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7 Phone & Video Prospecting Tips for Sales Reps to Crush It

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7 Phone & Video Prospecting Tips for Sales Reps to Crush It

Plenty of sales reps love the convenience of email and LinkedIn prospecting. But poorly crafted, AI-generated messages do little to build rapport and trust with your prospects. 

That’s why, as much as some people despise it, you have to pick up the phone. 

As young reps continue to phase into the sales force, there is a growing challenge for them to get beyond the keyboard. And while the pandemic certainly didn’t help matters, fostering those face-to-face (or voice-to-voice) connections has become more critical than ever.

Suffice it to say that salespeople can’t afford to rest on their laurels. We have to fight harder to build pipeline, persuade prospects, and win deals. 

That means moving from behind the keyboard, picking up the phone, and utilizing videos in prospecting.

If you’re ready to crush it, here are seven tips that can help our reps make the most of phone and video in their prospecting efforts. 

1. Don’t rely on email alone

It’s important to connect with people on social and email, certainly. But think about it: when’s the last time you bought something over email? 

Never mind that people are wary of scammers and phishing attempts. No one buys from text on a screen. 

People buy from other people. More importantly, they buy from people they trust. 

That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t use email. But there are ways to make email more engaging and personal. 

For example, emails that use video get a 96% higher click-through rate than those that don’t. It makes sense: video shows off your face, which helps to foster that personal connection.

So if you’re relying on a “spray and pray” approach to email where you’re sending as many as you can hoping for something to stick, just stop. You’ve got way more tools at your disposal. 

2. Make your videos watchable

Just getting started using video in your prospecting efforts is a great first step. But if you really want to maximize your chance of success, then you need to make your videos as watchable as possible.

Most people drop off of videos 70-80% of the way through. So it’s important to structure your video so you get their attention and deliver necessary value as quickly and efficiently as possible—before they click away. 

Here are some tips to make your videos more watchable:

  • Start with empathy. Show the prospect that you truly understand the problem they’re facing. 
    • Lead with value. Catch the prospect’s attention by offering something to help with that problem as early in the video as possible. 
  • Use a list to structure your video. “3 things before our call tomorrow,” or “4 things I noticed on your website.” That will help make the video more scannable and increase the prospect’s likelihood of retaining that information
  • Caption your video. Adding captions to videos can increase the watch rate by up to 80 percent. Captions also help with scannability. 
  • Put your call-to-action in the middle. It logically makes sense to throw the CTA at the end. But by that point, most people have dropped off. Put it in the middle to increase the likelihood that people will actually see it. 

3. Use the prospect’s name off the bat

The first few seconds of a video are key to getting your relationship with the prospect off on the right foot. One great way to do this: use the prospect’s name.

This goes back as far as Dale Carnegie: people perk up when they hear their own name. When you use their name, you set the tone of the relationship as a familiar one, which increases their likelihood to trust you. 

What’s more, when you use a prospect’s name in a video, it’s proof that you aren’t batch-sending messages. You’re taking the time to record a personalized message, which shows that you’re putting effort into building that connection. 

WATCH: 10 Tips for Building Human-to-Human Connections on Sales Calls

4. Don’t just call prospects once

It’s no surprise that phone calls used in tandem with email help to increase the likelihood of a response. 

The problem, however, is that only 10% of sales reps make more than three attempts to reach a prospect. Calling more than three times may seem like a lot, when you consider that it takes anywhere from seven to fourteen touches to get a conversation with a prospect, then frequent follow-up is key to making that conversion. 

Also remember that while email and social media are powerful tools, they have one purpose: to get you on a call with the prospect. That’s the only way you’ll be able to sell them. 

5. Don’t waste time following up if your data is incorrect

Spray and pray is popular because it’s quick and easy. Even if half the data is incorrect, you’re spending so little time on each prospect that it nets out positive. 

But when you’re taking the time to follow up multiple times, record videos, and build relationships with prospects, investing in the wrong people can be a significant time sink. 

That’s why it’s important to do your homework. One tip we recommend at Factor 8 is if you get a voicemail, hit the 0 button to find the directory or talk to someone else in the company. 

