Maybe you stopped for a second to view it, or you even clicked to find out more. Or perhaps you kept scrolling past it. But later, when it popped up in your mind, you went back on social media to search for it.

Sounds familiar? This is it—you’ve been the target of social selling.

Introduction to Social Selling

Simply put, social selling is sales 2.0. Social selling is the practice of using social media to find and engage with new prospects, providing value to sell your product or service.

These days, customers are looking for trustworthy relationships with brands they can relate to and connect with. For businesses, this means meeting customers where they are: on social media. For salespeople, it is an opportunity to expand their capabilities and network of contacts.

Did you know that 90% of decision-makers never answer a cold call, but 75% of B2B buyers use social media to make purchasing decisions?

Social selling is the latest wave in the tech-driven world. It generates better quality leads and boosts win rates.

Who Is a Social Seller?

You’ve probably already guessed that a social seller is a salesperson, leveraging their social network to attract the right prospects and to build trusted relationships. This practice is called social prospecting.

The social seller has to be a proactive, friendly person who likes to engage with people. Moreover, they should have at least a basic understanding of marketing to help them navigate the social selling process.

Social media are the business tools for social sellers—very powerful tools. Therefore, it is crucial to create a systematic and customized social strategy to make direct sales according to the audience’s specific needs.

There are 5 key elements involved in creating a successful social selling strategy that wins customers over:

1. Target market research and identifying key social platforms
2. Creating engaging, valuable content that tackles consumer problems
3. Building credibility through thoughtful discussions
4. Creative campaigns that stand out and make a difference
5. A consistent strategy that continues to bring in new customers

What Are the Requirements For Social Seller

Employers usually care about these parameters when looking for a social seller:

1. Previous sales experience
2. Experience with social media and content marketing
3. Social network and your engagement
4. Team spirit
5. Personality & charisma

Your Previous Sales Experience

Social selling is the new sales model, but it is still sales. Therefore, your previous sales experience matters to them. Do you bring any relevant experience to the table? Have you worked in this industry before? Do you have your contacts?

Social selling can be used across industries. However, industries like entertainment, real estate, fashion, or marketing excel more than social selling. Nevertheless, your experience from the relevant sector still matters.

Your Social Media Experience

Even though social selling is s a relatively new sales approach, experience with social media is necessary to deliver results. Social media have been here for more than 10 years now, and millions of people have had a chance to get acquainted with them.

Having experience with some of the social selling tools is a valuable asset as well: Canva, Buffer, LinkedIn Sales Navigator, or Nimble, to mention a few.

Your Social Network & Engagement

One of the essential factors for social selling is understanding your persona, where you find them, and optimizing the marketing & sales funnel.

Your employer might ask you about this as, without this knowledge, you might end up promoting content on the wrong platform or missing the mark with your messaging—which is not the desired outcome.

Understanding where your audience is the most active and what content they are interacting with the most is a cornerstone of leveraging your skills.

Through commenting, liking, or sharing content with prospects, the social seller becomes part of the conversation and boosts its credibility by showing an active interest in what its buyers are posting and talking about.

The best of the best social sellers are fearless in hiring a professional content writer to take their copy to the next level. 2023 might bring some changes as more users turn to AI software for answers. Find yourself a marketing agency that stays on top of trends.

Your Team Spirit

To be effective at social selling at an organizational level, everyone needs to be engaged. Like many successful business initiatives, social selling is a team effort.

The sales team may lead the charge, but marketing, HR, and other departments can all be an influence on social selling effectiveness. Here’s why more employees outside of sales should master social selling on LinkedIn.

Look for a social seller that can explain social media best practices and create clear expectations with staff. For example, is it really necessary to spend the entire day on LinkedIn to be productive? Or should this person have time for their colleagues to share and learn other aspects?

Your Personality & Charisma

Social prospecting and social selling are the art of listening to people—your clients, partners, or even competitors.

And at the end of the day, it is so true. Being genuinely authentic, kind, and empathetic is the best marketing strategy. It is about people, not mentions and keywords. Excellent sales & marketing make you forget it is sales & marketing.

Your goal should be to provide value and be approachable. Make sure that whichever social media platforms you work to optimize are grounded on a foundation of sincerity and honesty, as the alternative approach will ultimately turn off your target audience.

What Is the Salary of a Social Seller?

Based on PayScale, the average salary for a Social Seller is $55,222. However, your salary as a social seller might be up to $108k per year.

Final Thoughts

So this is social selling in a nutshell.

If you’re already using social media to promote your business, why not take it to the next step and start using it to generate more sales prospects?

Too many business people rely on their gut feeling regarding their selling strategies without considering the data that should drive their decisions.

Ultimately, leveraging your social networks when selling is critical to your success and better relationships with your prospects.

The post An Introduction to the Social Seller Profession appeared first on Social Commerce.

Nowadays, customers are looking for trustworthy relationships with brands they can relate to and connect with. For businesses, this means meeting customers where they are: on social media.

However, if you want to succeed, you have to have a strategy.

We have compiled a list of 19 best tips & best practices for your successful social selling strategy, read on!

1. Show Up

Showing up might sound obvious but in order to be successful in social selling, you have to interact personally with your audience. Because you know what is not sexy? Robots. Nobody wants to buy stuff from a sales robot. People like to buy from people with whom they can truly discuss the matter and trust their expertise.

At the end of the day, social media are all about being social, right? That means if you want to succeed in social media selling, you have to show up and communicate.

Yes, you can obviously automate a lot on social media. Automated liking and commenting tools can save you some time but they cannot substitute human interactions and they definitely cannot build relationships.

Needless to say, you should be careful using such bots as they might damage your brand.

2. Be Authentic

Nothing beats a real, live human interaction. Social selling is all about participation.

Use your personality to drive the interest of your audience to your brand, your products, or services. If you want to be successful with your social selling, you have to put yourself into it. 

Be present. Be your authentic self. Be personal and believable. Focus on your strengths and milk them. By removing the corporate mask, you are more likely to connect with people.

You have to (at least appear to) be genuinely interested in the product you’re selling, the business you’re selling into, and the people you’re talking to in that industry.

The goal is to make yourself seem more human and approachable—not less.

3. Build Your Credibility (Before You Start Selling)

Ultimately, your goal is to establish credibility and develop relationships that eventually lead to a sale. Social selling should never feel like cold outreach; your prospects should already feel that they can trust you.

Your company might have a solid reputation, but do you? Social networks can help you build your personal brand. You can grow your reputation and establish a solid foundation with every post or tweet on your social media.

Focus on your LinkedIn as that is the most obvious social network for engaging in social selling, particularly for the B2B sector.

Did you know that 90% of decision-makers never answer a cold call, but 75% of B2B buyers use social media to make purchasing decisions? You have to make sure you are active on LinkedIn.

When on LinkedIn, ask your colleagues, partners, and friends (with whom you have a good relationship) for endorsements and recommendations. Make sure your profile highlights expertise relevant to a potential customer, not only to a potential new employer. Don’t forget to highlight how you’ve helped previous customers achieve their goals.

Also, word of mouth can go a long way to helping you achieve this.

4. Keep Your Profiles Updated

This tip is connected to the previous point above: In order to build your credibility, you have to update your social media profiles regularly so they reflect your current activities and provide valuable information.

You want your profile to be a place that any company or potential customer can visit and find out all of the relevant information they’d want to create or continue a relationship with you. Make sure you are easily accessible, too.

It’s also important to ensure your profile picture looks professional and makes a good impression on potential prospects. Before you upload your image, ask yourself if you look like someone you’d want to do business with. Last but not least, make sure your profile picture is aligned with your company values.

5. Discover Connections & Extend Your Network

Once your social media profiles are updated and credible, it is time to expand! For instance, LinkedIn offers multiple ways to identify potential connections—people who might benefit from your product or service.

