Can social selling help with my discovery calls?, Tim Hughes

Why quality calls are more important than ever

I often write about how to get calls and conversations with senior people, if you haven't read any of these blogs (where have you been? :) ) anyway the links to these blogs are below.

So you have got on a call with a senior person, what do you need to do to make sure the calls are a success?

Let's talk about some obvious things, but often things that get missed

1. As a CEO of a company, i hate people wasting my time, time is something I cannot get back

If any salesperson try to sell to me, what do I do?

I look them up on social and I decide if they are worth my time.

Every single person you are contact is doing this, so what does your LinkedIn profile look like?

It's empty? It's a CV? It's tells people what a great salesperson you are?

What do you think, will make you stand out? make you look different? better still, make you look like a person I would want to spend time with?

You need a buyer-centric profile and we teach salespeople how to create one as part of our social selling and influence course. Get one of these and this places you ahead of your competition. Simple.

2. You need to be moving in the right circles

The next thing I do as a CEO when I check you out, do you know the right people?

Because if you know the people I like and respect, then i will more likely give you the time.

In our social selling and influence course, which teach and coach salespeople on how to grow their territory so they shift it from analog to digital. But we also coach the salespeople to make sure they move in the right places. On digital, of course.

As as anside, this then enables you to prospect in social by connecting to people, starting and joining conversations. All part of our social selling and influence course.

3. Intrigue me with inspiring, authentic content

As a CEO I like to spend time with people who are cleverer than me. Why? because I learn stuff and by learning stuff, I'm a better more rounded person.

If you are sharing brochures and whitepapers, you are no use to me as i can get that on your website.

It also shows me you have little insight, few opinions and you are probably just a corporate robot.

Don't forget, if I'm spending a lot of money, I want a sales person and a company who will support me.

If you are posting shit, you ain't the person or the company i will be wanting to work with. Period.

OK, you want to carry on just the same as you are .... I have no problem with that

Can social selling help me with my discovery calls?

But with social selling our clients get an average 25% higher conversion rate than companies using legacy methods.

I've used the word average.

When it gets to Director level it's a 42% higher conversion rate.

I totally get you may sell a lover value transactional product, this isn't for you, if you are in the world of B2B enterprise, this will be transformational.

And scaled across your sales teams.... just think of the revenue, profit and competitive advantage!

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.

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.

Other articles you might be interested in ....

Would you buy social selling training course from somebody that doesn't use social selling?