- [Voiceover] Engaging with prospects used
to be something just the sales organization did.
But now with the ever evolving
social and online landscape,
there's so many more ways an organization
can engage and communicate with their prospects.
So the question now is,
how does your organization engage with your prospects.
In order to determine the level of engagement,
where to engage,
and how to engage them,
you will need to paint as complete
of a picture of the prospect as possible.
This means your organization will know
where the are in the sales cycle,
what previous interactions, if any,
this prospect has had with your organization,
and you'll also receive data
helping you understand how you can provide the best value
to them at the stage they're in.
This could mean that you tweet out a relevant blog post
to answer a question they posed on Twitter
or you schedule a follow up call
to check in on them
to see how they're enjoying a product demo.
When your organization is able
to see a 360 degree view of your prospect,
so where they've been,
who they are,
and how you can best provide value,
your conversion rates will grow significantly.
You'll be able to connect all these data points
for a full picture,
and you'll begin to see your leads as people
and not just a name from a submitted form.
The first way an organization is going to interact
with a prospect is by putting their content
in front of them.
And social media is a perfect place to accomplish this.
It allows prospects to investigate your brand online
without receiving the hard sell.
See when people are on social media,
they don't want to be bombarded with a sales pitch.
You can work your way around that
by engaging with your prospects
by delivering them exceptional value.
So this is providing advice and content
that helps them with their pain,
and it will often result in dialogue
that will create credibility and build trust
for you and your brand.
What is the right content
to get in front of your prospects?
So that's content on message.
Your marketing department is busy creating content
specifically designed to speak to your audience.
So work with them to really understand the common problems
your organization solves
and your customers pain points.
Use this content to then help your prospect solve a problem.
And while we're talking about content,
make sure that it is engaging.
If you provide content
that is useful to your prospect's life
and helps them solve a problem,
your content is engaging.
I'm talking about things like videos,
e-books,
infographics,
and blog posts.
A great way to determine what your ideal customer
will find valuable,
is by monitoring trending topics online.
You will always want to listen
to what your customers are saying online,
because they're going to tell you
what they're finding valuable
and what they need.
And this is important,
know when to launch into your sale pitch
and when to not.
So when you're engaging with prospects online,
there's a lot of room for misinterpretation.
Tone and messaging can all be misconstrued.
So when you're reaching out to a prospect online
always lead with value
and let them know,
really clearly,
why you're reaching out.
So a good approach to this is,
say you notice a prospect complaining
about a common pain point that is
also relevant to your audience.
You can send them a simple message
with a friendly greeting
along with a helpful resource.
So this could be something like
"Hey, Megan. Noticed you're looking
for some info on some Social CRM tools for your business.
Here's an infographic I found.
It has the top five platforms
and I thought it might be useful for you."
So this is really casual.
It's establishing,
myself, the sender,
as a valuable resource
and hopefully it help solve their issue.
Next, the best way to engage your prospects
is by using a Social CRM tool.
So Social CRM uses lead scoring
to quantify the level of relationship
between a prospect and your brand.
And this isn't information you're going to be able to get
without a more robust tool.
It'll help your marketing team engage
with your prospect on the preferred social media channel.
It'll help your sales department know when
to get in touch with a lead
and begin the conversation with them.
So Social CRM really strengthens the relationship
you have to your prospect
and improves your conversion rate.
Engaging with your prospects is a lot more
than a sales phone call.
With the Social CRM strategy or tool
you can better understand
who your prospect is
and how to best engage them.
At the end of the day we all want to be seen,
heard,
and provided value as a customer.
And being able to deliver on this need
is critical for organizations.