What I tell people is: try to be James Bond for about 10 dials. You’re going to learn something critical that will help you find the right person or provide you with important information that you can then use to land the deal:

  • Who reports to who?
  • What system do they have?
  • How long has your decision maker worked there?
  • Are there any current projects that are a priority?
  • How many employers/locations are there?
  • Other key influencers that you should include in the process?

Use your personality, talk to people, and get some critical account information that can help you become more successful as you build your relationship with them over time. 

READ MORE: How to Use Sales Intelligence to Boost Profits

6. Qualify, qualify, qualify

First of all: sales qualification is not the same as lead qualification. The latter is a marketing indication that a prospect may be ready to buy due to their engagement. Sales qualification is about how much money you can make with a particular account—what’s the potential that they’ll buy from you?

There are a number of factors that go into play here:

  • Size of sales team—more reps means more revenue
  • Is the company B2B or B2C?
  • What tools or platforms does the company already have (especially important if you sell SaaS)?
  • Do salespeople have to acquire their own tools or does the company provide them? 

One great tip for this: don’t blow past the gatekeepers! In your haste to get to the decision maker, you may end up missing the opportunity to gain some vital information on the company that can help you tailor your video and phone communications. 

READ MORE: How to Build an Account and Lead Qualification Strategy

7. You were hired for your personality—use it

If marketing could source leads and close deals on their own, we wouldn’t need sales.

The reason you have a job is because salespeople can do something marketers just can’t. You weren’t hired to send canned messages. Marketing can do that more efficiently than you. 

Salespeople are there because personality makes a huge difference in how prospects feel about potential vendors. For many businesses, it’s the people that are the differentiator between themselves and their closest competitors. 

So let people get to know you. You’ve been hired to be a personality. Use it!

If your sales team struggles to use phone and video effectively, Factor 8 can provide the training and resources needed to get everyone up to speed. Learn more about our training and coaching services here. 

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Call Bridging 101: Paving the Way for a Follow-up Sales Call

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Call Bridging 101: Paving the Way for a Follow-up Sales Call

What is Call Bridging?

Call bridging is the art of gaining the next call before leaving the current conversation. It’s a critical skill if you’re used to face-to-face selling and now working the phones.

In my previous posts, I talked about call productivity and setting call goals as critical skills when transitioning from traditional selling to virtual selling. It’s because we often accomplish less on phone sales calls than in traditional face-to-face sales meetings. But we only build a pipeline when we’re able to execute multiple calls.  The key to getting multiple calls is Call Bridging.

Call bridging happens at the end of a call.  It’s a key phrase or question that paves the way for calls #2, #3, etc.

How to Use Call Bridging to Secure a Follow-up Sales Call

When it’s an established relationship, it’s as easy as setting up the next meeting. The key here is being sure you’re showing value during the ask. Everyone is busy and we’re easier to blow off (blow out for my UK friends) when we’re on the phone. It sounds like:

“This has been fantastic Mr. Customer. Thanks for the insight. We didn’t get a chance to cover XYZ, nor for me to share some insights I’ve gained from my network that I think you’ll find valuable. Let’s set up a follow-up call. Does this time next week work for you?”

Note: We aren’t saying that we need to cover key insights about our product or service. We aren’t saying we need to learn more to sell more. We’re offering “cross-pollination” value or the voice of our collective customer in the industry. This intel is a hot commodity!

If it’s a colder outreach, we may need to be more assumptive and simply GIVE ourselves permission. It sounds like:

“Thank you for your time and insight. I’ve learned so much from you and want to return the favor. I’ll call you back later this week so we can finish up.”

There are a million variations of this. Think of them as bases. A home run is their agreement to a follow-up, an appointment set and on the calendar, AND they bring another party to the call or take an action item (we call this “Getting Deals Moving” – Check out The Sale Bar for a full class on the subject)

Third base might just be an agreement to meet and an appointment set.

Second is their agreement to take your call.

First base is them basically NOT saying, “No, don’t call me back.”

Make it a habit to always bridge to the next call.  Go for the home run and even if you land at second you’re doing better than starting over cold.

