Despite outbound prospecting being a significant part of the sales process, why is it one of the most demotivating stages of sales? Yes, you guessed it right. No one likes getting rejected and ignored. That is, however, a big part of outbound prospecting marketing. 

Don’t you worry. We will make it simple for you so that you can use your time and effort by prospecting the right way where you go after the right people and use the right approach at the right time. 

Outbound sales email prospecting is about identifying potential customers and approaching them to generate new business opportunities for your organization. Engagement with a qualified prospect can accelerate the process and optimize your engagement.

There are various ways in which sales representatives can engage with the prospect, like cold emails, discovery calls, connecting with them on social media like LinkedIn, and more. When a prospect matches your ideal customer profile or falls under your target demographic, they can be considered qualified prospects with the potential to convert into a paying client. 

 The Initial steps of prospecting are:

  • Create a Customer Profile: When prospecting, finding a potential client can be optimized if you approach it systematically. A customer profile is a detailed description of your current customer, like purchasing behavior, pain points, psychographic data, and demographic data. The ultimate goal of an ideal customer profile is to target similar customers in your sales and marketing campaign.
  • Rank your prospect via lead scoring: Once you have acquired a qualified prospect, rank them by giving a score to them. Here you can use the method of lead scoring. Lead scoring is giving a numerical value to your prospect based on the information about them and how that information can favor your business. 
  • Prepare your approach: An effective engagement with your prospect can be an essential factor in sending them further into the sales funnel or out of it. Personalize your proposal and educate them about your products or services so that they can make an informed decision.

What is the difference between a lead and a prospect?

You must have often encountered the words “lead” and “prospect” when discussing any sales process. Therefore knowing their meaning is necessary.

  • Lead is a person who has shown some engagement with the marketing material, such as visiting your website, reading your blog, or opting for a demo your company has provided. They may or may not be potential customers.
  • Prospect is a qualified lead. A prospect is a good fit for your ideal customer profile, and they can be pursued further.

Knowing the difference between a prospect and a lead is vital for understanding your clients better.

Generate more qualified leads with cold outreach!

What is the difference between inbound and outbound sales?

Outbound sales prospecting is where a sales rep approaches potential prospects. So you are the one going over to them. In the case of inbound sales, the customer goes to you.

  •  In outbound sales, reps connect with your potential prospects via cold calling, trade shows, cold emails, social media websites, etc.
  •  For inbound sales, they engage with prospects via content, white page, website, social media, demo videos, and webinars.

 It’s hard to say which approach is better as both have merits and demerits. And every business sales process is different. So we can’t generalize which method is suitable for your business. Go with the one that works best for you.

Stages of Outbound Prospecting

When a sales rep contacts a prospect via cold calling, cold emailing, or cold texting, he is unaware of the prospect’s interests, pain points, and whereabouts. Hence it takes multiple follow-ups for them to become receptive to the sales rep. 

Process of Outbound sales process

  1. Prospecting 
  2. Outreach 
  3. Qualification
  4. Pitching 
  5. Handling of objection
  6. Closing the deal

The first step of outbound sales starts with making a lead list. This list contains people with a high chance of converting to paying clients.

The second step is outreach. The sales rep contact leads via cold calling or cold email. Here a sales rep should emphasize on sales pitch which should be customer-centric, i.e., knowing more about the customer. In case of cold emailing, make a user persona to draft emails that will create curiosity among your customer. 

Qualifying leads is the third step of outbound sales, where they are segmented to find if they are a good fit for your company and would potentially invest in your company. While qualifying, it’s vital to have the answer to a question. Will your product/services make a difference for the prospect?

After finding your ideal customer profile, it’s time to engage with them via multiple offers to find the right offer that will cater to their needs and solve their problem.

No matter how much a prospect is interested in your offer, he will have some objection or doubt that you would have to clear to convince him to purchase your product or solution that you’re providing.

Closing deals are the most rewarding part of the sales process. But most reps stumble here as well by not asking for a close.

Why is outbound prospecting important for your business?

In this new age of technology where sales and marketing have drastically evolved, outbound sales still stand strong to give consistent results and is a cost-effective method to boost your sales process and increase your conversion rate. Here are some reasons to opt for outbound sale prospecting.

  1. Quick review – When sales reps approach the prospect, they can know how convinced they are. What is their perception of the product or solution that they are selling? In this way, they can also comprehend the customer’s perception of the product.
  2. Can catch big fish – When it comes to targeting big enterprise, especially in B2B business, outbound sales increases the probability of getting noticed by the authoritative person with the current responsibility to make decisions regarding sales. Another case is if you are new to technology in the market. Then outbound can be a more effective sales tactic that you should go for.
  3. Handle objection – When you are engaged in one-to-one conversations with the client, you are available in person to solve any doubts or objections your prospect may have. That will speed up your sales process and increase your chance of closing deals.
  4. Human touch – This is a significant advantage of outbound sales, as the ultimate goal of any marketing and sales endeavor is to give their market material a human touch. This can increase prospect engagement and makes your reach prospect more effective.
  5. Explore new opportunities – Outbound prospecting provides a flow of new leads that will keep your sales pipeline filled with quality and new prospects. If dealt with in the right way, it will generate good business.