One of the greatest things about LinkedIn is its search functionality that is just perfect for social prospecting. Search for skills, job titles, companies, or industries that correlate with your buyer personas, and look out for people with whom you have shared connections. That way, you can use your existing relationship to send a connection request and start a conversation.

You can also expand your network by joining LinkedIn Groups that are relevant to your industry and business to start networking. This gives you an opportunity to get involved in conversations and demonstrate your expertise.

LinkedIn’s Sales Navigator is also a valuable social selling tool, as well as Nimble or Exigo.

6. Choose Your Channel Mix

Social selling can happen on any platform but it tends to be Twitter and LinkedIn. Part of the reason is that these platforms are more public-facing and people tend to use them for professional interactions.

However, the real winners of social selling are salespeople that are active on the same platform as their potential customers. This is the cornerstone of social selling success. This is why salespeople in fashion excel on Pinterest and why B2B sales reps generate leads from LinkedIn.

YouTube might be a great bonus to LinkedIn and Twitter as it is a perfect place to share video tutorials or explain complex ideas.

No matter what is your channel mix, focus on building a community.

7. Listen to Your Audience

And serve before you sell. Serving before selling means giving away valuable information for free. It means solving problems and offering solutions without a price tag attached. Always think about how you can help your audience. And in order to find that out, you need to listen carefully.

Social selling is a long-term relationship-building strategy that involves a lot of information gathering and active listening.

Your customers and prospects are sharing incredibly valuable information on their social channels—they’re basically telling you exactly what they want and need. All you have to do is pay attention.

In LinkedIn Groups or even in Facebook Groups, listen for the right moment to join the conversation so you can present yourself as a solution to a problem. The goal is to address a need to make your prospect’s life easier rather than becoming just another online source of annoyance.

8. Provide Valuable Information and Insights

If you’ve already listened to your prospects enough to understand their problem, try to provide valuable insight into it.

Try to humanize your pitch. Your goal should be to contribute with insightful information that can help establish you as an expert in your field. Write posts that share important knowledge, but don’t be afraid to share relevant posts from other credible sources as well. And yes, it could also be your competitors.

It’s obviously fine to mention your product or service in some of your posts on social media, but make sure your profiles are not walking sales presentations or pitches. At the end of the day, your goal in social selling is to establish relationships that will eventually lead to a sale, not to make a sale on first contact.

9. Give More than You Receive

Or more precisely: be ready to give more than you receive. You might be sharing valuable content daily, yet, it might not lead to sales straight away and that’s OK. Social selling is a marathon, not a sprint.

Keep being consistent with your content and make sure the majority of your social media posts are value-driven, with useful information that is meant to help your audience.

Moreover, spend a good proportion of time sharing other people’s content and leaving helpful comments. If you want to be successful, you have to give far more than you receive.

10. Create Content Regularly

As we mentioned before, you need to be ready to give more than you receive to be successful. Being helpful and providing valuable information is the key. And content is your king.

Every social selling expert needs a good content schedule that they follow to ensure the right information is being posted on a consistent basis, with proper timing and branding. This way, prospects can get to know you and with time, feel comfortable with what is being promoted or sold.

If you provide thoughtful comments and share valuable content, your outreach is likely to be reciprocated and that’s how you drive engagement.

11. Do Your Research

Don’t ignore the importance of researching your audience. The more you know, the better you’ll be at crafting effective social selling strategies in the future.

Luckily, you will find out that many prospects are keen on sharing their wants, needs, goals, and challenges on their social media. For you as a salesperson, it is an opportunity to get to know them a bit in advance and personalize your interactions with them.

To help you identify which people can become prospective customers, look for those who are searching for products or services that are similar to what you’re trying to sell.

If you come across someone who has bought from a competitor but didn’t have a positive experience, that’s a great opportunity to come in and sweep them off their feet with your brilliant solution.

12. Create Solid Relationships (Not Sales)

Sales has always been about building relationships, establishing rapport and credibility, and providing the right solution to the right prospect at the right time. Social selling doesn’t change that.

It’s the modern way to develop meaningful relationships with potential customers so you’re the first person or brand a prospect thinks of when they’re ready to buy.

If a contact moves to a new position or company, send a quick note of congratulations. If you notice a contact asking for help or advice, jump in with a meaningful answer, even if it doesn’t directly promote your product.

Focus on how you can help your contacts or make their lives easier. If you can establish yourself as their go-to person in your industry, guess who they’ll call when they’re ready to make a purchase?

13. Engage with Your Followers

Every relationship needs time and care. For social selling to be effective, you must interact with followers and connections regularly (and genuinely).

Stay in touch with your new social contacts over time. Pay attention to the content they’re posting, and from time to time, like or comment on their posts to let them know you’ve read and appreciated what they have to say.

Don’t overdo it, though, and be sure that your engagements with clients are meaningful. Like those posts that you actually like.

14. Continue the Conversation on Other Channels

We have already talked about the importance of differentiating social media. However, don’t feel like you have to limit your communication only to LinkedIn or Twitter.

Different platforms have different feels. Some of your prospects might appreciate seeing you being more playful on Instagram or TikTok, even though that obviously depends on the industry you are in.

Take that opportunity to form a bond that encompasses a range of different thoughts and emotions and you’ll likely have greater success in meeting your objectives.

15. Don’t Forget About Your Existing Customers

You might be fiercely chasing those new leads and new sales and that’s OK. But don’t forget there are your existing customers on social media, too, that have probably helped you in the past with your sales and revenue. They deserve your attention, too.

They say it is six times more expensive to win a new customer than to keep the existing one. If they have bought from your company once, they will likely buy again, but it can’t just be assumed they will. 

Make sure you notice your loyal customers—they deserve your loyalty as well.

A massive advantage of existing customers is that you can ask them more profound questions and get relevant feedback. Take time to nurture your relationships with your loyal customers.

16. Check Regularly What Works

Social media keeps evolving and changing all the time. You have no time to underestimate them. Make sure you are up to date with the latest trends and updates. Real experts use what works and think about results.

It is fine to learn your lesson and adjust or change your original strategy if it didn’t bring you the results you wanted.

17. Track & Evaluate Results

True social selling professionals know it is crucial to collect data and insights from current and past efforts in order to optimize the process and bring positive results.

Every expert marketer tests, tracks, and measures, so if you want to be among the elite, it should also be part of your social selling strategy. Learning from what you’ve already tried is a great way to save time and maximize ROI with social selling. 

18. Keep Up with Your Competitors

This whole article was focusing on you and your efforts regarding a successful social selling strategy. However, this picture wouldn’t be complete without your competition.

Social selling isn’t just for connecting with prospects, it’s a great way to gather competitive intelligence.

Monitoring what your competitors are doing can provide inspiration for your own social selling strategy. For example, perhaps they’re sharing a particularly informative piece of content, or targeting a certain type of prospect. And perhaps you could be doing the same thing.

Overall, your competition is a fantastic source of inspiration and knowledge and you should learn how to leverage it for your benefit.

19. Be Patient

And above all, be patient. Analyzing prospects and building (and maintaining) relationships will take some time. There is no shortcut to success, no ‘quick-fix’ solutions.

Remember: Great things take time.

Take a deep breath and keep working!

Conclusion

Social selling truly works and there are plenty of statistics proving it.

These 19 social selling tips & techniques should help you to tackle the power of social selling, no matter in which industry you are working. It is all about building relationships and providing insightful information while being authentic and credible.

We all know, a sales representative’s time is precious. And while social selling is a valuable tactic, you probably don’t want to spend all day on LinkedIn chatting to potential customers.

Luckily, there are plenty of awesome social selling tools which can help you create, execute, and measure your social selling strategy.

