Category: Social Selling

Posted on by — Leave a comment

“Somebody belongs somewhere”

“Somebody belongs somewhere”.

What? Say that again.

In this day & age, we are still seeing inequalities of all kinds in employment. Recently, a fast-food major, tweeted something that was not in good taste. I was shocked to see that.

So, you will do anything to get clicks. Right?

Utterly wrong. And so cheap.

Does anyone in these companies think before starting such a campaign?

In this internet age, brands can kill themselves in a matter of few seconds. With wrong judgement. With poorly written copy. With arrogance. With position of power. While underestimating the power of the medium that they use, to run the very same campaigns.

How great brands get wiped out? Think about it.

Customers will forgive you for anything that you had committed. What they won’t forgive is this: How bad you made them feel while dealing with you. For ex, that tweet by this fast-food major made them lose all the women as their customers, in a matter of seconds. Did I say they tweeted on International Women’s day? Yes, they did.

Arrogance: In one-word, if I have to sum it up all, this is that.

I look at it as an opportunity for all small & upcoming brands to make a name for themselves.

Personally, as a shopper, I will buy from smaller brands or brands that treats it’s customers like God. It’s a win-win.

What do you think?

#marketing #b2c #b2b #sales #campaign #adcopy

Posted on by — Leave a comment

What makes a content, good?

I understand the difficulties involved in creating good content.

Here are some tips for creating good content – be it a blog post / a podcast / a video:

  1. Be objective.
  2. Keep it short & to the point.
  3. Stay on course.
  4. Narrate stories.
  5. Use humour.
  6. Engage audience. Connect with them.
  7. Be human. Some errors are fine. In fact, they are actually needed.
  8. Deliver tons of value.
  9. Give a reward to the audience at the end, for reading, listening or watching.
  10. Ask for feedback.

Happy Selling!!

#b2b #b2c #sales #content #storytelling

Posted on by — Leave a comment

LinkedIn Top Voices 2020: India

LinkedIn Top Voices 2020: India is out. In case you missed it, you can view it here:

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/linkedin-top-voices-2020-india-abhigyan-chand/

In a world where people, ask you to double tap for a surprise or copy paste others’ stories or narrate stories about how they gave a job to the most deserving candidate or ask you to click on these icons – “like” or “celebrate” or “support”, if you like working from home or office or both, here is a list of people who genuinely drive engagement on their posts with their insights and tips in their domain.

If you are not following them, you should, depending on your interests.

LinkedIn has released Top Voices 2020 in various categories:

  1. Data Science and AI
  2. Design
  3. Education
  4. Entrepreneurship and Small Business
  5. Equity in the Workplace
  6. Finance and Economy
  7. Frontline Health Care
  8. Frontline Retail
  9. Job Search and Careers
  10. Marketing and Advertising
  11. Sales
  12. Sports
  13. Technology

Also, LinkedIn has released lists region wise.

Here is the complete list: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/linkedin-top-voices-2020-meet-professionals-driving-todays-roth/?published=t

#HappyLearning

#HappySelling!!

Posted on by — Leave a comment

What’s your Social Selling Index [SSI]?

Before I get to that, in today’s world, you exist only if you are in #Instagram, #LinkedIn, #Facebook etc. Right / Wrong?

Couple of things to do:

  1. Post regularly on your subject matter.
  2. Share other people’s insightful posts. [like this one :)]
  3. Like & Share valuable comments on other’s posts. [I encourage you to start with my post :)]
  4. Be resourceful.
  5. Have a social media playbook.
  6. Have social media goals.
  7. Create a content calendar.
  8. Be creative.
  9. Be helpful.
  10. Stay on course.

LinkedIn Social Selling Index is a measure of how effective you are in:

a) establishing your personal brand

b) finding the right people

c) engaging with insights

d) building relationships

B2B buyers like to deal with Sales professionals who have been referred by someone they know or trust. So, it is important to connect with people in your industry and build trust and confidence. They may be referring you to someone they know who might fit your buyer persona.

Here’s my SSI in this pdf. I dropped from a score of 78 to 72 now. This is computed daily.

You can find yours here: https://www.linkedin.com/sales/ssi

HappySocialSelling!!

HappySelling!!

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Be Inspired! But don’t copy!

My #content was stolen. [Why am I not happy about it?]

By a Director, Solutions and Services of a computer hardware company that’s also into Doc imaging. The Director is based in California & handles the marketing for the company.

I first received a #LinkedIn request from this person. I accepted. Then after a while, this copying happened.

I am not a guru on #PersonalBranding. But that didn’t stop me from sharing what I knew on the subject.

The first three points I wrote:

  1. How do you want to be perceived?
  2. What should people remember when they think of you?
  3. What do you stand for?

And the Director wrote:

How do you want people to perceive you?

How do you want to be remembered?

What do you want your name to be synonymous with?

———

What a clever lift?

Escaping Google’s punishment. 🙂

Quotes:

  1. “I don’t worry about people “copying” me. Their next move can’t happen until I make mine.” -Germany Kent
  2. “Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery that mediocrity can pay to greatness.” – Oscar Wilde

My advice to this person:

  1. Please be yourself.
  2. Don’t try to be me.
  3. You can’t be me.
  4. Find the real meaning of “copywriting”.

What’s more: This person is writing a book on Personal Branding that is likely to be published soon on #Amazon.

