Buyers Are More Educated Than Ever — Before Engaging With Sales People
Social media sites are giving buyers vital tools to research companies, pre-qualify products and services and gauge customer satisfaction — well in advance of contacting sales people directly. Consider these recent findings:
◄ 93% of B2B buyers begin their buying process using Internet search (source: Marketo) (1)
◄ CEB indicates that the B2B buyer is on average 60% through the sales cycle before they engage with a salesperson (2)
◄ Marketing Sherpa recently released a report that showed the average B2B deal size is declining, with sales professionals now competing on price instead of value and offering incentives to close deals quickly (3)
◄ The 2012 Inside The Mind of the BtoB Buyer Survey, conducted by DemandGen Report, revealed that more business buyers are using social media as part of their purchasing decisions
In 2012,
Facebook topped
1 billion users,
while runners-up
Google+ and LinkedIn
surpassed
500 million and
175 million accounts,
respectively.
Increasingly, people
of all ages
and backgrounds
are using social media
sites on a daily basis.
Source: Wikipedia
Embracing Social Media For Sales
Making It Part Of A Proven Sales Process
Social media sites continue to grow exponentially to meet
consumer demand. Are you taking advantage of the unprecedented
opportunities to connect with customers and prospects throughout
the buying process — or are you being left behind?
The Benefits of Social Selling
The good news is that top performing sales organizations are seeing a positive return-on-investment through social selling. According to research by Aberdeen Group, users of social selling far outpace other companies around a number of key performance indicators (KPIs) directly related to sales effectiveness (Figure 1). (4)
more than 1/3
had already
used social
media to engage
with vendors.
Source: IBM Institute For Business Value
70% 60% 50% 40% 30% Total Team Attainment of Sales Quota Customer
Renewal Rate Sales Forecast Accuracy Percent of Sales Reps Achieving Quota
n = 182
Figure 1 Source: Aberdeen Group, June 2012
Users of Social Selling All Others
Current Performance Benefits of Social Selling
According to Aberdeen Group, the leading pressures reported by best-in-class companies included:
◄ “Customers and prospects are communicating on social networks; we need to be there too” (71%)
◄ “Address the diminishing effectiveness of traditional marketing activities” (57%)
Social Media: Helping Transform Sales Cultures
Andris A. Zoltners, Professor Emeritus of Marketing at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management, discussed ways to transform sales cultures in an article in Harvard Business Review. He noted that most evolutionary changes work within the current sales strategy, organizational structure and sales team.
“The focus is on getting current sales team members to behave differently,” Zoltners said. “For example, to spend more (or less) time prospecting, to improve customer engagement quality or to manage the pipeline more effectively.” Several operational levers influence sales team activity to help achieve these ends, including the following:
◄ Performance Management: Set expectations and manage against them
◄ Data and Tools: Provide salespeople with insights that enable success with customers ◄ Incentives: Motivate high levels of the right sales activity
◄ Training and Coaching: Help salespeople develop the competencies they need(5)
Sales Organizations Must Evolve To Meet Social Media Challenges
The online information and social media revolutions point to a new era for sales professionals. The lines between personal and professional use of social media are blurring, with buyers simply seeking results.
The sales people who win more deals will understand the need to utilize social media to stay attuned to potential opportunities, while also building their credibility and the “social proof” of their offerings. They will require training to ensure they operate within company and industry guidelines.
Effective Social Media Requires More Than Mastery of New Tools
From Facebook to LinkedIn, Google+ and YouTube, there are hundreds of social media sites to choose from. However, just setting up accounts and using various tools are not enough to effectively impact the sales process.
Instead, sales people must develop a core strategy that supports and guides prospects throughout the buying lifecycle—from their initial interest through their acceptance of a potential solution to closing. Sellers must demonstrate a keen ability to listen and understand buyers’ needs empathically, before they attempt to connect one-on-one or one-to-many.
Aligning Multiple Organizational Interests
Depending on the size of the organization, sales people must also carefully consider how their sales-focused social media activities will align with the goals and objectives of multiple departments, including Marketing, PR and Customer Service.