One of these is Exigo—a comprehensive software that was designed to help you stay on track while measuring your results so you can consistently and successfully optimize your social media channels for sales.

Request Free Demo from Exigo

The post 19 Social Selling Tips For Your Successful Social Selling Strategy appeared first on Social Commerce.

But have you ever thought about actively going to your potential customers instead of waiting for them to come to you?

Did you know that according to Hootsuite almost half of the entire world’s population (3.03 billion people) has at least one social media account? That’s a lot of potential customers!

Despite its disadvantages, social media are great tools to connect with people you love, to share and follow life updates or see what’s new with your favorite brands.

Moreover, you can use social media to get more customers. It is called social media prospecting or social prospecting if you prefer.

This article will explain what social media prospecting is, how does it work and why you should care about it as a potential way for your business.

What Is Social Media Prospecting?

What exactly is social media prospecting, you wonder?

As already mentioned above, social media prospecting is the practice of using social networking platforms to find, research and engage with prospective new customers.

You can also take Hubspot’s approach and look at social media prospecting as the art of listening to people — your clients, partners or even competitors.

And at the end of the day, it is so true. Being genuinely kind and empathetic is the best marketing strategy. It is about people, not mentions and keywords. Great marketing makes you forget it is marketing.

Why You Should Care About Social Media Prospecting

The truth is social media has been around for many years now but there’s still a lot of people who are not sure how exactly to use it for business and generating leads.

Yet, social media can be very productive when you’re searching for a potential client, a strategic partner, or a new hire.

Do you think calling is better? Think twice! 90% of decision-makers never answer a cold call, but 75% of B2B buyers use social media to make purchasing decisions according to LinkedIn.

So you want to be trigger-ready where prospects are. And that’s social media.

You can find prospects literally on every social platform from LinkedIn via Instagram to Quora and Reddit. Odds are that the prospective clients or partners you are looking for will be there.

Social Media Prospecting Tips

Last but not least, here are some tips on how to get started with social media prospecting:

1. Research and identify your prospect, including the social platforms. Who are they? What are their needs and where they look for answers?
2. Listen and observe more than you share, especially in the beginning. When you identify the bigger social sites for your audience, listen and use what you hear — recurring concerns, needs, and questions — as leverage for real conversations.
3. Build your personalized pitch and engage. Overall, focusing on being helpful is the best way to engage your prospect. Helping to meet a need will cause you to stand out amongst the crowd.
4. Be authentic and approachable. Make sure that whichever social media platforms you work to optimize are grounded on a foundation of sincerity and honesty, as the alternative approach will ultimately turn off your target audience.
5. Always test. Even if you have a template that works, it’s best practice to tweak your approach and test different approaches. It is great to be proactive!

Final Thoughts

So this is social media prospecting in a nutshell.

If you’re already using social media to promote your business, why not take it to the next step and start using it to also generate more sales prospects?

Too many business people rely on their gut feeling when it comes to their selling strategies without considering the data that should drive their decisions.

Ultimately, leveraging your social networks when selling is critical to your success and better relationships with your prospects.

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The post Social Media Prospecting: What Is It and Why You Should Even Care appeared first on Social Commerce.

Maybe you stopped for a second to view it or you even clicked to find out more. Or maybe you kept scrolling past it. But when it popped up in your mind later, you went back on the hunt for it. 

Sounds familiar? This is it—you’ve been the target of social selling.

Social selling is the latest wave in the tech-driven consumer revolution, and you should be part of it.

These days, consumers are looking for trustworthy relationships with brands they can relate to and connect with.

For businesses, this means meeting customers where they are rather than forcing them to leave their comfort zone with cold calling for instance.

However, if you want to succeed, you have to have a strategy.

Posting a few posts on LinkedIn or Instagram with a website link is not enough, even if your content is absolutely mind-blowing, using the nicest visuals and proofreader services.

Luckily, there are plenty of awesome social selling tools which can help you create, execute, and measure your social selling strategy. 

Read on to learn more!

Statistics: Why You Should Be Tapping into Social Selling

According to Aberdeen Group, 73% of sales representatives using social selling as part of their sales process did better than their colleagues who didn’t use social selling. On top of that, they exceeded quota 23% more often.

Not convinced yet? According to SalesforLife, companies who have consistent social selling processes are 40% more likely to hit revenue goals than non-social sellers.

Social selling just perfectly taps into the customer-centric buying landscape that defines consumers’ behavior today.

Instead of blindly promoting your products at every opportunity, it’s far more effective to meet your customers on platforms they’re already spending a lot of time on.

Oh and—if you want to learn more about social selling statistics, we have compiled a comprehensive list of them in this blog post.

Using Social Media for Business

Social selling is all about using social media to connect with prospects and provide them with value in an effort to ultimately sell your product or service.

Today, the social media business is a tool—a very powerful one.

It’s all about creating a systematic and customized strategy to make direct sales via social media in a way that your specific audience is open to.

Your consumers are looking for a trustworthy relationship with your brand. They want to relate and connect with you. 

There are five key elements involved in creating a successful social selling strategy that wins customers over:

1. Target market research and identifying key social platforms
2. Creating engaging, valuable content that tackles consumer problems
3. Building credibility through thoughtful discussions
4. Creative campaigns that stand out and make a difference
5. A consistent strategy that continues to bring in new customers

Using social selling tools can help you:

• Understand where your audience is the most active
• What content they’re interacting the most with
• Post regular, sales-driven content at the right time
• Ultimately create a strategy that you can stick to
• Be consistent with your social media content

How Social Selling Tools Help Generate Sales

If your goal is to generate more sales and boost revenue in your business, social selling can be the final piece of the puzzle. 

Here’s how social selling tools can massively help transform your sales.

1. Know Your Buyer’s Persona

First things first: Who is your audience?

It is absolutely vital whom you’re targeting in the first place. Without this knowledge, you might end up promoting content on the wrong platform or missing the mark with your messaging. 

Who wakes up in the morning and thinks, “I am going to buy something today”? Probably nobody. Instead, your potential buyers do research. They evaluate their options and potential suppliers before committing to purchasing.

Nowadays, 81% of shoppers carry out online research before buying, and an enormous 74% turn to social media for product inspiration.

Your social media channels are now one of the most important steps in your sales strategy. Knowing how to leverage them properly can turn your sales around for the better. 

Social selling tools dig deep to discover the most common journeys your buyers take to make a purchase from you. Not only can they map out a route (which will then help you optimize each step), but they can also track past purchase behaviors.

Sprinklr—a customer experience management system—wanted to test their product so they used a social selling tool to find out exactly who their customers were and the kind of content they wanted. 

The tool helped them gather the information they needed to build a solid relationship with leads and continue to engage them in a meaningful way. 

By monitoring their prospect’s feeds, they were able to find out what their audience is interested in and what their biggest challenges are, and then use these insights to explain how their solution will help. 

The end result is the social feed packed full of attractive content they know their audience will love—like short Sprinklr Coffee Club videos. 

2. Optimize the Marketing & Sales Funnel

Once you’ve figured out who you’re targeting and where you’re best placed to target them, social selling tools can help you identify key parts of the marketing funnel where consumers regularly make decisions. 

There are three main stages in the buyer’s journey:

1. The awareness stage. This is where consumers become aware they have a problem that needs solving or a need for a product, but they don’t know what product they need or where to start looking for it
2. The consideration stage. This is where consumers know what it is they need, but they’re weighing up their options about which brand or product to go for
3. The decision stage. This is where consumers have decided what it is they want to buy, but might have some objections before they hit the buy button 

Social selling tools can help you figure out what interactions customers need at each stage of the cycle. 

For example, someone in the awareness stage probably isn’t going to be interested in reviews about your best-selling product because they don’t even know they need your product yet. 

