𝐃𝐢𝐝 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐤𝐧𝐨𝐰? 𝐑𝐞𝐩𝐬 𝐰𝐡𝐨 𝐞𝐱𝐜𝐞𝐥 𝐚𝐭 𝐬𝐨𝐜𝐢𝐚𝐥 𝐬𝐞𝐥𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐠𝐞𝐧𝐞𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝟒𝟓% 𝐦𝐨𝐫𝐞 𝐬𝐚𝐥𝐞𝐬 𝐨𝐩𝐩𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐮𝐧𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐞𝐬, 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝟓𝟏% 𝐦𝐨𝐫𝐞 𝐥𝐢𝐤𝐞𝐥𝐲 𝐭𝐨 𝐡𝐢𝐭 𝐪𝐮𝐨𝐭𝐚!
Social selling is on the rise, and B2B businesses are increasingly incorporating social selling into their sales processes. It can now be considered a key sales strategy for sales teams to meet their sales targets.
It entails the support of sales and marketing teams to engage prospective buyers on digital social platforms, in order to build close relationships with them. Through the building of such relationships, sales people who engage in social selling can often close sales more rapidly and frequently than they would if other methods were utilised instead.
Check out our latest blog on the 4 pillars of social selling to find out more!
📌 The Benefits of Social Selling
If you are still unsure of the value social selling would bring for your business, the following are several benefits that businesses can reap through social selling:
1️⃣ Social Selling Builds Trust
Building trust is essential in the sales relationship between the salespeople and buyers. With the advent of the internet and social media, it is now easier for buyers to search up the salesperson’s profile, poor reviews of brands and their products and services, which may lead to salespersons having a more difficulty in generating successful leads.
Through social selling, sales people are able to forge deep and personal connections with their target audience, and this in turn will lead to more effective selling. Through addressing your questions promptly and being able to provide personalised responses directly to each client, prospects will more likely have your business at the top-of-mind and are more likely to engage in your products or services.
2️⃣ Social Selling Shortens the Sales Cycle
The sales cycle is the length of time taken for a sales person to move a lead to prospect and finally to an actual closed won of his or her solutions. Today, buyers have become more empowered in making decisions on the solutions. It is critical for the salespeople to engage at the right time with the right buyer at each stage of the selling cycle in order to progress the deal.
Through effective social selling, sales people are able to interact with buyers or prospects at the crucial checkpoints in the sales funnel, especially when these prospects are gathering information in aid of their decision making between brands. This can in turn cut down the duration of the sales process, as it enables salespeople to immediately address questions that their prospective buyers may have, at the point when the question arises.
3️⃣ Social Selling Enables Business to Build Deeper Relationships With Buyers
As discussed in our blog on brand loyalty, keeping one loyal customer is equivalent to gaining 95 new customers. For sustainable business growth in the long term, it is crucial for businesses to maintain a loyal base of customers. In order to do so, sales teams should utilise social selling methods to stay on the radar of recent and past customers, through constant and consistent engagement.
Engagement through sharing their comments, direct messaging, and sharing useful content with the customers based on what they’re looking for. Sharing consistent quality content with your target audience that adds value to them is the key to growing your follower base. Engage with them by responding to their comments and direct messages, and by sharing relevant and informational content which they would value.
4️⃣ Social Selling Enables Businesses to Manage Their Online Reputation
65% of buyers feel that a brand’s online reputation had an impact on their final purchase decision. Undoubtedly, building a positive online reputation will help attract more prospective buyers to your business. Conversely, having a negative online reputation can directly affect your sales, and ultimately reputation.
Through social selling, businesses can receive immediate notifications when customer feedback is provided, which can help them take action quickly to improve their products or services. Through this, businesses can also gain more insights on what they are doing well and should continue doing, and also aspects that can be improved on.
📌 Integrating Social Selling Into the Sales Process
To successfully integrate social selling into the sales process, brands must first understand that social selling entails interacting with technologically-savvy modern buyers, rather than directly hard-selling to them. It is about building the relationship with the prospective buyer, rather than striving to close a sale upfront. Executives must also recognise that change in mindset and behaviour is necessary for sellers to become successful at social selling. In order for salespersons to have long-lasting, social selling-oriented behaviour modification, social selling coaching and training are essential.
Tools and training are necessary for a successful social selling deployment that results in salesperson behavioural change and a discernible influence on sales productivity. As such, sales leaders and managers who want to reap the benefits from social selling should prepare to garner internal approval and support for their social selling strategy before it is launched, since it will require time, money, and process integration.
📌 Attain Success Through Social Selling Today!
With the transformation of the B2B Selling landscape over the last couple of years, VKT and SMU Academy have jointly launched the Executive Certificate in Strategic Digital Sales Leadership for Singapore Businesses programme. Up to 90% Skillsfuture subsidy can be made available for mid-career executives and SMEs.
Apply Now! The practical design of this programme will take you through the key elements of a Sales Leader’s role & responsibility, sales culture, recruiting & hiring, adopting the right sales compensation, sales strategy, sales coaching, and effective sales pipeline management so you will gain the skill sets and toolkits required to build a high-impact sales team.
Wait no longer and sign up now! You can also contact us for a coffee chat to discover more about how you may start your digital sales journey and leverage our expertise.
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