Prospecting And Lead Generation (Edited)

Time consuming, process oriented, overwhelming…these are just a few ways of describing the task of business to business lead generation.

Its great to consider that the fastest way to grow your business is to leverage your current client base and with some strategic planning your clients will introduce you to new opportunities to increase sales. But far from that there are needs to continually generate sales lead.

Sales people are under more pressure than ever and always facing the “what can you do for me now” message from management. Inside and outside sales people have little time for sales prospecting and nurturing; however, everyone knows these are fundamental building blocks of every pipeline. Unless the sales funnel is flowing at unusually high levels, causing businesses to struggle keeping up, sales prospecting is the very first step in any sales cycle.

One of the greatest headache of sales and business developers is generating strings on sales leads to leverage on on monthly basis.

According to the B-to-B Lead Generation Handbook from Marketing Sherpa, when a sale occurred 80% of all decision makers found the vendor while 20% of all decision makers say the vendor found them. The point is prospects don’t look for the vendor when you have a new solution or product, they look when they are ready. The window of opportunity is always open but organizations don’t have the visibility they need to find these pockets of opportunity. By employing business to business lead generation tactics organizations will find more leads and ensure prospects keep your solution at the forefront of their mind when they’re ready to buy.

You can as well Join our up coming prospecting, Lead Generation and winning New Business Workshop

Read through our tips and ideas to stimulate ideas to help improve your business to business lead generation strategies.

1. Join industry forums. Research the industry forums in your marketplace and get involved where you can.

2. Ask for feedback when calling people. Have you ever heard that sales people talk more than they listen? Some say that God gave us two ears and one mouth to make sure we listen more than we talk. When prospecting or taking sales calls, approach the discussions with a “consultative attitude”. Think of yourself like a doctor. Try to understand the other persons (company’s) problem(s) first. After all, we don’t want to write any bad prescriptions.

You can as well Join our up coming prospecting, Lead Generation and winning New Business Workshop

1. Send gifts and cards during holiday seasons. Have a system to keep track of holiday gifts. Spreadsheets work well for this. If you have some good prospects in the funnel make sure to get them a box of cookies or chocolates (a step above a holiday card). They’ll have something to remember you by. Your prospects are human beings, creatures of habit, and doing something nice for them will soften them up. They’ll feel obligated to return the favor; hopefully, in the form of an inquiry, evaluation or purchase.

2. Hire industry consultants with executive level relationships. Sometimes, it’s not what you know but who you know. If you don’t know anyone then you’re not driving your networking in the pole position. Leverage industry experts. Find a consultant in your business, an ex-executive at a competing company or someone who has great relationships in your market. Work out a compensation plan to incent them to help with introductions, referrals or reselling to prospective clients.

3. Join a Chamber of Commerce. This is an old school tactic that every company should do. This is because birds of same feather flock together. This will help update and be at par with other players in the industry.

You can as well Join our up coming prospecting, Lead Generation and winning New Business Workshop

1. Building partnerships at the sales level wont be a bad idea. Sales people should understand there is a whole bunch of other sales people just like them looking for leads. Map out your industry to identify key players in your market. If you’re in sales, invite sales people working at non-competitive companies in your industry and territory to have lunch and socialize with them. Approach the lunch with an open mind and focus on them, not you, during the discussion. Understand their objectives, goals, and motivations and see how you can help them with leads, introductions, partnerships, and more. Give and you will get.

Credit: ( leadliaison) https://www.leadliaison.com/best-practices/lead-generation/101-business-to-business-lead-generation-ideas-and-tips/