IBM’s “intelligent listening” program is a great example of using social selling tools to target different stages of the sales cycle.

The aim of the program was to learn what conversations around cloud computing were taking place on social media and what key trends were being discussed. IBM implemented a social selling tool to find hot topics and content that fit the context of the discussions at each and every stage of the sales funnel and shared them across social media. 

The end result was 4x more orders than the same time period the year before. Simply by listening to their audience’s needs and serving them strategic content when they needed it, IBM skyrocketed their sales. 

3. Measure and Tweak in One Place

Even if you have created a great social selling strategy, it can be tricky to keep on top of it and remember what you need to post and when & where you need to post it. 

Technology can massively help here. Luckily, there are some ground-breaking social selling tools that can help you stay on track while measuring your results so you can continue to optimize the process. 

For instance: if you roll out your social selling strategy and quickly discover that Instagram isn’t as powerful as Facebook, you can change your strategy to focus mainly on Facebook and minimize the time & effort you spend on Instagram. 

Likewise, if you find that consumers respond more positively to UGC (user-generated content) rather than company-crafted photos, you have the insights you need to post more of that. 

Creating a successful social selling strategy is all about finding out what works with your audience—something that will be different for every brand.

However, despite the industry, social selling tools can come super-handy. Make your life easier and try using some of these great social selling tools!

Powerful Social Selling Tools to Use

The modern market is filled with a variety of social selling tools, but there are a few that stand out amongst the competition in terms of their usability and effectiveness.

Here are our favorites:

1. Canva
2. Buffer
3. LinkedIn Sales Navigator
4. Nimble
5. InstaChamp by Mobile Monkey
6. DirectScale

Canva

You are right if you think that Canva isn’t necessarily a social selling tool. Yet, for your social selling, you need great, visually appealing content. And that’s when Canva plays its important role.

Canva is a content creation tool that can be used for social selling. It was made for both individuals and teams to create and download beautiful designs in any format and for any occasion. Do you fancy modern presentations, appealing Facebook & Instagram posts, or easy-to-follow infographics for Stories? Canva has it all.

The tool offers a free drag and drop interface allowing you to create content that is easy on the eye using Canva’s free design modules.

We absolutely love Canva—but if you want to try some other tools, Pixelied or Crello might be your good bet.

Buffer

Buffer is a fantastic social selling tool that allows you to clearly plan your social media content. Thanks to Buffer, you can simply schedule your posts and track the performance of your content shared. Therefore, it is a valuable content distribution tool.

With direct posting available for Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn, Buffer helps you stay on top of your social selling strategy while saving time in the content sharing process.

Buffer allows you to build your audience and grow your brand on social media. However, if you are not a fan of Buffer, you can alternatively use Hootsuite or Sprout Social.

LinkedIn Sales Navigator

When it comes to prospect hunting tools for your social selling, LinkedIn Sales Navigator is your best bet.

This great tool helps you target the right buyers, understand key insights, and make your outreach personalized. So it is not a surprise that for many sales professionals, “social selling” means LinkedIn.

The tool is enriched with some of the advanced search filters that bring a detailed view to the tip of your fingers and improve your sales process. LinkedIn Sales Navigator is trusted by more than 80% of the Forbes Cloud 100.

An alternative might be FRONTLINE Selling (previously known as PeopleLinx).

Nimble

You’ve probably heard before that having a good CRM (Customer Relationship Management) is crucial for efficient maintenance & creating relationships with your customers.

Nimble might be a good option for you, especially if you are a small business. It is a CRM designed for the social media age. The platform organizes your buyers and leads and allows you to keep track of your entire relationship with them—including your social media interactions.

Nimble easily allows you to compile all social media data into specific records for each lead that you are nurturing, tracking your engagement with the person as you go.

InstaChamp by MobileMonkey

81% of people use Instagram to help research products and services. And 2 in 3 people say the network helps foster interactions with brands. It is absolutely crucial to stay in touch with your fan and potential customers! InstaChamp can help you with that.

InstaChamp by Mobile Monkey is a simple tool for increasing engagement and automating lead generation and customer service on Instagram and Facebook.

Instead of manually replying to every DM, you can save time with InstaChamp’s automated answering service.

The tool lets you activate auto-replies using customizable templates that send the same note to all users or different responses based on keywords in the messages received.

You’ll be able to provide information, request the user’s contact info, say thanks, or let them know when you’ll respond personally.

DirectScale

Source

We’ve saved the best for last! DirectScale, now an Exigo company, is a software that allows direct sellers to create personalized web office experiences for their distributors that are customized for their specific product and brand. 

Through the web office, distributors can quickly find out updates and grab social copy and content to share with their followers. And, to top it all off, there is an in-built revenue optimization tool that aggregates all of the sales data. 

This gives direct sellers the chance to get a top-level overview of what’s working on social media and what’s not, which means they can continuously tweak their strategy until it’s getting them the results they want every single time.

Conclusion: Start Social Selling Today

Social selling tools like DirectScale and the others mentioned in this piece are specifically designed to help you stay on track while measuring your results so you can consistently and successfully optimize your social media channels for sales.

As consumers spend more and more time online, social selling is becoming an increasingly important marketing tactic.

Creating a strategy that generates sales over and over again can seem like an impossible task, particularly when you bear in mind just how many social platforms there are and how many different marketing tactics are talked about every day.

However, there are solutions out there that can help you both short and long term.

Using a social selling tool can make the process a whole lot easier and clearer. Not only do they help you plan where you need to focus your energy and who you need to focus it on, but they also help you execute your strategy and keep you on track for success with in-built insights and cold, hard data. 

So don’t hold back—start using social selling tools right now!

Read more:

• 19 Social Selling Tips For Your Successful Social Selling Strategy
• Social Media Prospecting: What Is It and Why You Should Even Care
• How to Win Over Customers with Social Selling
• 54 Mind-Blowing Stats about Social Selling

The post Why You Should Use Social Selling Tools appeared first on Social Commerce.

Image by Malachi Witt from Pixabay

Social selling is all about using social media to connect with prospects and provide them with value in an effort to ultimately sell your product or service.

It’s only logical to engage with your audience where they spend a lot of time. And for better results, you should reach them where they consume content on a daily basis: online.

Successful social selling is similar to lead nurturing in the way that you have to engage buyers on an ongoing basis. Fortunately, this effort pays off. According to a study, 78% of social sellers outsell their competitors who don’t recognize the power of using social media. 

It’s easy to see why every business needs social selling strategies to achieve great results. And when you consider the fact that 90% of decision-makers claim they never respond to cold outreach, it’s clear that social selling really is the future. 

If you don’t want your team to fail at social selling, keep reading. Below you will find essential tips for training your team to become experts at social selling. 

Lead by Example

If you want social selling to work for your business, you must clearly define it to your team. They need to know social selling trends and how they will affect business. 

You should give your team members some tips to help them get started. Share examples and results of your own social posts with the people you want to encourage. This can be done with the assistance of reflection models that offer a bridge between your past experience and future progress. For instance, you should show them a good example of your social post that got a lot of exposure, likes, shares, and comments.

Finally, make sure to give your team members opportunities to reiterate the power of social selling to each other. Celebrate small wins and give credit where credit is due. 

Dedicate Clear Roles

Image by Werner Heiber from Pixabay

Every team works better when everyone onboard knows and understands their individual roles. 

It is important for every member to know how exactly they contribute to the greater cause. From frontline sellers to team managers and high-level sales leaders, each member has to know what and how they are contributing if you want them to function as smoothly as a Swiss watch. 

Bear in mind that frontline sellers play the most critical role in any sales organization since they have the most influence over what sales representatives sell, where they sell, who they sell to, and even how they sell. 

Be sure to establish the roles within your sales teams with clearly-defined objectives so they can work effectively.

