When you are selling outbound the biggest challenge you face is to get your sales prospects attention. Here are some ideas that will help give you the best chance to get noticed by the companies you want to sell to.
Target your ‘decision-maker’ to get introduced to your ‘champion’
The thing we want to do is to sell straight to the decision maker, the tricky thing is they’re very senior and therefore, its hard to get their time. But what if you don’t ask for their time and instead ask for someone else’s time. It’s a much easier request to respond to, it requires much less thought and effort and is, therefore, more likely to get a response “Can you put me in touch with the best person in your team that looks after X” You’ve accomplished 3 things here. A) You have the right person in the team to now approach. B)You have created urgency because you can now say “Your manager” has asked that I reach out to you as you’re the best person to discuss X.” C) You’re now on the radar of the buyer, even if it’s just a little, its better than not at all.
Have multiple contacts you want to sell to
Every company has a different organisation structure so it can be hard to easily understand who looks after what. It’s likely there are multiple people you can sell your product or service to in any business so if you’ve only got one contact that you’re targeting then you’re significantly reducing your chances of starting the conversation. Make sure that you have 3-4 contacts in your CRM you can target one after each other. Many times I have had a situation where one contact might tell me they are not interested and then their colleague is happy to start a conversation with me. The opportunity is not lost just because one person said no.
Always try multiple ways to reach out
Your contact is going to busy and they have no idea who you are. There will be a way they prefer to be contacted but you don’t know this so you need to try all avenues. I would always try to connect in multiple ways, message on social media, calls, leave voicemails and email. I hear sales professionals say they don’t want to feel like they’re pestering their prospects, unfortunately, they make the mistake of believing that the sales prospect has seen and registered every contact point that they’ve made with them. The truth is they haven’t, it takes multiple attempts to push yourself to the top and get noticed. I always say if you haven’t had a response assume they have no idea who you are.
Take time to align your message with what’s important to their company
There is a certain amount of guesswork that goes into this, but better to have a calculated guess than just pushing product features. What can you tell is important to the company from the research you’ve done on them and how can that align with your message to get their attention? For example, if you can see they have offices around the globe with plans for big expansion and you have a product that could help them in multiple countries then reach out with a message that highlights your products global benefits to its clients.
Make sure you align your style with the company’s style
When communicating look at how the company talk to their customers and employees. Do they seem more relaxed and friendly or more corporate in tone? Translate that to how you reach out, it can be as simple as starting with ‘Hey’ or ‘Hello’ in an email, but all these things are important when wanting to make that first connection.
Think about how your message will appear on a mobile
67% of people check their email on their phone, so as you write your email on your laptop or desktop, stop to think about how it would appear in the palm of their hand. If it’s not going to be easy to digest on the go it’s likely you’ll lose their attention quickly.
Is there a personal connection you can make?
Has your sales prospect spoken at events you can see on YouTube? Do they have a blog? Have you found an interesting article they have featured in? The important question is, what is your sales prospect really passionate about? Understanding that changes your perspective, it’s that moment when they stop being your ‘prospect’ and they start being a human. A bit of extra time spent before making contact means you can reach out in a really personal way which increases your chance of getting their attention.
I hope this helps
