Spooky Times: Sales in a Pre-Recessionary Economy
As the forecasted 2023 recession continues its wicked progression, B2B marketing and sales representatives still have to wonder if their preventive measures and ingenious lead-generation strategies will be enough to endure the upcoming impact.
Yet, nothing is set in stone. "There's a reasonable chance of a recession in the U.S., but it's not certain," said David Solomon, Goldman Sachs CEO, in an interview for Reuters. "I could still see a scenario with a soft landing."
Nevertheless, the pressure for B2B advertisers and sales development representatives (SDRs) will likely rise in the next months. CIENCE has found that past pandemics and recessions produce the following effects:
While it’s true that some businesses may slow down or even cease operations during the economic turmoil, bold and clever sales experts will always find a way to convert a menace into an opportunity.
So let's take a peek under the white blanket of this ghastly recession to identify better the threats it brings along and what B2B companies can do to take advantage of the approaching situation.
B2B Prospecting During a Bear Market
As measured by the benchmark S&P 500 index, U.S. stocks officially fell into "bear market" territory in June 2022. Colloquially, a bear market can be taken as Wall Street slang when a stock index has fallen 20% or more for a sustained period of time.
The reason bear markets are so menacing is that they tend to generate high unemployment rates and economic recessions. That said, B2B prospects will still come across old and new needs that demand practical solutions to continue operating. It is the mission of SDRs to fulfill such necessities.
As Neil Bhuiyan, managing director and founder of Happy Selling, mentioned in our Enterprise Sales Development podcast, “If you are an SDR, you must feel like you had a direct impact trying to help build a company, but you’re also trying to help people out there, and you’re in essence trying to change the world.”
If B2B prospecting isn't challenging enough, possible buyers will require more assistance than ever to confirm that your product will meet their expectations. For this reason, vendors should deploy all prospecting efforts with extra care during a recession.
Gong found that objections derived from macroeconomic factors increased a 55% since October 2021. For this reason, SDRs must emphasize the following values while conducting their prospecting actions:
5 Tips to Recession-Proof Your Business
There are numerous approaches that B2B companies can take to mitigate the risks before and during a recession. Here are some outstanding examples:
1. Adapt your sales pipelines.
Sales pipelines are the visual representation of the journey that every lead must take before becoming a customer. Sales managers will have to evaluate the present outcomes of all follow-up processes, adjust the time and effort that needs to be applied to each step, and redefine revenue objectives according to data-based insights.
2. Automatize your messages.
Email marketing automation is the process of creating and automatically dispatching email sequences that are triggered by specific actions taken by your prospects. Email automation tools allow marketers to tailor every email by integrating data segmentation practices, which dissect and organize account-related data through different criteria.
3. Track your website visitors.
In these times of uncertainty, every visitor counts. Tracking website visitors can help you understand who visits your website, what type of content is preferred, what actions are being displayed, and who is fit to become a customer.
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CIENCE GO Show uses tracking pixel technology to generate a detailed profile of all website visitors. Through its visual ID system, marketing teams can identify even the live anonymous traffic happening on landing pages and target them with remarketing campaigns.
4. Leverage programmatic advertising.
Programmatic advertising can be defined as the automated buying and selling of digital ad space in real time through artificial intelligence and machine learning software. Its main goal is to improve efficiency and transparency for both advertisers and publishers.
By working with demand-side platforms (DSPs), advertisers can create, run, and analyze multiple campaigns simultaneously through a centralized user interface.
5. Enhance the quality of your data.
High-quality data can be considered as the fuel that propels all sales efforts. This means that the success or failure of SDRs during a recession will be highly influenced by prospect records' freshness, accuracy, and availability.
For this reason, it is advisable to outsource B2B databases that could fill your vendors with validated lead profiles. This way, they can focus on closing deals while other parties take care of gathering, filtering, and updating prospects daily.
How prepared do you feel for the 2023 recession? What other actions would you recommend? Please share with us, and don't forget that this recession is just one more feat to conquer. We’ve got this!
Before You Go
Check out our favorite content this week to get your sales and marketing juices flowing.
Blog of the Week
At CIENCE, we’ve spent considerable time analyzing the potential impact of a recession on businesses and developing a B2B marketing playbook that allows companies to react effectively. Keep reading to acces more analytics, resources, and advices derived from this economic phenomenon.
Podcast of the Week
In this episode of Enterprise Sales Development podcast, we speak with Jessica Rasheed, global outbound sales leader at Preply. Jessica shares some of the lessons she’s learned through her experience in the SDR world and her time as a sales development team lead at Workato. Be sure to check it out.
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