Difference between B2B and B2C outbound prospecting

The definition differs on the bases of the end users. In B2B, as the name suggests, the sale is between two businesses. In B2C, the same is between a company and customers. 

 So, in B2B, the prospect is other businesses. But in B2C, they are regular retail customers. Inbound sales work better in B2B when compared with B2C, as getting to customers via social media is more convenient today than before.

Who is responsible for outbound prospecting?

The role of a sales rep varies according to the size of the business, budget, and requirements. In a large organization, you have more specialization because of the magnitude and amount of work. Generally, the sales process is divided into three: 

  1. Sales development representative: The task is majorly related to generating new leads via cold calls, cold mailing, and more, and ensuring a regular flow of the same. They explore the market thoroughly to find new opportunities.
  2. Business development representative: They are concerned with the inbound sale they engage with the prospect, which comes via social media, website, and content blog. They nurture leads that are generated via marketing efforts.    
  3. Account exclusive: They bring closer to the sale process. They deal with the prospect, make sales presentations and conduct demos. The final stage of the sales process of converting prospects into clients is their responsibility.

Some fantastic outbound prospecting tips and tools

Here are some tips on improving your outbound prospecting and tools to help you.

Understand how a prospect will perceive your product and services. This will help sales reps know how to convince them and ways to cater to their needs. When done in an organized manner, this can lead to good results. Here are some suggestions and tools for optimizing sales engagement and increasing sales.

Where can you find your prospect, and how do you qualify them

The beginning of any sales process is prospecting. Two factors that matter the most here are 

  • Source your prospect.
  • Research information about them and approach them.

Sourcing can be done by reaching out on multiple channels and contacting them via call, email, LinkedIn, and more. Will your finding leads in multiple channels keep in  mind some key factors like:

  1. Is your solution a good fit for the solution they are looking for? Sales reps engage with prospects and later find out that their product or solution would not provide the solution they are looking for. This will be just putting your efforts down the drain. So, when you find leads, initially look for factors like the size of their company, their current priority, and how you will cater to them.
  2.  Once you are through with the basic segmentation of your lead, quantify them before making them your potential prospect. Assign different scores to various criteria that are your priority and then give ranks on how they can fit there. Doing this at scale is very time-consuming. Here automation can help you. A sales engagement software can help your rep by automated lead scoring.
  3.  89% of marketers use LinkedIn for B2B business lead generation, and 62% say they generated two times more leads than the next-highest social channel. So, using them to generate leads will help you know about them, such as their career profile, company size, and more. Automation can facilitate multi-channel engagement so that you can reach your prospect where they are.

Approaching your prospect: One of the most crucial parts of sales engagement is to come up to your client. On average, businesses lose 10 to 25 percent of their customer base every year. With this rate, keeping prospects in the sales pipeline is necessary. Explore how you can do so:

  1. When you contact your prospect via cold calling, it is often looked down upon. But even today, 92% of customer interaction happens over call. It is still a very feasible way to proceed with your engagement.
  2.  Now the big question is how to use cold calling effectively. The answer is easier than you think. Make it personalized and customer-centric. Yes, 98% of marketers say personalization advances their relationships with prospects.
  3. So, engage with prospects and know their pain points, needs, budget, and priority. It is easier said than done. But with consistent follow-ups, it can be achieved. Efficiently, making calls in a single click by integrating your CRM and booking meetings directly via sales engagement can help you with this.
  4. Attend networking events before attending calls, texts, or emailing your prospect. This will increase the personal touch and strengthen your relationship. You can use this meeting as a reference to pitch your value proposition in the future.
  5. Cold emailing is the next best option to approach your prospects. Use intriguing subject lines, CTA, and links in your email to know what interests them and their behavior. Track them by knowing the open rate, link clicks, and replies to reach out the right way. You can approach your prospect at scale with email temples where you can customize placeholders and make engagement more personalized. Marketers say they see a 760% upgrade in their email campaign after personalization and segmentation in email marketing.

More customer-centric your approach, the better the result you can expect.

Closing the deal: When your prospect finally reaches the end of the sales pipeline, you have to successfully convert them into paying customers. You should be ready to handle any objection. Present them with the offers that suit them. Make sure to be available for them when they need you, as all your hard work boils down to this very result. Some tips to keep in mind here are:

  • Don’t just abruptly end the conversion after the sale. Give your client contact details to reach you in case they need you again. This will make a good impression and increase the retention and lifetime of your client as well.
  • Analyze your journey with the client. Don’t roll your eyes on this one. It might require some extra effort. Analyzing your performance will improve your performance in the future. An efficient way to do so is by examining the basis of data that automation of your sales engagement process can provide.
Want to grow your outreach? Try SendBuzz today!

Conclusion

In the end, it’s your sales process. The above suggestions can help you with your sales. But you are the one who has to decide which approach will suit the best. Automation can accelerate this process and optimize your sales engagement process. Send buzz is one such have we are a sales engagement software. We help you take your sales process to new highs and increase your conversion.