Give the Right Tools

Even though digital and social selling is not only about technology, you have to provide the right tools to your team members if you expect them to be effective.

Enable your team members with the right tools so they can connect with prospects at all stages of the buying journey. 

LinkedIn is the most popular B2B social selling tool, but most consumer sales happen on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, which is the place customers most commonly engage with brands. Consider third-party tools like HootSuite and TweetDeck, which can help you and your teams manage and optimize social media use across all channels.

It’s important that all sellers have their social marketing and social selling strategies aligned to tell a consistent story about your products and brand, which allows for a greater degree of penetration using social channels. 

Optimize Social Profiles

Image by Photo Mix from Pixabay

When optimizing social profiles, start with your company’s accounts. Make sure you provide consistent information across LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and other networks. 

Include a link to your website, a short description of your company, your office address, and other relevant contact information, in addition to compelling photos and profile pictures that match your brand. 

Once you are done optimizing your company profile, put together a framework for your salespeople to use when updating their own profiles.   

Here are some key aspects to focus on:

• Profile picture. Professional photos are best, but any clear photo will do. Friendly faces make better connections, but be sure to avoid blurry pictures, group images, or inanimate objects. 
• Headline. Some networks allow customizing your headline description of yourself. So, use some keywords that highlight your role and passion for the products, brand, or associated lifestyle. 
• Bio. When writing your biography, try focusing on your audience and not on your accomplishments. In other words, you need to present yourself as a solver of their problems.
• Company. For instance, LinkedIn allows you to link to your company page. This is a great way to highlight your company’s presence further.
• Website. If you can, include a link to your personal online shop.

Finally, you should be aware of the fact that each social platform is different. So, keep in mind that you should optimize each profile according to the individual platform— each has its own algorithm for presenting content, image sizing structure, and post character limit. 

Focus on Customer Journey

Image by Mohamed Hassan from Pixabay

You increase deal win rates when you align the customer’s journey with the sales approach. Win rates can be improved by 15% when sellers align their process with the customer journey. 

Social selling allows sellers to engage with customers at all points of the customer journey, from the early stages of research all the way to the purchasing point.

To better understand the customer journey, consider using social listening tools like BuzzSumo or HootSuite to discover where people are in the lifecycle – from looking for recommendations on social media to stating an intention to buy a particular product. 

Your team members should always keep the customer in mind when selling. The customers’ wants and needs need to be carefully considered if you want great results. Always remember that your job is to solve problems for customers, and your selling tactics should reflect that goal.

Insist on Collaboration

Studies have shown that the key challenges for aligning sales and marketing are:

• communication
• broken/flawed processes
• inconsistent use of metrics
• lack of accurate data on target customers
• reporting challenges

It is essential to break down the walls between salespeople and the marketing support they receive, encouraging collaboration from team to team and person to person. 

At first, aligning sales and marketing can be challenging, but the benefits of telling a consistent story across all your channels are critical. If you manage, your teams will win more deals and keep customers returning for more.

To bridge the gap between the two teams, try to involve your sellers in the content creation process. 

Share Relevant, Quality Content

If you want to connect with new people, you have to share relevant and quality content or risk actually losing followers— it’s also the best way to stay in front of your audience and position your salespeople and your company as the authorities of your industry. 

Try to push educational content about your industry and other areas that might be relevant to your prospects.

Use the content your marketing department is creating to support your sales team. If your content isn’t aligned with your sales team’s needs, get together with your marketing department to align your goals and see if they can help support your content needs.

Remember not to be overly promotional. Find other people’s content that is useful and share it with your followers. Yes, sharing your company content is good, but don’t make your efforts should start with education rather than selling. Be sure to mix in content from other sources to build your credibility. 

Finally, take advantage of visual content. Use high-quality images, record videos, and even create infographics to grab your audience’s attention.

Connect and Reach Out

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Make sure to encourage your team members to find and connect to new contacts through social media. 

Twitter and similar networks make this less awkward since most of the accounts are public. You can also search for relevant accounts to connect with through hashtags or keywords.

On LinkedIn, this process can be a bit more difficult. Especially if you don’t really know the person, you are trying to connect with. To make connecting easier, try joining relevant groups and commenting on posts.

Also, blog using the LinkedIn platform. This way, you will have a wider reach and become an industry authority if you manage to provide content that adds value. 

Finally, connect with people who have engaged with your content or forum posts, or even those who just looked at your profile. 

Make It a Long-term Commitment

It is fair to say that the success of all selling strategies ebb and flow. Don’t get discouraged and constantly try to reinvent the wheel; focus on a defined set of activities if you want long-term success.

A consistent strategy doesn’t mean your tactics can’t evolve based on new products, time of year, or things you learn along the way. Be sure to share new social selling tactics in regular team communications. This way, you will educate your team members about new trends, tricks, and tactics so that they can up their game. 

Curate a list of content assets your team can share, whether blogs, ebooks, or even simple post templates. Ask your marketing department to update this list with new assets when they become available, and be sure to let your teams know when new content is ready.

Finally, use your messaging platforms and corporate social channels to announce new blog posts and exciting content that should be shared. 

Wrap-up

Now it’s time to get your sales team fully acclimated to social selling. 

Be sure to share the strategies you develop with all the key stakeholders in your organizations so they can all be successful. 

By empowering your salespeople at every level, you are increasing your chances of establishing a deep and long-lasting impact on your sales figures with their loyalty and that of their customers.

The post How to Train Your Team for Social Selling appeared first on Social Commerce.

Let’s face it: cold calling doesn’t work like it used to, and direct sellers are turning to other tactics to reach more people.

It’s even more frustrating when you consider that consumers are savvier than ever in today’s selling landscape and the vast majority are skeptical of brands who come at them with the “sell, sell, sell” mentality.

Instead, consumers are looking for trustworthy relationships with brands they can relate to and connect with. For businesses, this means meeting customers where they are rather than forcing them to leave their comfort zone.

As a result, we’ve seen a dramatic rise in social selling in the multi-level marketing world.

This simply refers to the act of selling your products via social channels through educational, entertaining, and engaging content. These are the platforms where consumers are already hanging out and interacting with their friends, family, colleagues, and brands.

The Power of Social Selling

According to an Aberdeen Group study on the impact of social selling, sales teams that use this tactic find 45% more opportunities than those that don’t. Social selling also helps cream of the crop companies to achieve a 16% gain in year-on-year revenue.

If you’re thinking “not another marketing technique to implement!” you’re not alone. It really does seem like there is a new, “must-do” method popping up every day, and it can be overwhelming trying to fit them all into your strategy.

However, social selling is quickly pushing its way to the top.

In fact, it’s the third most important priority for sales teams this year according to the Aberdeen Group study – if you lag behind, you’ll miss out on prospects that are ready and waiting to buy from their social channels.

Here’s the catch: only one in four marketers know how to use social media for sales, leaving the vast majority floundering on platforms they don’t fully understand with no return for their investment.

So how can you make sure you’re one of the few salespeople that does know how to use social media for selling? How can you rise to the top and win customers over with this activity?

There are five key elements involved in creating a successful social selling strategy that wins customers over:

1. Target market research and identifying key social platforms
2. Creating engaging, valuable content that tackles consumer problems
3. Building credibility through thoughtful discussions
4. Creative campaigns that stand out and make a difference
5. A consistent strategy that continues to bring in new customers

We’ve put together a handy guide to help you carry out each of these steps.

1. Choose the Right Social Media Platform

It’s no secret that different social media channels attract different audiences. Snapchat and Instagram are renowned for being favored by younger demographics, while Facebook is predominantly used by older generations and decision makers primarily log in to Twitter and LinkedIn.

The key to finding the right platform for you and your business is getting to know your audience and identifying which platforms they hang out on the most.