Bonus tip: Send the calendar invite even if they don’t agree or accept the invite. It will show up on their calendar even if they don’t accept it and they may be more willing to pick up the phone when you call (you MUST call during this time!  Don’t just set a task to follow up, put it in your calendar too!). And if they don’t pick up, you’ve at the very least gained some mind share and a little bit of guilt on your side. When they do finally take your next call, they may even apologize and/or be a touch more open.

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6 Logistics Sales Tips to Master Phone Selling

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6 Logistics Sales Tips to Master Phone Selling

Freight and logistics sales has undergone a massive change in the past few years. As companies embrace digital transformation, in-person sales meetings are falling in frequency. So you’re probably spending a lot more time on the phone than before. 

This can be…how should I put it…intimidating? 😱 Or at the very least, uncomfortable?

So here are six logistics sales tips to help you crush cold calls and reach those tough-to-crack prospects. 

(Psst! Interested in logistics sales training? We can help! Contact us today.)

1. Don’t stop calling

For sales calls, the third time isn’t the charm. You have to call someone at least six times before you get a response. Not just for cold leads, but warm leads too. 

People are shocked when I say this. But think about it: when was the last time you called someone once and immediately got a response? (I’m gonna guess it doesn’t happen that often.) 

Over 36% of purchased leads receive no sales contact. And it’s not because reps are lazy. It’s because we’d rather go after the low-hanging fruit for immediate results. But there just isn’t enough low-hanging fruit to go around. If you want consistent results, you’ve got to climb a little higher. That’s why I recommend 10 touches for A leads, 8 for B leads, and 6 for C leads…as a bare minimum. 

READ: How to Build an Account and Lead Qualification Strategy

2. Leave a voicemail and send an email—every time

Yes, you read that right. Every time. It’s easy to ignore a missed call. It’s harder to ignore several missed calls, multiple voicemails, emails—you get the picture. If you’re going to invest the time in making several hundred calls a week, make it hard for them to forget it. 

Think of the voicemail as a resume. It’s there to show who you are, what differentiates you, and what value you offer. If you put it in front of them enough times, the prospect is more likely to pick up. Once that happens, then you can start selling. 

WATCH: How to Leave Voicemails that Get Returned 

3. Be patient. 

In a virtual environment, sales cycles can be longer than traditional, F2F approaches. So when you make 100 calls in a day and don’t hear anything, don’t worry! Eventually, you’ll call someone enough times and they’ll pick up (even if it’s because they feel guilty 😉). At that point, you can make them feel like they’re the one doing you a favor by taking the call. 

READ: Quick and Effective Voicemail Scripts

4. Keep your intro and pitch SWIIFT℠

Salespeople often talk about “engaging prospects.” But what does “engage” actually mean? It’s simple: An engaged prospect is a talking prospect. And what’s the best way to get someone talking? Ask them a question. 

So instead of going through your usual dog-and-pony show, use the SWIIFT℠ methodology (So, What’s in it for Them?) to flip the conversation around. SWIIFT℠ gets the prospect to answer 2-5 short, closed questions to get the conversation going. This helps you build the necessary rapport and understand the prospect enough to demonstrate your value. 

READ: The SWIIFT℠ Selling Methodology

5. Don’t “check in” with prospects. 

Be real: how many times have you jumped at the chance to “check in” with a sales rep? Yeah, me neither.

If you’re going to ask for your prospect’s time, you better give them a good reason to get on the line with you. So start brainstorming how you can add value to them:

  • Address a specific issue they raised last time you talked
  • Update them on new and improved features
  • Talk about something in the news and how you can respond to that
  • Share something you learned from another client—a kind of cross-pollination

Don’t just call to sell something. Call to add value…real value.

DOWNLOAD: 20 Value-Add Reasons to Call Your Customers

6. Make the most of short calls

In virtual sales, the average first call is three-and-a-half minutes. If you last that long, you’re doing great. 

You may wonder: what could I possibly get done in such a short amount of time? In reality, you only have to do three things:

  • Differentiate yourself
  • Get a commitment for the next step
  • Book the next call

Commitments change depending on where the buyer is in the journey: set up a demo, loop in other stakeholders and decision-makers, read over a contract, or even sign and onboard. But every call you make needs to involve getting some kind of commitment. Then, you use that commitment to bridge to the next call. 

