If we are in the age of social media, ignoring these communication channels means giving up on a large portion of users who are potential customers. In Brazil, Facebook has reached 127 million active users per month.
So, if you want to engage this audience, see, in this post, what social selling is and how to implement it in your actions!
What is social selling?
This technique uses social media to create unique and trustworthy relationships with potential customers. This generates qualified leads that can be converted more easily throughout the purchasing journey. This strategy is important because it eliminates practices that consumers hate, such as telemarketing or other invasive tactics.
Bots, for example, are great allies for social selling. They can vp communication officer email list be configured to answer customers' main questions and are available 24 hours a day. This way, users can contact the brand at any time and, later, a trained professional will follow up with the contact.
The success of a good salesperson is building good relationships with customers, and through social selling it has been possible to maximize this impact. If before the salesperson had to identify with little data who could be a potential customer, now, with social networks, it is possible to engage an audience that already shows interest in your brand and your products.
LinkedIn is a social network focused on businesses and companies. The network itself has defined 4 fundamental pillars for social selling. See:
establish a professional/personal brand;
locate the right people;
interact and offer insights;
cultivate relationships.
It is possible to measure your Social Selling Index (SSI) on the platform called Social Selling Index.
How to insert it into your strategies?
The assumption that everyone uses social media creates a false impression that it is easy to build social relationships. Being present on these communication channels and posting frequently is not enough.
First, you need to know your brand's persona, create a plan with content strategies for this audience, and then put the actions into practice. Social media has an advantage because it allows the brand to know and segment its audience.
For example, LinkedIn is a social network aimed at B2B businesses, while Facebook and Instagram are aimed at B2C audiences, but the way you connect with them should be different. Instagram is a completely image-based network, so using videos and photos can be the differentiator in capturing the user's attention. In the case of Facebook, longer texts and captions still gain space.
Identifying and using the right channels
Once you’ve identified which channels your persona is on, start creating content that engages the user and only then talk about sales. In the case of Instagram, you can create posts with polls, promotions and questions.
Many professionals still believe that Facebook's relationship strategies are more important than other media. However, the Social Media 360° study showed that the average number of followers per brand on Instagram exceeded one million people in 2017.
Therefore, seeking strategies for this network can be important. Create high-quality photos, use strategic hashtags, include location in posts, invest in partnerships with influencers and show behind-the-scenes footage in stories.
Creating moments and engaging the audience
When the user is active, the contact is non-invasive. For example, if your brand made a post about a new product and a user tagged someone else to see it, it might be interesting to make a comment that will engage with that message.
Additionally, after a user has liked or commented on a photo, sending an exclusive promotion to the inbox can be interesting to open a channel of communication and better understand what the user is looking for.
If your company has a page with a lot of likes or followers, it may not be easy to monitor everything that happens on it. Therefore, solutions like Iconosquare , Buzzmonitor and Hootsuite can be good helpers to track mentions and follower engagement.
The ability to do social selling is a prerequisite for today’s salespeople. Therefore, like any other skill, it must be learned, trained and put into practice.
Prospecting and maintaining contacts
Social selling does not necessarily have to arise from interactions that originate on social media. They can emerge at industry events and then be extended to online communication channels.
When a salesperson attends a trade show or event, they establish initial contact with dozens of people. Therefore, approaching them after the event is important to start identifying potential customers and creating lasting relationships with them.
Participating in groups is also an interesting source of prospecting. Facebook and LinkedIn are platforms that offer several opportunities through groups. Joining communities with topics that you are an expert in can be the difference in capturing users' attention. Naturally, potential clients will be interested in the subject and will seek you out to learn more.
Social selling is part of the digital marketing strategy and, like any strategy, it needs to be analyzed and measured. Check the real impact of this action on your sales funnel. Has it contributed to conversions? Has the investment been worthwhile? Gather CRM and social media data and calculate the strategy's ROI. This way, you will be able to define other actions to bring more results to the company.
Social selling has become one of the best ways to generate leads and increase brand awareness and engagement. If you want to learn more about strategies recommended for social media, read our blog post !
