Best Social Selling Techniques You Should Know About
What is Social Selling?
Social selling is the process of finding and connecting with potential clients through social media platforms.
While the concept may sound a lot like social media marketing or influencer marketing, the key difference is, the scale and the way that you connect and build relationships.
In social selling, the focus is on making one-to-one connections with the end goal being to drive sales. By contrast, social media marketing and influencer marketing use a one-to-many communication style. In marketing, the goal is to grow an engaged digital audience and generate brand awareness.
Social selling works
According to LinkedIn Sales Solutions’ internal data:
- Businesses that are leaders in the social selling space create 45% more sales opportunities than brands with a low social selling index.
- Businesses that prioritize social selling are 51% more likely to reach their sales quotas.
- 78% of businesses that use social selling outsell businesses that don’t use social media.
It helps your sales team build real relationships
A recent Forbes article states: “87% of business event professionals have canceled events because of the pandemic, and 66% postponed events.”
Networking and relationship-building have shifted online due to the COVID-19 pandemic — and now is the perfect time to prioritize social selling.
Social selling creates opportunities to connect with new potential customers on social media, where they’re already active and engaging in conversations.
Your customers (and prospects) are already engaged in social buying
In the last six months of 2020, 25% of Americans ages 18 to 34 made a purchase via social media. India, the UK, Australia and New Zealand all saw approximately a third of people ages 18 to 34 make a purchase via social media in that same time frame.
Considering the sheer volume of people currently using social media, the potential for brands to make social sales is huge:
- 4.2 billion people worldwide are active on social media.
- Social media platforms gained 490 million users in 2020 alone.
- That’s a 13.2% increase — 2019 saw a growth rate of 7.2%.
Social Selling Techniques:
The Now-or-Never Close
Making people see that they have to act now is an old trick, not just for salespeople, but for all types of ads. It’s the same thing used on shopping channels and can even be seen on many online shopping sites. Creating a sense of urgency makes people worry that they will miss out if they don’t act now.
The Summary Close
Repeating all the things a customer will receive when making their purchase helps to establish value and highlight benefits. You can outline everything available and tie it into pain points you’ve learned throughout your conversations. This one works because you are stressing all of the things they will receive and helping them see it is a deal like no other.
The Question Close
Asking questions is the best way to discover why your customer needs your product or service. Questions allow you to hear their desires while also giving you an opportunity to develop answers to their potential objections. Questions also help you get an answer on how well you are doing.
The Assumptive Close
Assuming you’ve got this sale already can help close on pure confidence and positive thinking. Sounds a bit out there, but it can work.
In the usual sales forum, you are monitoring a prospect, trying to gauge their interest, and assessing how engaged they seem or if they might object to your digital sales pitch.
The Match-Game Close
Providing solutions to pain points is very important to overcoming objections and coming closer to a sale. The match game then becomes one of the most powerful tools in your closing arsenal. If you are doing your job well, you are noting every objection or pain point that comes up. This allows you to compose counters to each issue and then wind up for the match-game close.
The Value Close
The value close is slightly different from the match-game technique. It stresses an overview of the benefits of your product. Also, it takes a more direct approach, using a question that tries to get the prospect to admit that you are providing value with your product.
It works because it allows you to have the prospect buy into what you’re selling, enabling you to carry the conversation toward a closed sale.