READ: Call Bridging 101

So there you go. Follow these six tips, and I promise you’ll be crushing those sales calls. Happy selling!

Watch The Video Below For More Logistics Sales Tips.

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Top Sales Prospecting Strategies

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4 Time-Saving Sales Prospecting Strategies

Can you guess what percent of sellers HATE prospecting?

(Hint: it’s not 100% – that was my first guess) But it is the majority of sellers…

64%! 

Yet 100% of managers DO say that sellers need to prospect more (and be better at it – if you’re one of those managers, contact us. We can help 😉)

So what can you do?

It all starts with planning.

In order to get better results without feeling like you’re wasting hours, you’ve got to put some work in ahead of time. But have no fear, there is a way for you to plan for prospecting without being part of that 64% hating it along the way (and if you already are, maybe this article will change your mind!)

Check out these top 4 sales prospecting strategies to help speed things up.

WATCH: Sales Shot –  Power Prospecting

Drastically Underprepare

Yep, read it again. Think about it this way: what’s your main goal when you pick up the phone? The obvious answer is to entice them to set up meeting 1. But that’s probably a pretty unlikely accomplishment with just one phone call.

What’s the most likely case? You’re going to get their voicemail!

READ: 4 Quick and Effective Voicemail Scripts

With speed in mind, think about the key elements you need to craft and leave your voicemail during your prospecting. Here’s a list of the usual suspects with a breakdown of why you do or don’t need them.

  • Name – This one is pretty obvious. Know their name when you call! (But guess what? Sometimes you don’t even need this when they’ll repeat it in their voicemail!)
  • Solution Match – If they aren’t even on the phone, you’ve got nothing to diagnose for them, so you don’t need it yet.
  • Value Prop – YES! (SWIIFT℠ everyone!) What value are you bringing them? An absolute must. A whopping 74% of buyers will choose to work with sellers who are the FIRST to add value according to Corporate Visions.
  • Case Study – Sure, a ready case study is helpful, but do you really want to bog down your call OR voicemail by spitting out stats? They don’t care yet! Skip it.
  • Pricing – Again, hard to know what they need yet, and that doesn’t lend itself well to providing pricing.
  • Job History -Spoiler: it’s not needed! Focus instead on one quick rapport builder.
  • Call Intro – Make sure you have this down pat.
  • Voicemail – ALWAYS leave a voicemail! Otherwise, the effort you put into making this call goes right down the drain. You’re not buying a billboard to leave it blank, are you? (Shameless plug: your voicemail is 3x more likely to get returned when you take our class, Messages That Get Returned, which we offer in our eLearning platform, The Sales Bar)

READ: Best Sales Scripts To Get A Buyer’s Attention 

So to summarize – when you pick up that phone, know their name, have your value prop handy, your call intro, and a voicemail if all else fails. Save the image below to help you remember.

Group Your Leads

Make it easier on yourself by grouping your leads together. Here are some quick categories to organize them by:

  • CRM History
  • Trigger Event (did they all attend a conference? Fill out an inbound lead form?)
  • Profile/Demographics
  • Offer (do you have an incentive to offer when you reach out to them?)
  • Location (do you have a rep going to that location soon? Perfect time to reach out!)
  • Social Connection (mutual friend, past acquaintance, school history, etc.!)

READ: Build A Lead Qualification Strategy

Group Your Research

When you do your research, your first instinct might make you feel like you HAVE to give individual attention to every single person and potential lead. Guess what? You don’t!

Easily group call goals, qualify & explore questions, voicemail scripts, and your SWIIFT intros.

What should you individualize? The rapport builder – it’ll be unique for each person.

Boom, you just saved yourself a whole lot of time!

Never Prepare Twice

Be nice to future you! By taking better notes and including specific details about the voicemail you’ve previously left, you’ll never be left scratching your head wondering what you’ve already done and having to double back.

