Social Selling — How Social Media Can Improve Your Sales

Still only using phone calls to make a sale for your B2B business? You probably aren’t seeing great results, but don’t worry, we have something that can help increase your sales dramatically. In the past few years, social media has played a huge part in closing sales for B2B businesses. 

For example, an article from SuperOffice demonstrates how social media plays a big part in the B2B Buyer Journey — 84% C-level and VP level buyers use social media in decision making!

Why social media? Well, nowadays everyone is on their phone or computer scrolling through social media. That’s how people make connections today. Therefore, social media is a great window for you and your sales team to build relationships with future customers and then complete that sale when that person/company is ready. 

Social media can transform how you do sales and increase your success rate. The process of using social media to make sales is called social selling.

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What is Social Selling? 

Social selling is more than just selling surprisingly. Social selling is about finding your community of future customers via social media and building a relationship with them through interactions, and demonstrating your brand’s ideals on social platforms. 

Social selling as a whole is a process aimed at gaining trust from your customers instead of pressuring them to buy something immediately. You will complete far more sales today by building a relationship with your customers, and social media is just the platform for that. 

Why Social Selling Works? 

Social selling has proven to work in the world of sales this past year. Here are some amazing statistics. 

10 Key B2B Social Selling Statistics 

According to OptinMonster, 

1. 78% of salespeople engaged in social selling are outselling their peers who aren’t.
2. 31% of B2B professionals say that social selling has allowed them to build deeper relationships with clients.
3. More than 10% of social sales reps have closed 5 or more deals due to being active on social media.
4. 76% of buyers are ready to have a social media conversation with potential providers.
5. 92% of B2B buyers are willing to engage with a sales professional who is a known industry thought leader.
6. 53% of customer loyalty is driven by a salesperson’s ability to deliver unique insight, easily done through social media.
7. Social sellers are 51% more likely to achieve sales quotas.
8. Companies with consistent social selling processes are 40% more likely to hit revenue goals than non-social sellers.
9. 39% of B2B professionals said social selling reduced the amount of time they had to spend researching potential leads.
10. 84% of C-Level executives use social media to make purchasing choices.

How to Start Social Selling?

To start social selling, research what platforms your customers are on. Are they on LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, a combination of some? Now get on these platforms and provide engaging, insightful posts that will show your customers that you’re an expert in your field. 

Avoid too many posts where you are outright trying to sell a product. Also, discover what problems your customers have in their industry and cater your posts to that. They will be more drawn to you if they know you can help them with a problem. 

SuperOffice, in their article on Social Selling, gives great advice on actively following companies you think your company can help and provide services too. At CycleWerx, when we reach out to companies on LinkedIn, we craft a message that is founded on building a relationship instead of asking them to hire us for marketing services.  Here is one example of a kind of message we use for our company: 

Hi Charles, It looks like we share some of the same connections. Maybe we should connect? How long have you known Kevin? I like connecting with other marketing leaders in the SaaS community. I truly hope our connection can lead to some positive opportunities.

— Scotty

Lastly, interact with your customers via social media in the comments. Interacting with them shows your customers that you want to build a relationship with them and aren’t out to just sell, sell, sell!

Learn to Improve Your Lead Generation with
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Free Download!

Social selling is the next step you need to take to increase your sales and stay competitive in this social media-run business world. Instead of striking out with business calls, strive to build relationships with your future customers and you will see great results! 

Need help with running your social media or need more sales tips? Contact CycleWerx Marketing today!