Social Selling: The Golden Currency in the Digital Age

?Benefits of Social Selling

Technology's rapid innovations are continuously changing how our prospects buy. Outdated sales tactics such as pitching through phone calls, emails or word-of-mouth referrals are being replaced with updated sales processes such as social selling.

Social channels shorten the sales cycle as most pre-purchase research is done online. You can actively monitor and listen to your target audience's pain points to offer helpful and value-adding solutions, but not sales pitches.

Also, through social selling, you can generate new revenue streams once you have a well-established personal brand. You can identify various topics using hashtag's on Twitter, Instagram or LinkedIn and engage in conversations with your prospects. It will help improve your lead generation and create a loyal customer base. You don't want your customers to just buy once and leave. Your goal is to convince them to return again and again.

When your products and customers are online it's common sense for you to build a personal brand and actively engage with your target audience. According to Jim Keenan, who is a social sales specialist, using social media to sell improves profits.

But social selling doesn't only increase your profits, it also adds a layer of trust to each transaction. That's when personal branding comes in. When you establish a relationship with your customers through personal branding, you'll improve their experience with your company which leads to referral business.

Top 5 Steps on How to Achieve Social Selling Success

Any sales executive knows that social selling offers a unique and low-cost opportunity to communicate with customers and prospects. Through social media channels such as LinkedIn, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram or Facebook, you can shorten the sales funnel, improve lead generation and increase your business' sales.

However, social selling doesn't only involve creating a profile and uploading a few photos or articles. To achieve the best results, you must follow specific tactics and adapt them around your personal brand.

Having a social media presence isn't enough. You must listen to what your prospects are saying. However, don't just comment or reply to questions. Explore and carefully consider what your customers say so you can improve and tailor your solutions to solve their problems. You'll have the opportunity to create and improve your customers' experience, control and manage your personal branding, discover what products your clients' prefer, and tap into influencers' opinions.

If you're a beginner in selling on social media, you must understand the benefits and the main pillars of social selling before you dive into it.

So, here are the top 5 steps on how to achieve social selling success.

1.    Develop a Personal Brand

What is a personal brand? According to marketers Karl Speak and David McNally, authors of Be Your Own Brand, a personal brand is the emotion or perception which someone has about the experience of interacting with you.

Personal branding comprises optimizing your profile, sharing valuable content to show your industry expertise, and engaging with your prospects. And, social proof on platforms such as LinkedIn achieved by listing your skills, receiving endorsements and reviews, will add value to your online profile.

Also, if you share expert advice, company and product updates you can build trust with your buyers and validate your industry knowledge.

2.  Find Your relevant Target Audience

Social selling success depends on connecting, engaging and targeting your prospects with the right message. And because of the rapid transitioning in job roles, if you're not actively connecting with new prospects every week, your social selling rates will decrease. You should achieve a weekly ratio of 3 connections with prospects and 5 connections with clients.

To connect with key people, use the search tools on social platforms such as LinkedIn, Facebook or Twitter.

First, identify and define your target market on social media based on indicators such as age, location, income, common values and pain points. Also, consider where your prospects go to find information and what type of content do they prefer.

Next, analyze the different social media platforms and find out where your prospects are spending their time. According to Statista, Facebook reported having 2.23 billion users logging in every month as of Q1 of 2019 and Twitter accounted for 330 million monthly users during the same period. However, according to Omnicore Agency, Instagram has about 1 billion monthly users and LinkedIn has 303 million active users.

Also, surveys will help you identify the key features of your buyer persona. To get complete data on your prospects' preferences, ask your existing clients' the right questions about their favorite social media platform, what blogs do they regularly read, or who do they follow on social media. You can use free tools such as Google Forms or TypeForm to collect your customers responses.

3. Listen to Your Prospects on Social Media

Once you've created your social profile, you should establish connections which matter and listen to what your prospects are saying.

Identify and follow your prospects on social media. For example, on LinkedIn don't use the default message when you request a connection. Offer details about why you want to connect. It'll set you apart from typical salespeople.

Moreover, you should find and follow brands which you're interested in and subscribe to receive their newsletters. It'll help you achieve a complete overview of the brand, their marketing strategy, and target audience.

Social selling involves exploring what customers say on platforms such as Twitter and LinkedIn so you can improve and tailor your solutions to solve their problems. Considering that peer recommendations influence 90% of B2B purchasing decisions if you listen to your prospects' conversations you can assess when they'll buy.

Also, you'll have the opportunity to create and improve your customers' experience, control and manage your personal branding, discover what products your clients' prefer, and tap into influencers' opinions.

To automate your social listening you can use tools such as Hootsuite for social listening on all platforms or TweetDeck for personalized listening on Twitter.

4. Answer Your Customers Complaints

Finally, answering customer complaints and positive or negative reviews is a sure way to improve your company's revenue and sales.

 In the digital age, word-of-mouth reaches millions and reviews are essential for your buyer's journey. Your sales team must be aware and actively engage online with your customers to maintain and control your brand's online reputation and transform any negatives into positives.

To enjoy the benefits of social selling and achieve the best results for your company you must understand and implement specific techniques comprising personal branding, social listening, monitoring your prospects, aligning sales with your marketing strategy and actively responding to clients' complaints.

5. Engage with Industry Leaders and Prospects

Sharing content which counts will help you develop credibility online and increase your business' sales. But make sure that you don't just add to the noise. You should only publish, share or retweet content which is valuable to your target audience. And, sharing others' content will show a soft sales approach, build trust and prove an unbiased opinion. It will increase your social selling opportunities.

You can use different online tools to schedule and plan your content publishing times throughout the week. It will allow you to share content on the go such as product launch updates or relevant industry news.

Also, by engaging with thought leaders who are outside of your organization you can better establish yourself as an industry expert. Social selling involves creating a layer of trust through your personal branding efforts and being active on relevant social media platforms.

A Few Last Words

To enjoy the benefits of social selling and achieve the best results for your company you must understand and implement specific techniques comprising personal branding, social listening, monitoring your prospects, aligning sales with your marketing strategy and actively responding to clients' complaints.

Social selling is the easiest way to communicate with your customers. It's low cost, available across a variety of social channels, and, when done right, it dramatically boosts your sales. By implementing the main techniques for optimized social selling you'll soon enjoy increased sales and a real improvement of your customers' experience.

Where do you stand on social selling? Let me know your thoughts below that like button! ??

 About the author: Irène Kilubi accompanies thought leaders, makers and pioneers in the realisation of their individual personal brand vision.

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