Here’s what to include:

  • What group is your lead in
  • What value prop did you use
  • What was your rapport builder
  • What was your call goal
  • What type of voicemail did you leave

BONUS: Always Add Value

Seems like a no-brainer, right? You always want to call to add value to your prospects. Try the following:

  • Interact with them on social media – comment and share their posts
  • Recognize something – give a compliment!
  • Customize your request
  • Be brief
  • Always GIVE something first
  • Ask short and closed questions to get them talking

Bottom Line

Prospecting is always going to be a numbers game. Remember: it takes 6-9 times to get to 90% of the people on your list! Put in the work – but don’t worry about putting in extra.

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Leading Sales Teams Through A Recessions

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Leading Sales Teams Through a Recession

Nobody wants to use the “R” word, but whatever you call it, selling is tough right now. I’ve had the good fortune of speaking with dozens of leaders and managers about what they’re doing right now with their teams to protect their bases and keep building pipeline in case a recession does officially happen.

READ: Top Pipeline-Building and Recession Selling Tips

Here’s an idea I love that I hope you will steal when leading sales teams through a recession: 

Turn down lead qualification criteria immediately. 

As deals slow down, you’ll need more in the funnel to close the gap. If you’re using a standard BANT or MEDICC qualification criteria, work with the team to decide what is worth taking anyway. If your sales team isn’t busy creating proposals and demonstrating your solution, the simple answer is to get more leads. They could literally be sitting in the “reject” pile of your BDR/SDR or marketing team right now!

What should you accept? I’d start with budget. 

Many buyers aren’t spending as freely right now, so if your lead qualification criteria require a ready budget, you’re rejecting most buyers. 

I get it, you need leads ready and able to buy to close more deals, but if they’re not as available right now, are you willing to build future pipeline for when times change? 

Can you and your team work harder to convince buyers you’re worth assigning a budget? 

READ: Changing Sales Incentives During A Recession

Along these same lines, are you willing to build future pipeline for opportunities with longer timelines? 

If we’ve moved on the B (budget) and T (timeline), what about Authority and Need? Truth is, now more than ever you need to show this is something prospects need over want. So check the value props being touted by your lead generation team. Can you switch something that feels like a “nice to have” to something that seems more like a “Can’t live without it, especially in today’s economy?”

For example, I sell training. People often come to us because they’re growing (nope, many in RIF mode now). Others find us because they know they need better onboarding and upskilling to attract and retain talent (nice to have, less important if not hiring). 

READ: Why You Need Special Recession Payment Terms

How about this one?

During today’s economic times, the sellers are separated from the order takers. You can’t afford NOT to make sure your team have the very sharpest skills to close more deals. Protect your revenue by teaching your team how to push deals through when there’s economic uncertainty. (BTW, click here to email us and learn more about our training! 😉)

Finally, let’s talk about Authority or Champion. I think you’ve got to have it. Every deal in tough economies will be approved by your economic decision maker (e.g. CFO), and nothing is getting there without a champion explaining the urgent need for it right now.

Boom! BANT just became NC (Need and Champion).

Next step: go sit with the teams to help draft the right questions and gates for this. Just because you know what a good “need” looks like, doesn’t mean the person training your BDR team or writing the marketing copy can translate what you’re looking for into criteria and sales questions/marketing form fills.

Good luck out there!

READ: 5 Tips for Reps to Keep Selling During a Recession

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5 Tips to Transition from Field to Inside Sales

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5 Tips to Transition from Field to Inside Sales

There’s no ifs, ands, or buts about it – virtual selling is here to stay, folks. That’s why the transition from field to inside sales is becoming more prevalent.

If you’ve spent years perfecting the art of in-person selling and are struggling (or resisting) the shift to virtual, it’s time to get on track and embrace it.

I get it – virtual selling is a whole different ball game where reaching contacts is harder, your sales cycle is longer, talk tracks are shorter, and a whole slew of other things you’re not used to.

That’s why I took 30 minutes on our recent Sales Shot to break down key virtual and hybrid work practices that will help you feel like a superstar again.

Whether you’ve been at it for a while or recently transitioned, these are tips you can start implementing RIGHT NOW to help you fill those holes in your pipeline.

