Commercial prospecting is essential for all companies, whether they work in B to B or B to C. If a definition had to be given, this phase aims to contact prospect targets to transform them into new customers to develop the turnover. For a long time, sales teams favored analog prospecting through door-to-door phone calls or sending letters. But the advent of the Internet has upset these practices, offering new possibilities to salespeople. This new digital prospecting gives particular prominence to social networks. However, prospecting is a complex process, and its results can be disappointing if suitable methods are not used. Discover five practical tips for effective sales prospecting.
Table of Contents
Define A Prospecting Plan
Above all, the first step is to build a prospecting plan, namely the strategy implemented to make your campaign a success. Without it, you risk spreading yourself too thin and significantly lowering your productivity. You will therefore have to start by defining your prospect targets’ socio-demographic and behavioral characteristics and objectives. Make sure these are SMART for optimal efficiency.
For each segment, it is also necessary to set up a conversion funnel, from the first point of contact with your prospect to their acquisition and retention. Assign each phase of this funnel the tools you will need, such as a telephone script, a teaser email, a product pitch, and the performance indicators to monitor. Finally, plan an analysis phase at the end of your campaign to adjust your following actions.
Personalize Your Approach
To succeed in your prospecting and develop your client portfolio, it is essential to integrate added value into your approach. To do this, you have every interest in personalizing your commercial prospecting. Prospects indeed need to feel listened to and understood, far from the generic speeches of the salespeople of the early 2000s.
By personalizing your approach, you will provide specific solutions to the problems encountered by your prospects. In this sense, do not hesitate to research upstream to know your interlocutor better and thus adapt your speech to his specificities.
Use CRM Software
A CRM for Customer Relationship Management is a tool to improve a company’s performance in terms of commercial relations with its prospects and customers. Whether local or online, this essential tool centralizes all commercial information, from interactions with prospects to the commercial plan, including contact management, customer reviews, and sales forecasting.
The use of such a tool, therefore, offers considerable time savings. It is also a collaborative solution, constantly enriched by all employees, and sharing information is accessible and real-time. You can also program automated actions there, such as a reminder by email three days after first contact, for example.
In addition to operational monitoring, it offers many indicators for analyzing the results of a sales prospecting campaign. It is, therefore, an essential ally in business management centered on performance.
Anticipate Business Objections
Regardless of the quality of your product pitch or appointment scheduling, it’s a safe bet that your interlocutor will respond with one or more objections. To optimize your prospecting, you must be able to precisely identify the different reasons that may lead a prospect to refuse to meet you or buy your product. And, of course, it is necessary to provide a reasoned response to each of the objections.
This work is fundamental to the success of your commercial prospecting. If a positive response cannot overcome specific objections, try to divert your interlocutor’s attention by highlighting another strong point of your product or service. In any case, do not hesitate to train yourself to deal with it, through role-playing, for example.
Opt For An Omnichannel Approach
At a time when digital is increasingly important in daily life, it is strongly recommended to set up omnichannel prospecting in line with the uses and behaviors of your prospects.
One such strategy is to simultaneously use various communication channels to interact with your potential customers. However, the purchasing process for the latter must be clear and fluid, especially when moving from one channel to another. The difficulty lies in building a perfect synergy between the tools used to complement each other to offer a continuous journey to your prospects. Emailing, phoning, feeding a blog with inbound marketing content, or using social networks are all channels that can be combined endlessly!
Thanks to these five practical tips, you can improve the performance of your commercial prospecting and thus increase your turnover. A CRM is one of the essential suggestions, as its usefulness is transversal and will save you precious time during your steps.
Also Read: Digital Marketing Strategies To Get Succeed In Sales