“Consumers see the
social layer around
a brand as one that
supports their
buying decision
in providing
engagement and
information
pre-purchase,
then supports them
after the purchase
when they have
questions.”
While there are many business-oriented social media training programs available, very few focus on sales. Even fewer align the use of social media with a proven sales methodology.
To address these shortcomings, Sales Performance International designed a new curriculum to help sellers use social media tools to their advantage. The workshop integrates social media usage with the best practices of the highly effective Solution Selling® sales process and methodology. This program educates sales professionals on how to apply a “Buyer 2.0” framework for business development and prospecting that addresses the use of social media to (Figure 2):
◄ Target ◄ Listen
◄ Network and Research ◄ Create Demand
◄ Manage and Nurture
In each of these areas, participants gain a deeper understanding on the use of key social media technologies including LinkedIn, Twitter and InsideView, along with techniques to support their personal branding and prospect targeting efforts. The training program complements the release of Solution Selling 2.0, a holistic buyer/seller framework that addresses the impact of social media, dealing with buyer pre-conceptions and the increased demands for “proof-of-value” from sellers.
The New Sales Challenge:
Adapting To The Reality of Socially Empowered Customers
The new paradigm in buyer empowerment creates an expanded set of challenges for sales professionals. The exchange of new ideas and insights is much more rapid than ever before, making it is more difficult to control the flow of information and perspectives to a selective set of prospects. Even if sellers are armed with innovative ideas to help their customers, the shelf life of uniqueness is shrinking quickly—by virtue of social media sharing and the unprecedented access to both information and individuals.
Therefore, sellers must master three distinct personas or roles to correspond to prospects’ behavioral buying phases and concerns. These personas include Micro-Marketer, Situational Expert, and Risk Manager (Figure 3).
To get back to the front of the sales cycle, sales professionals must now engage in “informal” marketing, by actively participating in industry or community discussion groups in order to demonstrate thought-leadership and credibility. They also need to regularly monitor and engage in discussions that are talking place in relevant online communities. To accomplish this, sellers need to become “social media literate” through the use of new tools and technologies that allow them to efficiently engage where and when buyers are forming their initial ideas about a potential problem or opportunity. In addition, since most sales professionals don’t have the time or background to research innovative new ways for their prospects to compete or solve problems, marketing needs to actively assist sales with messages to “seed” early stage discussions.
In conclusion, as social media continues to impact buyer behavior, forward-thinking sellers and transformational cultures will adapt their practices accordingly. By learning and applying new skills in social media, sales people will be better able to identify opportunities, engage prospects, convert them into customers and maintain strong, long-term relationships.
Phase 0:
Planning or Latent Determine NeedsPhase I:
Phase II: Evaluate Alternatives Phase III: Evaluate Risk Risk Cost Needs Solution Time Le ve l o f C on ce rn
Micro-Marketer Situational Expert Risk Manager
Pain: Problem, Issue or Missed Opportunity Strategy Initiatives Issues Priorities Figure 3
How Buyers Buy — Behaviorally
Will YOUR sales
organization embrace
the change,
or fall behind?
Uttley earned the Accreditation in Public Relations (APR) designation from Public Relations Society of America and served as president of the PRSA Charlotte chapter in 2009. He is a frequent public speaker and a regular contributor to the top social media site SocialFresh.com.
About Sales Performance International
Sales Performance International (SPI) is a global sales performance improvement firm dedicated to helping the world’s leading corporations elevate their sales relationships and drive measurable, sustainable revenue growth and operational sales performance improvement.
Founded in 1988, SPI has been the leader in helping global companies successfully transition from selling products to marketing and selling high-value solutions. With extensive sales performance expertise, deep industry knowledge, global resources and a proven track record, SPI collaborates with clients to deliver strategic, operational and tactical solutions.
SPI has assisted more than 1,000,000 sales and management professionals in more than 50 countries and 14 languages achieve higher levels of performance.
(1) Marketo, 2012: marketo.com/b2b-marketing-resources/best-practices/marketing-automation/three-strikes-and-youre-out (2) CEB, 2011: mlcwideangle.exbdblogs.com/2011/08/31/the-most-important-number-in-b2b-marketing
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