DOWNLOAD: How to Sell to the CFO to Keep Deals Moving

Pick Up The Phone

Do you like baseball? (Even if you don’t, stick with me for a minute.)

Home base is closing the deal and having a happy client – but you can’t get to home base if you aren’t even on first! First base is getting someone on the phone.

Chances are, they’re not going to pick up on the first try. In fact, less than 20% will connect on that initial call. Even if it takes 12 attempts to connect – you keep calling!

Research shows that 30% of leads are never even contacted at all. That’s a ton of missed opportunity. Especially when you consider that 82% of buyers admit they bought something after a series of cold calls. 

So, moral of the story: Pick. Up. The. Phone.

Always Leave a Voicemail

If you’re making all these calls, you’d absolutely better be leaving a voicemail – a GREAT voicemail. In fact, make voicemails your new BFF!

Voicemails have a few different goals. The most obvious one is getting a callback. Realistically, most of them are probably never going to get returned. But here’s what you CAN do: create a positive impression of yourself and your company, and guilt them into either picking up the phone or eventually calling back. So, get creative and make it fun!

The 4 most effective types of voicemails are:

  • Lever – Drop their first name, reference one of their coworkers, mention a previous rep they worked with – something that’s going to get their attention! Whatever you do, make it about them!
  • Mystery – Keeping the message short and vague can pique their interest.
  • Urgency – Are you running a limited promo on a product or service? Are they losing money by the minute if they aren’t using your product? Give them a reason to JUMP!
  • Value – There are 6 of them we teach (remember SWIIFT℠, everyone?), but remember that during economic challenges people tend to care most about saving money and mitigating risk.

Whatever you do, ALWAYS leave a voicemail. No voicemail = no touch. It’s like buying a billboard and leaving it blank. Yikes!

Quick Tip: Send an email right after you leave a voicemail. Your likelihood of getting a response is MUCH higher when you mix voicemail + email. 

Embrace Smaller Goals

A year ago, your quota probably looked a whole lot different than today. So, take your goals and break them up into smaller, more achievable pieces!

The average successful call is now just 3.5 minutes! 

Structure your calls around these 3 key questions:

  • What do I need to learn?
  • What do I want them to know?
  • What commitment do I want to close?

Qualify Your Leads

Do NOT go through an alphabetical list of prospects and pick away at it until you get to Z.

Take the time to actually qualify your leads and call based on that score! You’ll have A,B, C, and D leads (and you can probably skip the D leads). Start with your A leads and work your way down the list until you finish the C leads.

As a general rule, here’s how often to call each lead:

  • A leads = 10-12 dials
  • B leads = 8 dials
  • C leads = 6 dials

Build A Bridge to Call #2

If you got someone talking on the phone after a cold call, the hardest part is over. So make sure you’re taking advantage of it by ALWAYS scheduling the next step WHILE you’re on the call.

Can you schedule the follow-up call now? How about sending a calendar invite with the next meeting’s info? Have you given your cell number to get theirs?

Give yourself permission to call back by urging them to look at their calendar and confirming when you’ll be connecting again.

WATCH: Transitioning from Field to Virtual Selling

Keep in mind, the more you try out these tips, the easier it gets and the more success you’ll see. So get on the virtual train with the rest of us and start building that pipeline. You got this!

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sales intelligence

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How to Use Sales Intelligence to Close Deals and Boost Profits

The buyer’s journey is evolving quicker than ever before. Prospects want personalization at every level of the sales cycle, yet customization is impossible without accurate and relevant data, as every salesperson knows. This is where sales intelligence comes into play.

Sales intelligence is a word used to describe collecting and analyzing customer data to enhance lead generation, boost conversions, close extra transactions, and offer you a much larger and more precise picture of the sales process.

Finally, the primary purpose of sales intelligence is to improve your understanding of present and future consumers. Any information you acquire will be unique to your company.

Sales intelligence data goes far deeper than traditional customer data, allowing you to get customer insights such as demand data, buyer journey duration, source of acquisition, and improved customer persona profiles.

This article explains why and how sales intelligence is crucial for your business to close more deals and boost profitability. 

