How Social Sellers Build Their Pipeline with LinkedIn

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How Social Sellers Build Their Pipeline

with

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Cold Calling is

ineffective because no one

answers their

phone.

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Your customers are too smart to respond to

SPAM or generic emails

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Today’s successful Sales Reps excel with LinkedIn on several fronts:

• They position themselves to win the deal they’re working on now.

• They understand the individuals who compete for their business.

• They expand their personal network to fill their sales pipeline through customer referrals.

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LinkedIn currently has 200 million members

worldwide

65.1% have held director-level or above positions

These are the decision makers YOU need to access.

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Referral-based Connecting

Successful people tend to work together.

A referral from a successful customer legitimizes you.

Our research shows an average 65% win rate on

referrals!

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LinkedIn provides tools that facilitate social gifting

Social Debt Economics

Endorsements, recommendations, mentions, and idea sharing are the currency in social debt economics

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3 Steps to Use LinkedIn to Build Your

Referral Pipeline

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Step #1 -Position Yourself as a

Thought Leader

Your LinkedIn profile represents your personal

brand. This is where Content Marketing meets

Social Selling.

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You cannot afford to simply digitize your resume.

Demonstrate thought leadership through your connections and

profile content.

Learn more detail about social selling here and here.

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Step #2 Connect to Your Customer

Customer connections are an ABSOLUTE MUST!

This is where the social debt economics can pay huge

dividends.

If you are good at your job, your customer will facilitate

introductions.

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Step #3 -Expand Your Personal Network

Build your customer-centric pipeline around the referrals from your

customer.

Use their profile as your window into their connected world.

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When researching your customer’s network, look to find the decision-makers

• The Customer Decision-maker: Look at their LinkedIn profiles to understand how influential they are. Are they connected to potential prospects?

• Your Customer’s Competitors: Chances are someone in your organization has worked for their competitor. Find the link.

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A good partner may be willing to collaborate with you. Look at partner profiles to find common connections. See “how you’re connected” to individuals in the company.

Research your customer’s Suppliers / Vendors / Channel Partners:

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These are the industry watering holes.

Research your Customer’s Industry Associations

To find future customers like the

one you have, look at ASSOCIATION

MEMBERSHIPS.

Then find the contacts within the

organizations that can help you most.

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Execute the PlanTo be successful, you MUST

execute!

Successful Sales Reps master the art of Social Selling over

cold calling.

When these Reps deliver success to their customers,

they create their sales pipeline.

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6 Tips to help build your pipeline

using

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Start by downloading the

Account Networking Tool

to centralize and

categorize your referrals in one place.

Tip #1

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Adopt a ‘Pay it Forward’

attitude.

Social debt is the currency of building your referral-based

pipeline

Tip #2

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Always ask, sometimes get. Sometimes ask,

never get.

Don’t hesitate to ask your customers for

introductions

Tip #3

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Make this effort a part of your daily habit.

Tip #4

Building a quality database takes time and commitment.

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Success does not happen overnight.

Tip #5

You won’t immediately know if what you did resulted in a referral.

This process requires patience.

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Integrate your effort with your current sales tools

Tip #6

Export your referrals into Salesforce.com

(or whatever tool your company uses)

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Need Help?

Download the Account Networking Tool

to build a referral database around your customer

GOOD LUCK!

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Learn More

If you don’t have a content management process or need help optimizing your current one, Contact us to hear the rest of the story...

Email - info@salesbenchmarkindex.comPhone - 1-888-556-7338Web: http://www.salesbenchmarkindex.com

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