company that might have decided to do this on a whim, this is a very conservative financial services company that has made a decision based on data.

But surely cold calling has a better ROI than social selling?  Not according to Merrill Lynch.

"They will also be encouraged to contact prospects over LinkedIn, which has a higher hit rate than cold calling"

The CRO (chief revenue officer), Richard Eltham of Namos Solutions, of one of clients posted a comment on LinkedIn about social selling. See here.

“Social selling is not an option now it is the way of the world and you either learn and execute it or fear getting left behind” 

Kevin Murray who is the Head of Sales at MacArtney Underwater Technology recently posted about his success with social selling here and wrote an article about the transformation that has happened in sales here.

I don't believe you Tim!

If you check out this video of Chris Mason CEO at Oracle reseller Namos, fast forward to 19 minutes 55 seconds. Chris talks about a $2.6 million win from being on social, after completing the DLA Ignite social selling and influence course. 

Here at DLA Ignite we don't do "hints and tips sessions" we don't want you to waste your money. Our social selling and influence methodology will provide your sales team with the stable platform for growth. It is also the only social selling program based on 70:20:10 change management principles which gives your business the mindset change and habit change they need in this digital world.