Why is Sales Intelligence Important?

The sales intelligence platform can provide new ways to obtain new sales. Here are a few reasons why sales intelligence is so important for your business.

Discover Your Market Potential

You can access diverse prospects within your target market.

During talks with their target audience, many businesses merely nudge the tip of the iceberg.

The good news is that sales intelligence provides a highly complete, comprehensive perspective of your industry, guaranteeing that you don’t miss any prospective possibilities today or in the near future.

Identify Your Target Audience

Wouldn’t it be nice to get rid of most (or maybe all) of that significant research you have to do to find out what your target audience is looking for? It’s possible with sales intelligence. Static data and dynamic data are combined to make it easy for you to identify your ideal customer.

Monitor Your Competitors

Sales intelligence platforms can assist you in identifying your competition. It can also assist you in keeping track of what they’re up to.

Sure, you definitely know who some of your rivals are, but can you honestly say that you know who every one of them is?

Sales intelligence can assist you in locating each competition and monitoring their market performance.

Find Out Decision-Makers

When reaching out to your prospects, you must know the decision maker or the right person to help you reach the decision maker. It simplifies the procedure and helps you appear more professional.

Sales intelligence tools assist you in determining who the best point of contact at a firm is. You may search and filter by position titles and hierarchical levels to choose who to contact directly.

How to Use Sales Intelligence Tools to Boost Revenue

Build Your Ideal Customer Profile

One of the most critical and early phases in lead generation, qualifying, and nurturing is creating your ideal customer profile (ICP). However, because business is so fast-paced, the typical ideal consumer profile will not suffice. This is where sales intelligence can help.

By understanding more about your customers, sales intelligence data can increase the overall accuracy of your ICP. Insights such as intent drivers, content consumed, purchase triggers, region of operations, company size, and more may be obtained.

Enhance Sales Prospecting

Getting straight into the minds of your buyers and knowing what drives their buying decisions is one of the most important sales intelligence strategies. You may contact them more effectively if you understand their goal and are confident in your facts.

When intent data is integrated into sales intelligence software, you may begin to get notifications with specific purchasing signals when a prospect has the potential to convert into a client. These are hot leads on which your sales staff may zero in and provide modest nudges to persuade them to convert.

Assume a potential customer has had a fundraiser and is looking for expertise in your sector. What does this have to do with you? It signifies they are in need of and have the money to spend on the goods or services you are offering.

These insights might serve as a trigger for your sales team to contact the most relevant individual in the organization for a quick talk.

Better Lead Quality

The goal of the sales game is to obtain more leads. Many rookie salespeople believe that the goal of click funnels is to get more individuals into the funnel. In reality, the sales funnel assists in filtering out folks who aren’t yet ready to buy! When a customer becomes a possible qualified lead, sales intelligence tools alert you. This is due to the solution’s ability to track prior sales. It will also assist you in forecasting their future requirements.

You may also use website analytics with sales intelligence tools. This allows you to see what goods consumers are interested in rather than what they’ve purchased. This information can then be entered into your CRM.

These analytics can function in two ways. The first is to gather cookies and use them to reverse engineer where the user has visited. The second method is to utilize cursor trackers, which detect a user’s location and correlate it with what’s on the webpage. To process this raw data, both current methods employ AI.

Acquire Key Competitor Insights

While one of your company goals may be to sell a significant quantity of products or meet particular revenue targets, the truth remains that success depends on a variety of things other than how much you sell and how much income you generate. You must keep an eye on your opponent to stay ahead of the game.

Your competitive intelligence program can provide you with critical information. One crucial piece of intelligence you may get is the expiration date of contracts with your competition. This information is important since it allows you to create a sound strategy to entice them away from your rival and toward your brand.

You may accomplish this by demonstrating the benefits of your unique selling proposition, addressing their issues more efficiently, or simply providing a better value. With the correct tools, you can detect new competitors in real-time, monitor their campaigns and behaviors, and evaluate past data from your competitors.

Boost Revenue

When working with customers or clients, you must guarantee that your company remains relevant in the marketplace. This implies you’ll have to keep working on your brand. You’ll also need to expose your company to as many customers as possible continually. In short, you must continue to prod people with the brand to remember it.