This means you can join them there, start conversations with them, and contribute to discussions in a place that they’re already comfortable with.

If you’re not sure where your audience hangs out, try the following simple approach:

• Determine your top two to three competitors
• Check out which social channels they’re most active on
• Voila! If you have the same audience as these competitors, you can copy the social platforms they use the most
• After a while, you’ll get a feel for where you’re getting the most interaction and can increase your time spent on those channels

2. Create Engaging, Useful Content

Gone are the days where marketers could simply tout their products on social media over and over again.

You know the ones: they’ve just launched the new “best thing ever” and they’ve already shared fifteen Tweets about it in the last hour. They’ve crammed the post with hashtags and haven’t even bothered to change the copy in each Tweet to make it unique and different.

Somehow, this method used to work. Now, it doesn’t.

Instead, brands are striving to build a loyal following of prospects who will consistently buy from them. This involves establishing a sense of trust, which can be sparked by sharing engaging content that solves a key problem the audience has.

Try the following to get started with this technique:

Step 1: Check out what kind of content your audience is already interacting with on social media (stalk your competitors for inspiration here if you need to)

Step 2: Identify your customers’ key pain points by scouring forums, listening to questions they’re asking on social, and digging into reviews of products like yours or similar

Step 3: Create content (or find content to share) that provides a solution to their most pressing pain points

Beauty brand Kate Somerville tackles dry skin in cooler temperatures – a struggle their customers are likely facing.

3. Build Credibility

Once you’ve got your baseline of useful content for your audience or consumer, it’s time to start cementing that trust and building credibility – in the end, this is what will win over customers on social media.

Think about it: say, for example, you’re looking to buy a course that shows you how to effectively use email marketing.

Are you more likely to buy it from someone you’ve never heard of before or someone who regularly posts content about the biggest struggles you have with email marketing and offers a solution to those problems?

We’re willing to bet it’s the latter.

Although this is a very basic example, you get the gist of how important credibility is in winning over customers on social media.

So how do you create a credible image of your brand?

• Demonstrate your understanding of your industry on social media by sharing relevant articles and adding thoughtful insights to conversations
• Participate and engage in discussions that are already taking place to prove your authority on the topic and simultaneously spread the world about your brand
• Share case studies, testimonials, and reviews from other customers who can vouch for your business

This realtor shares client testimonials on Instagram to boost their credibility.

4. Get Creative

Just like cold calling doesn’t work any more, neither does sharing generic fluff about your products Remember those old-fashioned brands we mentioned before? Don’t use their example as an excuse to shout into the void about your products on social media.

If you want to win social media users over, you have to create customer-centric campaigns that really resonate with them – and don’t be afraid to get creative here.

People are far more likely to remember a brand that went all out with their social strategy and did something different than a brand that followed the crowd and played it safe.

Thankfully, social media is packed full of features that can help you bring your brand to life and make it stand out:

• Tap into the power of Instagram Stories to share the “human-ness” of your brand and to go behind the scenes (consumers love to take a peek behind the scenes)
• Use features like Facebook Live or IGTV to share in-the-moment announcements and snapshots of advice that provide quick wins to your audience
• Re-share content that your audience have posted themselves to create a sense of community and encourage more of your followers to get involved

5. Be Consistent

If you’re looking to win over customers with social selling, the most important thing is that you show up regularly.

Consistency is king.

Once you start showing up in user feeds regularly with quality content and useful, credible information, your followers will start to actively expect you to pop up. As a result, they’re more likely to interact with you as they become more familiar with who you are and what you’re selling and, to top it off, are more likely to buy from you.

Don’t Miss Out On the Power of Social Selling

Social selling is one of the hottest marketing trends right now – and for good reason. It gives brands the chance to meet and hang out with their customers in a place they’re comfortable with and join in conversations.

Selling is no longer a game of who can shout the loudest; instead, it’s about nurturing audiences, showing you understand their struggles, and providing solutions to those pain points that enrich their lives.

Tap into the power of social selling by ensuring you’re visible on the right social platforms, sharing relevant, engaging content, and getting involved in discussions. The more you show up and cement your credibility, the more trust you’ll build, and the more customers you’ll get flocking to your products.

The key is to keep things consistent. If you follow this super simple strategy, and you’ll be winning over customers in no time at all.

The post How to Win Over Customers with Social Selling appeared first on Social Commerce.

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In a world where social media is becoming more and more important, failing to implement a concentrated strategy on social platforms can lead a business to ruin. Too many businesspeople rely on their gut feeling when it comes to their social selling strategy without considering the data that should drive their decisions.

We’ve compiled a list of social selling statistics to give you important insights and help you approach your followers the right way: Social selling is the latest wave in the tech-driven consumer revolution, and you should be part of it.

General Social Media Statistics

1. According to Statista, 22% of the world’s population has a Facebook account.

2. More than 600 million people have LinkedIn accounts across 200+ countries. (LinkedIn)

3. According to PEW Research, Facebook is still the most widely used social media platform with 79% of American internet users. 

4. A staggering 80% of the time spent on social media platforms happens on mobile devices. (ComScore)

5. More than 56% of internet users have more than one social media account. (PEW Research)

6. Almost half of the entire world’s population (3.03 billion people) has at least one social media account. (Hootsuite)

Crucial Social Selling Stats to Keep in Mind

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7. 73% of sales representatives using social selling as part of their sales process did better than their colleagues who didn’t use social selling. On top of that, they exceeded quota 23% more often. (Aberdeen Group) 

8. Salespeople who use social media as part of their sales methods outsell 78% of their peers. (A Sales Guy)

9. 90% of top-performing salespeople now use social media as part of their sales strategy. (LinkedIn)

10. According to SalesforLife, companies who have consistent social selling processes are 40% more likely to hit revenue goals than non-social sellers.

11. 50% of revenue is influenced by social selling in 14 common industries, including computer software, healthcare, and marketing & advertising. (LinkedIn)

12. 90% of decision-makers never answer a cold call, but 75% of B2B buyers use social media to make purchasing decisions. (LinkedIn)

13. 54% of sales agents using social media are able to track their social media usage back to at least one closed deal. (A Sales Guy)

14. 77% of B2B buyers claimed they did not talk with a sales agent until after they had performed independent research. (DemandGen)

15. 53% of sales agents want help in understanding social selling better. (Adam Global)

16. Sales agents with high social network activity achieve 45% more sales opportunities and are 51% more likely to hit their sales targets. (LinkedIn)

17. Employee-generated content receives 8 times more engagement than content shared by brand channels. (Social Media Today)

18. Brand messages reached 561% further when shared by employees compared to the same messages shared via official brand social channels. (Marketing Advisory Network)

19. 93% of sales executives have not received any formal training on social selling. (EveryoneSocial)

20. According to EveryoneSocial, a good social selling program can drive 16% better win rates, 2x pipeline, and deliver 48% better deals.

21. 89% of top-performing sales agents claim social networking platforms, such as LinkedIn, play a major role in closing deals and are part of their sales strategy. Moreover, 70% of sales professionals are active on LinkedIn for business purposes, compared to 64% on Facebook and 43% on Twitter.https://www.youtube.com/embed/L2y8wCZ9JVY?feature=oembed

22. 64% of sales agents that invested in social media hit their quota. On the other hand, only 49% of sales agents that don’t use social selling hit the quota. 

23. Social selling leaders manage to create 45% more sales opportunities than their peers.

24. 97% of consumers go online to find and research products and services.

25. 47% of buyers view at least 3 to 5 pieces of content before they contact a sales agent, according to DemandGen.  

26. Baylor University’s Keller Center for Research reports that the success rate of cold calls to appointments stands at only 0.3%.  

27. 75% of B2B buyers are impacted by social media when making a purchasing decision.  

28. 31% of B2B professionals claim that social selling has allowed them to build deeper relationships with clients.

