Today, BrainSell and InsideView ran a webinar, Leveraging Social Media in SugarCRM. Nirav Bisarya, Channel Development Manager at InsideView, started off with a great overview of why sales people should leverage social data in their sales process. Social tools in SugarCRM were also demonstrated.
Guest Blog! This week, Koka Sexton, Director of Social Strategy at InsideView graces the BrainSell Blog with his social wisdom. Later this week, Sexton will co-host a webinar with BrainSell on Social Media in SugarCRM. Sign up for the Nov. 30 webinar here.
In order to be an effective sales person you have to be leveraging the Internet and social media to keep you connected to prospects. Sales intelligence is a driving force for sales teams trying to leverage all of the data about prospects and turn them into opportunities.
Social media and sales intelligence increases companies win rates of new business. Since driving more revenue is a cornerstone for companies, it shouldn’t be overlooked as a tool to enable your sales teams.
Social Media is the Key
There is too much information available online these days that a sales person is walking blind if they are not using it in some way. Sales prospecting lists for contact data is fine but it’s not very effective on a large scale. Gathering contact information is only the first step in an effective sales process. The real intelligence comes from contact data and the relevant information about that contact.
When a sales person understands the impact of having relevant information on their prospects being handed to them on a daily basis, they are able to decrease the amount of time spent researching information that can help. When acted on with social selling best practices, prospects will be highly engaged and you will close more deals.
What’s holding sales people back?
When it comes to doing pre-call research and getting some background on a prospect or company you are calling into, there is a lot of information gathered by just doing a Google search. The problem with this is there is very little context around the results. You can spend an hour digging through search results and other resources to get an idea of who the person is and what challenges their company is facing but you’re busy too and can’t justify a large amount of time to research to make a call that may only take 10-15 minutes. “Typically, there is a lot of knowledge out there,” says John Aiello, CEO of SAVO, in a video interview with Selling Power magazine publisher Gerhard Gschwandtner. “The gap is that people can’t find it.”
Sales Intelligence Drives the Conversation
As a sales person, there is no excuse any more for not knowing more about your prospects and the company you are calling into. Sales Intelligence tools enable you to have relevant information at your virtual fingertips that can be used to know in many cases exactly how to position your product or service. There are even free sales intelligence tools available that can help.
Sales people need intelligence to close more deals. Making that intelligence available in a way that sales can capture quickly and easy to find is a necessity. In an Accenture study of more than 1,000 managers in the United States and the United Kingdom, nearly 60 percent have to go to numerous sources to compile the information they need to do their jobs well. About the same number reported that information as poorly distributed across the organization.
Building your sales pipeline and increasing win rates is not magic. There is no secret code that needs to be cracked for success. All you need is more information and a better way of identifying what matters when you start making connections.
About the author: Koka Sexton, Director of Social Strategy at InsideView, is one of the most recognized social experts in the technology industry. With ten+ years of sales experience and a passion for social media, Koka is the perfect evangelist for social selling, a topic that he promotes through national speaking engagements and InsideView’s newest social media endeavor: Social Selling University. Koka’s expertise extends beyond his endless knowledge of social networks into his skill at employing them to drive lead generation, create new opportunities, and engage customers
Our Duct Tape Marketing friend Dan Kraus cited an amazing web site this morning on his blog and Twitter. I got so excited about the new site that I’m dropping everything to write about it. That’s right, everything.
The site is fiverr.com. Regular people post services they’re willing to do for $5, no more, no less. There is a huge spread of offerings. Some are silly, “I will put a live tarantula in my mouth for $5″ and some are exceptional deals “I will make you a beautiful website or blog for $5″
I’ll take that!
Besides business stuff, there are great gift ideas, “I will draw a picture of your pet for $5″ or “I will make a custom greeting card for $5″
Social media also shines on the site. People are offering to post comments on your blog for $5, get you Twitter followers and even Facebook fans.
I had a fuzzy feeling looking through the site. People connecting and offering services they love to do for a very fair price of $5.
As I look around I’ve noticed competitors selling their businesses, closing their doors or simply getting small. It’s not just my competition, it’s the business world around us. Whether you’re starting a business or want to build your business in this economy, here’s 7 simple ideas to consider.
1. Acquire: Growth through aqcuisition could be your key to future growth. Find businesses within your industry that are distressed or tired. Or stretch a bit and add a business that has synergy with your core business. But don’t wander too far from your core business. Look for a business that adds to your cross-sell initiative since new customers are hard to find in a tough economy.