Unfortunately, a company’s marketing budget is limited. You may increase your income by using sales intelligence technologies. They aid in determining whether or not a person has previously dealt with your firm. Following that, they choose the optimum moment to give them promotions.

It’s also a good idea to develop a filtering procedure for your customer list. Self-exporting is a big deal in the market. This may upset them and drive them away from your rival.

Final Thoughts

In the B2B arena, sales intelligence and sales intelligence tools are crucial not just for businesses because they help complete more transactions. Still, they are also vital for consumers who want to acquire a product or service that adds value to their business and alleviates their pain points. While several sales intelligence firms provide various sorts of sales intelligence tools and sales intelligence software, you must choose the one that is best for you. 

The litmus test you should use is to look at how they can assist you in completing more business with less effort. Suppose they do not provide reliable information on prospects, their interests, and insights into their behavior patterns to help you plan your follow-up activities. In that case, such tools may not be the best fit for you.

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lead qualification strategy

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How to Build an Account and Lead Qualification Strategy

Does anyone out there NOT have a story about working their tail off to reach a Decision Maker only to find out that it was a bum lead? Account and lead qualification strategies and categorization are topics near and dear to my heart because:

  1. Yeah, I’ve done it too
  2. I hate wasting time more than I hate wasting wine
  3. I fancy myself a strategic sales gal

It’s this third point that really struck me in a recent client site.  Reps were calling lists of 800 leads from top to bottom every day. At 8 am the next day, they started again at the top.  That’s actually physically painful to me, is it to you?

Create A Better Lead Qualification Strategy

If they employed a lead qualification strategy (and you bet they do now! :)) then reps would be speed-dialing through all 800 leads with the first goal of NOT reaching the DM, but instead reaching any “live body” to ask 3-4 quick questions and determine the account’s worth.

For this client, it was:

  • Size of company (employees)
  • Size of facilities (square footage)
  • Type of operation (manufacturing, warehouse, etc.)

With the right delivery, these 3 questions net the rep everything they need to know to classify this account as an A, B, C, or D opportunity.  Sure it’s not exactly right, but it’s close enough to build a strategy.

Now, Work Those “A” Accounts

How much harder would you work an A account?  I recommend you call it 15 times.  Odds say that you’ll connect with over 95% of leads after 15 attempts.  A “B” account would net about 10 attempts from me, and I’d throw a few Hail-Mary calls at a “C”.

What else could you capture while on the phone?  An email?  Another contact?

Then, We Have Reasons To Celebrate

Here’s another benefit of a lead qualification strategy:  when we break the cold call down into two stages (qualify it, sell it) then we actually set better expectations for our reps and give everyone more chances to win.  (celebrate the number of leads qualified for the day!)  Best of all, they’ll never call a list “from the top” or “alphabetical order” again.

A strategic seller is a successful seller!

Now, where is that leftover wine?

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Top Three Mistakes That Reps Make On Lead Follow Up

We’ve all heard the scary lead follow-up stats floating around – 73% of web leads are never contacted (Source: HubSpot), 44% of salespeople give up after 1 contact attempt (Source: Scripted), and that as much as 50% of sales go to the vendor that responds first (Source:InsideSales.com). Companies work so hard to get leads in the system, but how do you make sure that your team is making the most of those leads?

“Companies work so hard to get leads in the system, but how do you make sure that your team is making the most of those leads?”[Tweet this]

Being fast is critical (as a number of studies have highlighted), but being fast and sloppy is no better than not making the call at all. Just because the customer raised their hand or showed some interest doesn’t mean you’re off the hook from doing your job. Understand that if a prospect filled out a lead on your site, they probably filled out another 10 forms as well.

So while it is important to get to that lead first, you also need to set yourself apart from first time you engage with that client.

Check out this quick (sub 2 min) video that I did for Zoom Info recently on the most common mistakes that reps make on lead follow up and how to overcome them.

While you’re out there, make sure you subscribe to the Factor 8 YouTube channel to ensure you always get our latest content!

LB

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