29. More than 10% of social sales agents have closed 5 or more deals due to being active on social media. 

30. 76% of buyers are ready to have a social media conversation with potential providers.

31. A staggering 92% of B2B buyers are willing to engage with a sales professional who is a known industry thought leader. 

32. 53% of customer loyalty is driven by a salesperson’s ability to deliver unique insight, which is easily done through social media.

33. 39% of B2B professionals claimed social selling reduced the length of time they spent researching potential leads.

34. 84% of C-level executives use social media to make purchasing choices.

35. 33% of users prefer to contact brands through social media over making a phone call.

36. 80% of companies believe their salesforce would be more productive if they had a greater social media presence, but two-thirds of companies have no social media strategy for their sales organization.

37. 50.1% of social sales agents spend 5-10% of their time on social media. (A Sales Guy)

38. According to HubSpot, 61% of US marketers use social media for lead generation. 

B2B Social Selling with Twitter

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39. 92% of employees’ Twitter followers are new to their brand. (A Sales Guy)

40. 74% of B2B marketing companies use Twitter to push their content.

B2B Social Selling with Facebook

41. 81% of people find unsolicited Facebook messages from sales agents creepy, and 78% are turned off by friend requests from sales agents.  

42. The reach of 135 employees engaged in employer advocacy is larger than that of a company page with one million Facebook followers, likes, or fans. 

B2B Social Selling with LinkedIn

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43. 98% of sales agents with over 5,000 LinkedIn connections meet or surpass their quota.

44. 65% of people on LinkedIn wouldn’t find it awkward if a sales agent sent them a message and they had mutual connections.

45. There is a grand total of 154 million LinkedIn users in the US alone.   

Social Selling Efficiency Statistics

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46. IBM increased its sales by 400% thanks to its inbound social selling program.

47. Sales agents who took a look at the profiles of at least 10 people at each of their accounts were 69% more likely to exceed quota than those who viewed 4 or fewer.

48. Social sellers create 38% more new opportunities than traditional sellers.

49. 90% of top-performing sales agents use social selling tools, compared with 71% of overall sales professionals.

50. Social media has a 100% higher lead-to-close rate than outbound marketing.

51. 63.4% of social sellers reported an increase in company sales revenue, compared to 41.2% of non-social sellers.

52. Sales agents who leverage social selling in their sales process are 79% more likely to attain their quota than those who don’t use it.  

53. 77% of B2B purchasers claimed that they would not even talk to a sales agent until they had done their own research.   

54. 55% of all buyers do their research by using social networks.

Ultimately, leveraging your social network when selling is critical to your success. Use insights from these 54 stats to inform your social selling strategies using LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter: Doing so will meet potential customers where they are, leading to better relationships, impactful discussions, and more sales.

The post 54 Mind-Blowing Stats about Social Selling appeared first on Social Commerce.

For high-end brands like Rivera, giving customers the chance to see what their products look like in situ is an important step in the sales cycle. In the past, this would mean hiring a professional photographer to capture a few studio-style shots for the website.

Today, the possibilities have been blown wide open.

Riviera Maison shares photos from customers that have already bought their signature velvet sofa, mahogany sideboard, or luxurious winter blanket to provide endless decor inspiration for future prospects. 

And this isn’t a one-off.

In fact, the rise of social commerce shows us that shopping is (and always has been) an inherently social experience. Social commerce sales are on the rise even in spite of a dropoff in in-person shopping. Ultimately, conversations about brands and products are still happening— in fact, they’re happening more often than ever before with social media.

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In the current digital landscape, brands have a wealth of tools and opportunities at their fingertips. Savvy brands leverage their social power and build deeper connections with their buyers through social media platforms like Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube. And YouTube ad agencies are helping brands implement this . Starting conversations and engaging with customers online doesn’t just generate valuable feedback and loyalty; it inspires current consumers to share what they love about the brand.

With more than 50% of all shoppers following their favorite brands on social media for the sole purpose of seeing new products, there’s no point denying the impact social can have on sales. 

Social Selling In Action: Examples From 5 Real-Life Brands

1. “Shop Now” Insta Ads from Bombas

Bombas Socks taps the power of Instagram ads by encouraging shoppers to buy products directly through the social media app itself. 

Each ad is designed to stand out in a prospective customer’s feed, employing bright colors and quirky styling, and using the “Shop Now” call-to-action banner that Instagram ads provide. 

As a result, shoppers can make their purchase in one window, without ever having to leave Instagram, reducing friction that might otherwise decrease the likelihood of a sale. Once the purchase has been made, they can continue to scroll through their feeds.

The in-built nature of buying through social media demonstrates just how much online shopping has become a part of everyday life. Consumers can now impulse buy like never before with just a few clicks.

Key Takeaway From Bombas

Studies show that 60% of users learn about new products through Instagram. Online communities have evolved, and consumers are now open to purchasing through channels that were originally reserved for interacting with friends and keeping in touch with family.

In fact, one-third of Instagram users have actually bought something through the platform while on their mobile device. 

Take Bombas’ example and serve stand-out ads that link directly to a in-app purchase window, making it as easy as possible for potential customers to make a purchase while going about their everyday activities on Instagram. 

2. Shareworthy Giveaways by Friend’s Beauty

The main goal for social media savvy eCommerce brands is to generate engagement and interaction. The more buzz that’s created, the more chance they have of reaching new audiences and creating a loyal following that continues to buy their products.

Increasing engagement is the exact outcome Friend’s Beauty wanted to achieve by hosting a giveaway. They encouraged their Facebook followers to comment and share their giveaway post, ultimately increasing its reach on the platform.

As a result, the brand created a digital version of word-of-mouth marketing (which still remains one of the most effective forms of marketing ever). 

Source

Today’s consumer relies heavily on peer recommendations simply because there are so many brands out there to choose from. (Read more on consumer decision fatigue in the latest from Rodger Smith, CEO of DirectScale, an Exigo company.)

They tend to lean toward companies that come recommended by friends and family, because they trust those people more than the word of businesses themselves. 

Key Takeaway From Friend’s Beauty

Sharing is a core part of social media. People who use Facebook are primed to share content with their friends list that either makes them look good, is entertaining, or has some kind of potential personal benefit (in the case of the Friend’s Beauty giveaway, the chance to win an eyeliner and brush set). 

Take advantage of user’s innate need to share on social media by generating posts that encourage word-of-mouth marketing. 

This might come in the form of a giveaway, or it might simply be a “tag a friend” post, like Sephora does here: 

3. Customer Created Content by Batoko

In an age where consumers are cleverer than ever, creating human connections has never been more important. 

Brands are turning their backs on highly-polished marketing campaigns and are instead showcasing content that’s been created by their very own customers. 

93% of shoppers note that user generated content helps them decide whether to buy a product, and brands like Batoko are tapping into this powerful trend.

The recycled swimwear company exclusively shares customer photos on their Instagram feed. 

Not only does this show their products in a range of different environments and on a range of different bodies, but it also works as unbeatable social proof. It says “hey, look at all the people who’ve bought from us already and love our product!”. 

Key Takeaway From Batoko

Steer clear of highly-polished campaigns that consumers are becoming more and more skeptical of and instead showcase content that’s been created by your loyal fans. 

Encourage users to send in and post their photos using a specific hashtag, or bring influencers on board (like Au Revoir Cinderella have done below) to solidify your social proof. 

4. Getting Real With Stories by Zit Stick

Instagram Stories are on fire. 

They inject a sense of “realness” into a platform that is renowned for intensely edited images that show only the best parts of life.

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Since their introduction to Instagram in 2016, Stories have become a tool for eCommerce brands to demonstrate the human side of their business and forge deeper connections with their audience.

