I often see people posting on social media about some up and coming event, webinar or conference.
The event could be that you are running a webinar, or you are exhibiting at an exhibition.
Social is intertwined with marketing events, conferences and exhibitions
A friend of mine was telling me about an event that a marketing agency was creating for them. They were paying a marketing agency and the agency was placing the success (or failure) of the event on the friends companies ability to post on social.
After all, how long does it take to post and it's free?
Let me say that again, the agency was making it clear that the success or failure was down to the ability of my friends company to post on social.
Big money is dependant on social
This is just one example of how social is intertwined with other sales and marketing spend.
Let's walk though the process of posting about events on social
We all now have social media profiles, LinkedIn and Twitter, it seems pretty straight forward to post something on social and ...... everybody will go. Right?
"wow, I must attend that event".
Let's be honest here, the likelihood that one of your prospects will actually see the post, is small.
Most people on LinkedIn's network are x colleagues and recruitment consultants, this isn't your target market and is not the people you want to be influencing.
Let's answer the question.
Will your posting on social media about a future event any help to your company?
To answer the question, it is highly unlikely that your sales people, you marketing people, in fact anybody in your company posting about events will make any difference. Why? Because you are not connected to the right people.
But you want a solution to this problem right? You want to be able to post on social and that will drive people to your events. In fact, you want prospects and customers to attend all your events.
Let's talk quickly about what social selling is and how it will give you a solution.
What is social selling?
A quick definition of what social selling is .....
Using your presence and behaviour on Social Media to build influence,
make connections, grow relationships and trust, which leads to
conversation and commercial interaction.
Remember that social selling is about creating revenue and EBITDA for your business. If you post anything, there needs to be a strategy and you need to ask yourself two questions.
- How many meetings or leads can you create with your activity on social media?
- How much revenue have you created from your activity on social media?
Is your social selling a cost not a profit to your business?
The fact that you and other people in your company are posting and it is unlikely to make any difference is a cost and not a profit to your business.
Often we see people post and they are in an echo chamber, what do I mean?
But I got 70 likes
Often we see people posting about events and they do get likes, but check those likes out. I bet those likes will be other people in your company, the "point" of social selling is that you are influencing the people you want to influence, so your target accounts, your prospects and your customers.
If your own company is like your posts, you are talking in an echo chamber, again, this isn't social selling, it's like walking into you companies toilet (bathroom) and shouting about the event.
This is all doom and gloom I know, so what can you do so that when you post on social you DO make a difference?
How to make a difference when you post about your companies events.
How can you get people within the accounts you are trying to influence, so the accounts you are trying to sell to, so they do see about your event? How do you make sure your posting on social is a profit and not a loss to your business?
Social selling is the ideal vehicle for originating and selling deals.
Let's walk you through it.
1. Buyer centric profile - The first thing you need is a buyer-centric social media profile. This is a profile, that when your target accounts look at you, they see you as the expert you are, they see you say a human being that can help them, they see you as that sherpa, that helper, the person that can solve their business issues. Don't forget, that they don't know they have the business issue that you are going to solve. Well they don't know, yet. Let's not forget this company has zero understanding about what your business does. Hold that thought.
The last thing you you want is your LinkedIn profile to look like is a CV, it means you are looking for a job, or maybe you look like just another salesperson? These is revenue to be had here, this is the big prize, invest some time. Don't forget, you need to look different, like an expert and look human.
2. Build your digital network - Then taking your buyer centric profile, you start building your network, that is connecting with the people you want to influence and sell to in these global accounts. The wider and more varied you can get your network, the more influence you will spread.
There is a tip here, don't sell. Yes I know you have an amazing solution and you are passionate about it, (after all it pays your mortgage) but I don't know that. Yes I know it's called "social selling". But simple psychology tells us all that we all hate being sold to. So don't. It's your job is to get me into a conversation.
People buy from people they know, like and trust. We don't buy from people who turn up and pitch to us on social.
Don't worry we train and coach you on how to create a buyer centric profile and how to create a digital territory at scale as part of our social selling and influence course.
3. Content - The final thing you need is content.
Please forget the brochures that marketing create, nobody reads them.
I would suggest you flip articles from an app like Flipboard or better still, create your own blogs, like this. Let's not forget in this blog, I'm not telling you "buy my product, because we are great" I'm giving you insight, I'm showing you I'm an expert, I'm explaining how to sell with social selling. You need to create insight about what you do.
This is what you need to be doing, with your content.
Explain the business issue(s) one at a time.
Post everyday, don't forget if you don't post you are invisible.
We will take you through how to create content as part of our social selling and influence course.
On this course, we share with you what we do in our business to market and sell.
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