Happy Creating!!

#HappySelling #beinspired

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Conversation Starters!

How are you?

That’s weird & not what you should be asking your prospects or customers.

It doesn’t mean anything. Certainly not a conversation starter.

For you to have a fruitful discussion over phone or in person, you need to engage your customer in a way that sparks his or her interest.

If you understand their business & the person, you will readily have a range of things to speak about.

Some ideas:

  1. Innovations in their domain
  2. Pet projects they are working on
  3. What they truly care about
  4. Ask, what they are working on right now, in a non-intrusive way
  5. Milestones reached by them
  6. Their Products/Services
  7. Their People
  8. Their Work culture
  9. Their CEO
  10. Their campaigns & all the noise they are making in the marketplace

You got it.

It’s out and out their Story, their Show and your love for their Company.

Get them talking.

You shouldn’t be talking.

You just listen. And. Take. Notes. In your Mind.

#HappySelling

#b2b #sales #enterprisesales #business #changethegame #conversationstarter #engage #people #customers #prospects

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Track your competition!

Those were the days I was hungry for leads.

I used to trouble my tech support guys for leads.

Not a good lead source, you say. Hang on.

One such day, my tech support guy said “go to xyz [name of a place]” unable to bear my pestering.

Not knowing where to go, I knocked on all doors & accidentally found a training institute & met few people. Left my cards with every other department where I couldn’t meet anyone.

Two days later, the unimaginable happened.

I got a call.

Rest is history.

That turned out to be a very big order for many software for multi location.

My colleague had been in touch with his ex-colleague & friend. He casually heard him say that he had been to that place but didn’t tell him the client name.

I found it out.

Later, I asked my colleague how did he get that lead. That’s when he told me about his conversation with his ex-colleague.

This story helps me work with optimism till date.

Takeaways:

  1. Follow your competitors, if you cannot be there before they do.
  2. Be optimistic.
  3. Ask your colleagues, if you are stuck somewhere.
  4. Be at the right place at the right time. If you cannot be early, that is.
  5. Highlight your strengths.
  6. Allow the buyer to contact you & help them make it their decision to choose you. This is very important.

#HappySelling

#b2b #changethegame #sales #marketing #leads #business #leadgeneration #competition

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Rediscovering the “Art” of Prospecting!

John Barrows & M. Jeffrey Hoffman conducted the webinar “John Barrows Goes Back to School: Rediscovering the “Art” of #Prospecting” yesterday or today [depending on where you live :)].

I enjoyed it thoroughly. What an energy & insight. Learnt about “Why you? Why you now?” technique to turn cold calls and cold emails to hot ones. How to get them to call you back?

It is important to connect with the C level but start from bottom. Bottom-up approach. That Fedex story is going to stay with me forever.

My takeaways:

1. Fake it to yourself until you actually make it.

2. Connecting with the non-buyer first to learn something that you can use when you have the live conversation with the buyer.

3. Prefer live conversations with a non-buyer over email interaction with a buyer. [more relevant now, when all of us are getting thousands of emails]

4. Look for triggers while prospecting.

5. Energy and enthusiasm are important in Sales.

6. Keep yourself busy always.

7. Do not jump on the inbound leads at once. Give it some time before you do that.

8. Do not use all that you have learnt in an MBA when you interact with the C Level.

9. Have the maturity to walk out of a deal early if there is no fit.

10. During discovery & prospecting call, disqualify more than you qualify.

#Happyselling #b2b #sales #salesprocess #changethegame

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Networking in Sales!

That was Year 1996.

I had just then started selling to Corporate. Until then, I was selling to entrepreneurs and small businesses. Selling to corporate called for lot more skills than selling to entrepreneurs & small businesses.

Networking skill is one of them.

We didn’t have #LinkedIn then.

I was hanging out where my clients met.

Road shows, seminars, conferences, product launches, workshops and any event where the corporate was in full attendance.

In most cases, the event would be conducted by our Principals – Microsoft, Oracle, IBM etc. We used to get a stall outside the hall to showcase our solutions.

Do you know how and when I met my clients?

During tea breaks and lunch time.

I sacrificed my lunch to go around and meet people. When they were having their lunch.

It used to pay off.

I would introduce myself. Exchange business cards. Would ask them if they are looking for some help.

I then promise to visit them soon and talk further. They’ll agree.

If there were 2000 people in attendance, I would have met at least 40 customers. That was just 2%.

But I have 40 contacts now.

I would start my outreach immediately after the event.

I provided value to my prospects before they bought anything. And I provided more value after the sale.

Coming back to networking, I networked not just with prospects and customers but also with competitors, partners and principals. Literally, anyone in the Eco-system.

I would know about the purchase of Air Conditioners by my prospect through the AC vendors, even though I was selling only Software.

All those strategies apply these days as well. On LinkedIn as well as otherwise also.

Stay tuned for more stories.

Happy Selling!!

#sales #customers #prospects #networking #skills