2. Inbound Marketing: Invest wisely in marketing. Although traditional marketing still has it’s place, use your spare time or consider getting your marketing folks onboard with Inbound Marketing initiatives. Become a thought leader within your industry. Use the web to get found by your buyers. Today, people want to buy rather than being sold too. Using Inbound Marketing (blogs, Search Engine Optimization (SEO), Social Media like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and more) help your potential buyers find your company when they are ready to purchase. Inbound marketing creates credibility with your buying audience and it’s cost effective! It’s also timely since people who find you are already in the buying /sales cycle. Read the book Inbound Marketing. It’s full of ah-hah moments that will get you rolling with new marketing strategies. Check your web site grade against your competition with this free tool; website grader. Here’s a shout out to our friends at Hubspot for a great product too!
There’s been a lot of talk lately about the Social CRM process. Actually, the phrase was recently dubbed by blogger Jacob Morgan. As social media outlets continue to take off, we need to understand how the wealth of data can be categorized and monetized within CRM. It’s difficult to visualize how these outlets can turn into sales.
How can we successfuly integrate social media into our CRM systems? It seems like a messy undertaking, but Morgan does a great job of clearing it up.
Here is his original idea. It’s simple, maybe too simple.
Morgan's Original SCRM Depiction
Through the beauty of social media, his ideas grew in a few week’s time and he’s added on to it. A Google group, Social CRM Pioneers, led a discussion on Morgan’s initial thoughts. The discussion took on even more interest on the Cloud Ave. blog and ReTweets followed. Social media seems abstract, but with the help of others, Morgan drilled down a little more.
Morgan's Revised SCRM Process Depiction
How do you follow through with social media traffic? Have you created new fields in account records for Twitter activity?
BrainSell is so into social media that we’ve partnered with the very cool social media company, InsideView.
InsideView, located in San Francisco, has a great little product, SalesView. SalesView can integrate into SugarCRM and find social media connections and news.
Let’s face it, one can waste hours scouring social media sites, blogs and general news sites for mentions of their competitors, leads, customers and THEMSELVES. SalesView monitors thousands of sources relentlessly for that information. You can sit back and see the buzz happen right from SugarCRM.
Social media has never been so easy, and profitable!
Check out our new SalesView page! You can even try it for free.
Dharmesh Shah wowed an audience of 100 at BrainSell and SugarCRM’s Social Media and CRM event last Tuesday outside of Boston.
BrainSell’s recorded the entire event and the frist two installments of Dharmesh’s talk are ready for consumption. Check our YouTube channel, BrainsellTechnology, for more posts. Thanks again to all of our wonderful speakers!
BrainSell and Sugar’s CRM Acceleration event went off without a hitch yesterday. 100 people attended at the Hilton Woburn. Thanks to all for braving the rain!
We learned a few things from all of the planning and marketing.
1. Inbound marketing WORKS!
Over 75% of our registrants found out about the event through social media outlets. That would be re tweeting, messages on linkedin and facebook, and a few facebook and linkedin advertisements. People spread the word for us!
The event takes place this Tuesday, March 23rd. This has been one of the most exciting and dynamic events I’ve ever been involved in. We’re very lucky to have great presenters who are focused on delivering “remarkable content”. From Dharmesh Shah, co-author of Inbound Marketing, Umberto Milletti, CEO of Inside View, Mitch Lieberman, VP of Strategic Solutions at SugarCRM, Martin Schneider, Director of Marketing at SugarCRM and Chip Meyers, Sales Operations Manager at Insource Performance Solutions who pulls the whole story together as Inbound Marketeer and user of technology that allows his sales staff to take advantage of qualified prospects that his Inbound Marketing efforts identify.
What’s been so remarkable is that we have 190 sign ups. Which reinforces the power of Inbound Marketing. The bulk of those who’ve signed up for the event have done so by Inbound Marketing efforts through Social media.
In preparation for the event for those who have signed up, pick up Dharmesh’s book, Inbound Marketing. He’ll be signing books post event. What you’re going to find is genuine and authentic information. I fully expect attendees to walk out with information they can use.
The countdown is on – 5 days until our big social media event at the Woburn Hilton. Close to 200 people are signed up already and we’re setting our goals high. 300 sign ups! Almost all of the sign ups have come from social media. Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter.
We needed to step things up in the final sprint. So one of our fine colleagues from SugarCRM, @mjayliebs, suggested running a Twitter contest. After a little research, I found that short and easy is the best way to get traction with a contest.
@brainsell hyped about http://bit.ly/brainsellevent and giving away $100 in GC today! RT this to be eligible to win 1 of 4 $25 GCs
That’s it! Re-tweet our message about re-tweeting and you can win one of 4 $25 gift cards. To where? Who cares! It only takes one click for a chance at free money, I’m down. Are you? Starbucks anyone?
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