We're too conservative as an organisation to use social selling - really?
Timothy "Tim" Hughes 提姆·休斯 L.ISP
Should have Played Quidditch for England
One of my team was on a call the other day when one of the team he was presenting to said
“We are too conservative as an organisation to use social selling.
We all know the world has changed
All of us know that the internet, social media, mobile, Covid 19 has changed the world, we all know that and the data shows that too.
With new prospects, we walk them through a presentation that shows the data (not opinion) on how these changes have impacted on us in business.
We then, always walk people through case study after case study.
(The team here at DLA Ignite are happy to do this for you, in case you want to understand how social selling can transform your business.)
We are a business transformation company
Here at DLA Ignite, we all come from a B2B Enterprise background, we don't talk about “going viral” or “doing video” or “getting on TikTok”, we are a business transformation company.
We know that social media requires a strategic approach and throwing tactics at the problem is waste of time and money.
We talk about revenue, competitive advantage, impacting EBITDA while using social media.
We do this with customer examples of how modern businesses have transformed to use social media in sales and across other parts of the business. Not posting photos of their lunch, but showing how activity on social media and revenue are connected.
The comment took us by surprise
“We are too conservative as an organisation to use social selling”
After all, we have a long list of very conservative organisations we have worked with and in our opinion, more conservative from the company we were presenting to.
We probed and it came out that actually this person was scared of social media. She would open it up and then shut it down. She described social like watching a carousel. She had no anchor point.
We explained how our social selling and influence course was a journey for those new to social and social experts alike. We do that by our coaching. In fact, feedback from clients from people that have had no social media experience and experts has been amazing, see below.
We are also now backed by Institute of sales professionals, a global sales trade body. We are therefore the only company that can offer a social selling qualification, just like a school or college. Just think of the power of that in your selling career.
Now Imagine .....
Imagine, I pick you up tomorrow in my car and drive you to a place which is full of your prospects and customers. All you have to do is go up and have a conversations with them.
Remember, social media is, social media. In the past you interrupted somebody with a cold call or an email and pitched your services. As social media is being social on media, interrupting and pitching does not work.
If I walked up to you at a social event and pitched, you would make your excuses and go and talk to somebody else.
So how about tomorrow, I pick you up in my car and we go to a place where all your prospects are hanging out. You can stay as long as you want. All you have to do is have a conversation with them. It's that simple, if you are interested, read on.
What is social selling?
Here at DLA Ignite, we define social selling as
"Using your presence and behavior on Social Media to build influence,
make connections, grow relationships and trust, which leads to
conversation and commercial interaction."
It's not witchcraft, it's enabling your salespeople to work from home, (or the office) and create conversations with prospects and customers. Conversations on social media and conversations that convert.
The problem with the name "social selling" is that people think that this is selling on social. All these pitches that you get on social are not social selling, they are spam.
The other thing you need to know about social selling is that this isn't about "putting out some videos" or "putting flowers on your profile" or "going viral". Here at DLA Ignite, engagement is important but we are about driving revenue, EBITDA, for your business using social media. This is about you winning business from the competition and having a competitive advantage.
Social is about having a strategy and there are two key drivers
With anything you do on social there are two questions you need to ask
2. How much revenue / EBITDA am I getting as a business?
Posting and hoping or posting random stuff is not a strategy, in fact I doubt it's driving anything for your business.
So who's social selling?
In case you missed it, the Bank of America’s Merrill Lynch have banned cold calling and have moved all their people to social selling. This isn't some trendy tech company that might have decided to do this on a whim, this is a very conservative financial services company that has made a decision based on data.
But surely cold calling has a better ROI than social selling? Not according to Merrill Lynch.
"They will also be encouraged to contact prospects over LinkedIn, which has a higher hit rate than cold calling"
The CRO (chief revenue officer), Richard Eltham of Namos Solutions, of one of clients posted a comment on LinkedIn about social selling. See here.
“Social selling is not an option now it is the way of the world and you either learn and execute it or fear getting left behind”
Kevin Murray who is the Head of Sales at MacArtney Underwater Technology recently posted about his success with social selling here and wrote an article about the transformation that has happened in sales here.
Andrew Ferrier who is the CEO of Display Technology Ltd and in this article it talks about why Display Technology have adopted social selling. His team have also created a social media strategy with help from our partner, Crux.
Their social media mission statement is
“We want to position ourselves as a forward-thinking, knowledgeable team of individuals who are all experts in our own right, therefore, collectively awesome!”
Andrew also says in that post
"Adopting this (social selling) strategy has taken all of us well outside of our comfort zones but the rewards we have seen in a short period of time have created an excitement within the business development team (new term for sales team).
Because of the nature of social media, quite often you can get instant results. Even if that is just a comment left on your post, or a like, or someone taking the time to want to connect with you.
The excitement around the sales team is infectious, it’s no longer a chore to reach out to the market place because the results can be instant and are there, right in front of you."
What sort of results can you expect?
If you check out this video of Chris Mason CEO at Oracle reseller Namos, and DLA Ignite customer, fast forward to 19 minutes 55 seconds. Chris talks about a $2.6 million win from being on social, after completing the DLA Ignite social selling and influence course.
What happened? They buyer was on social media looking for a solution to their problem, spotted one of the Namos salespeople, who had a buyer-centric profile and asked if the salesperson could help them. That turned into a $2.6 million deal.
Contact any of the DLA Ignite team, Eric, Adam, Nick, Vanessa, Lorena, Priscilla, Lenwood, Alex and they will be more than happy to help.
Go and look at their LinkedIn profiles .... look how they can have digital conversations, create insightful content. This could be your company!
We are the only social selling and influence company in the world to offer a certificate in social selling sponsored by the Institute of Sales Professionals (ISP).
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Our VP of Sales Just got 83 likes on a LinkedIn post, so that means we are social selling? No!
Save Ferris!
2yToo conservative...or simply too scared?
Digital Commercial Strategist - Developing people and organisations to become leaders in their sectors - TedX Speaker / Coach - Keynote speaker, event host/compere/moderator - Artist
2yIt’s never the root issue, manly fear or lack of understanding. When these barriers are lifted, we can move on and prosper.