You’ll Need These 10 Sales Prospecting Methods In 2021

If you think prospecting is the hardest part of your job, you’re in good company. Over 40% of all salespeople agree with you , that prospecting is the most difficult part of the entire sales process, followed closely by closing and qualifying. The trick is to diversify your prospecting process, activities, and skills in order to maximize the number of quality leads you’re sourcing. This article is here to help turn the most difficult part of your day into the breeziest, so keep reading for our list of 10 top tips on how to improve your sales prospecting methods.

Top 10 Sales Prospecting Methods:

1. Heat those cold-calls up

It’s one of those sales prospecting methods that many people loathe, but whether you like it or not, cold-calling is still an effective way to source new prospects. In fact, 82% of buyers say they have accepted meetings with salespeople after a series of contacts beginning with sales cold calls.

Cold-calls are all about expediting the process of going from complete stranger to trusted ‘friend’ in a matter of minutes. Scared to take the plunge into freezing cold-call water? Do your research on the company beforehand so that once get through to a decision-maker, you’ll be able to demonstrate the value of your product to that particular company and build trust. Remember that decision-makers want to hear about value, not technical specifications, they’ll also want to talk about price, so don’t be too shy to bring it up after you’ve discussed value.

Want to find your decision-maker’s phone numbers? Download Lusha Contact’s Chrome extension to gives you immediate access to the personal phone numbers and email addresses of your prospects, as well as their company information. Lusha Contacts shortens your prospecting time down by a mile and makes prospecting a breeze.

2. Be a thought leader

As a salesperson, you’re a classified expert in your industry, after all, who knows more about a product than someone trying to sell it? Nobody, which is why thought leadership is a fantastic sales prospecting method. Build credibility and trust with your prospects by writing blogs, white pages, guest articles, and whatever else you can think of. Post this writing to your LinkedIn and share them amongst other social media channels. This way, you increase your chances of a prospect knowing about you, and learning from you before you make initial contact. This means you’ll no longer be a stranger, but someone smart and credible that they are already familiar with, this familiarity makes it a lot easier for you to sell to them.

3. Social media matters

We hate to break it to you but if you’re not squeezing as much juice out of your social media platforms as possible, then your sales prospecting methods are probably not up to scratch. Social media and prospecting go hand-in-hand, and it’s a great place to find, research, and interact with prospective customers. Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and Instagram are all great places to start. Once you’ve created those profiles, follow these 4 tips for prospecting on social media:

• Schedule your posts- create an ongoing schedule for all your social media posts, consistency is SO important
• Personalize your outreach- create templates that make personalizing your outreach messages easier, prospects like it when you call them by their actual name, (shock!)
• Test test test!- test how best to find your prospects on different social media channels, using different filters. There is no one size fits all approach.
• Less is more- narrow your target audience down using filters such as job role, geographic location, and more.

4. Prospecting never ends (mwahaha)

We know it sounds a bit grim, especially because prospecting is one of the hardest parts of your job in sales. But it’s important to remember that your sales prospecting method is on-going and not just a one-off event. You need to carve out time each day for prospecting. Remember that prospecting isn’t over after the first phone call, you need to stay consistent. Additionally, we recommend that you are constantly researching and updating your prospecting methods. We’re headed into 2021 baby, which means that changes to social media and technology are rampant, so keep your finger on the pulse and be open to the ever-evolving world of sales prospecting.

5. Focus on finding the right match

One of the most important things to remember when developing your sales prospecting methods is that prospects are a quality over quantity game. Don’t waste time focusing your prospecting efforts on chasing up uninterested people, wasting your time and theirs. Remember that the prospect comes before prospecting, so the trick is to figure out exactly who fits your profile as your ideal customer to sell to. Your Cinderella slipper match is going to take some time to find, so start by analyzing current customers and understand what it is about them that makes them the ideal customer. Develop ideal customer profiles (ICP’s) and use them to source ideal prospects. You should be thinking about these key ICP points of information when identifying your perfect prospect:

1. Budget/Revenue- can the prospects’ company afford your product? What’s the lowest price threshold that your prospect would need to pay?
2. Industry Vertical- what verticals do you work with? Which ones do you not?
3. Company size- what size companies are your ICP from?
4. Legality- is your potential customer base limited by legal reasons such as location, age, or government restrictions?

Want to find key company infographics in a flash? Lusha Contacts not only finds your prospect’s personal contact information, but it also sources important company infographics, such as geographic location, annual revenue, company size, and more. A killer prospecting method is to first develop your ICP’s, and then use Lusha to source prospects that fit the characteristics of your ideal prospect.

6. Don’t be shy, ask for referrals

Referrals are one of the most reliable sales prospecting methods, so take full advantage. Sales mavens know that referrals are the fastest revenue driver and solve two major issues:

1. Getting those qualified leads into the pipeline
2. Getting decision-makers into a meeting

So why are referrals such a fire prospecting method? Well, As we all know that sales are about building trust between salesperson and prospect. A staggering 92% of people will trust referrals from people they know. Referrals build confidence between salesperson and prospect, which means that a prospect will probably move through the sales pipeline faster. With referrals, prospects expect to hear from you, so they’re already warmed up and ready to take the call, making your job easier because you’re not a complete stranger. So, don’t be too shy to ask your favorite happy customers for referrals, and don’t forget to say thank you to the legend who referred you.

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