In fact, Stories are so successful for online shops, that one in four millenials and Gen Zers actively seek out Stories that feature the products and services they want to buy. 

Zit Stick buys into this need by populating their Stories with customer testimonials and real-life stories that lead into a call-to-action (or a “Swipe Up” to buy image). 

Their Stories show the products in action and share testimonials from customers who have bought and enjoyed the product (which again acts as a form of good old word-of-mouth marketing). 

Key Takeaway From Zit Stick

Let customers do the talking for you and incorporate their testimonials and experiences into a Stories thread. 

Once viewers are invested in the outcome, add a call-to-action that encourages your audience to “complete the story” by making a purchase. 

Stories are a great way to show the behind-the-scenes of your brand  (which ultimately builds relationships with customers), so don’t be afraid to share silly moments, the making of your products, or other raw, unpolished aspects of your brand. 

5. Shop Spring

With so many options available today, it’s important for eCommerce brands to stand out – and a huge part of that involves making sure your customer service is spot on.

Think about it:

If a consumer lands on your site and has questions about one of your products but can’t get an answer, they’ll go elsewhere to a place where they can get the answer in a timely manner. 

To combat the challenge of site abandonment, many brands are implementing Facebook Messenger or other chatbots to answer simple questions and to personalize the online shopping experience, suggesting products the customer would like based on their interactions with the bot. 

Shop Spring’s Facebook bot is a prime example. 

By using a machine-learning powered “robot,” Shop Spring answers immediate objections or questions consumers have to keep sales flowing. 

Impulse buying is becoming hotter than ever, and if a shopper is in the mood to buy right now, you must be able to accommodate that. Otherwise, the critical moment of impulse will pass, and you’ve lost a sale. 

It’s also worth noting that Shop Spring’s chatbot is used on a platform that most of its customers are familiar with. 

It doesn’t ask them to submit a form on a page they’ve never seen before. 

Instead, it turns up in their Facebook Messenger inbox amongst threads from their friends and family. 

Key Takeaway From Shop Spring

In addition to implementing a customer service portal on a platform that your customers are familiar with, the Facebook Messenger chatbot allows you to personalize the shopping experience. 

If you can recommend products they might also like based on their interactions with your chatbot, you are ultimately going to encourage more sales. 

Social Selling to Get More Sales

The evolution of free and paid social media services means it’s no longer just a place for keeping in touch with friends and family. Instead, it provides a platform where users do many other everyday activities without having to leave the safety of a platform they know and love. 

As a result, eCommerce brands must grow their social presence and interact with their customers, through mediums like authentic Instagram Stories, YouTube Ads AI-powered Facebook Messenger chatbots, or customer-created content.

If you’re not already engaging with your customers on social media, you’re missing out on chances to build your brand, create royalty, and even make sales directly. 

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The post 5 Brilliant Examples of Social Selling appeared first on Social Commerce.

Image by Erik Lucatero from Pixabay

Most influencers have social media to thank for their popularity and authority status in the eyes of so many followers. These famous individuals have the power to change behavior through social media. And that behavior often involves buying a product or service. 

After all, the influencer marketing industry has ballooned to $10 billion for a reason. That’s precisely why businesses across the globe are building relationships with influencers who can help them with social selling. 

How Influencer Marketing and Social Selling Go Hand in Hand

Image from Pixabay

Many industries leverage influencers regularly to promote their products. But why does influencer marketing look so different than the celebrity endorsements of days gone by? The answer lies in a cultural shift fueled by social media.

Demographics

As baby boomers retire, millennial consumers are slowly becoming the most powerful consumer group globally. Correspondingly, the biggest target market for influencers and influencer marketing, in general, is millennial consumers. 

According to a study by LaunchMetrics, millennials focus 76.4% of all influencer strategies. And when you consider that 90.4% of millennials use social media, the model makes sense. Millennials are often reluctant to trust what brands say in ad campaigns. Instead, they would much rather trust a popular figure on social media and then make a purchasing decision.

It’s worth noting that Gen Z is also maturing and joining the economy. Therefore, the companies that survive the consumer transformation will be the ones that cater to these two groups. 

Platforms & Perks

Social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter have millions to billions of users. But if a marketer wants to take advantage of these individual online communities, they must be aware that each platform is a different story. 

For instance, Instagram is an image-centric social platform, making it great for the fitness and clothing industries. Influencers can present new clothing garments through photos or videos, and fitness enthusiasts and bodybuilders can show off their bodies, explaining their diets and routines using visually-driven content.  

3 Reasons Why Companies Work with Influencers

Image by Free-Photos from Pixabay

More and more brands today are deciding to work with influencers. Let’s look at why so many companies want to leverage an influencer’s follower base to sell their products. 

Influencer Marketing is not Pushy

Many experts claim that this is the most significant benefit of this marketing method. This kind of marketing is radically different from traditional marketing methods because it doesn’t feel pushy to consumers. 

Followers on social media willingly follow influencers and look forward to their posts. Content influencers share isn’t spam; followers actively seek their advice and recommendations. 

And even when influencers post sponsored content that is clearly designed to generate revenue for a particular company, followers don’t mind as much.  

Influencers like Nichole Ciotti, whose claim to fame started with a popular set of photo filters, promote various brands. But, like Ralph Lauren and Abercrombie, her clothing sponsors are already popular with her audience, and those followers appreciate curated recommendations. 

Social Influencer Marketing is Credible

The most popular influencers had to spend a lot of time and effort in winning the trust of their followers. As a result, most of them seem true both to themselves and their audience. 

Such a feat cannot be achieved throughout a single night. To be viewed as a credible source or an authority, that individual has to be consistent and authentic. In addition, their story has to be engaging enough to attract followers. 

Once that kind of trust is established, everything becomes more accessible. And companies have recognized that. 

Brands have to spend years to gain this kind of trust, so they turn to influencers who have already made that investment to work their magic on social media platforms. And it works. One study by Twitter revealed that consumers rely on influencers almost as much as their friends. 

In fact, a whopping 40% of consumers have claimed that they have made a purchase based on an influencer’s tweet.   

Good for Brand Awareness

Influencer marketing can expand your reach online and position you as a modern, engaging brand. As a result, social users will start noticing you more often. They will learn more about your brand, about your story, and ultimately, about what you offer.

However, the key to reaping influencer marketing results is to provide valuable content that adds to their social media presence. 

Everyone gets something out of the campaign by ensuring value for the company, the influencer, and the audience.

Influencer Marketing Case Studies

Image source

Finally, let’s look at the examples where businesses have found the perfect formula for influencer marketing. 

Fiji Water

Fiji Water used the face of Danielle Bernstein to spark more interest in their message. 

Bernstein runs a trendy blog called ‘We Wore What.’ Fiji joined forces with her on Instagram to spread awareness about the importance of water for human health. 

Bernstein appeared in short videos that promoted the significance of water for staying healthy and fit. Her followers were quick to respond, and soon enough, we’re drinking more water to stay healthy, all while Berstein and Fiji made more sales. 

Subaru

This car giant has been experiencing significant growth during the past few years, and influencer marketing played an essential role in this growth. As a result, Subaru’s sales increased by 10% in 2016 alone.

Their influencer marketing campaign, called ‘Meet an Owner,’ was a significant success, improving brand awareness and brand sentiment.  

A total of 20 influencers were contacted for this campaign across various categories ranging from fitness to art to generate a broad appeal of relatable ambassadors. 

GOODFOODS

GOODFOODS had the goal of raising brand awareness for their natural guacamole and dips and eventually driving sales.

GOODFOODS assembled a team of 60 influencers with expertise in food, parenting, lifestyle, and home goods to accomplish their goal. These individuals had to create original recipes and stories that featured products from GOODFOODS.

The influencers created more than 2,000 pieces of content, ranging from blog posts and recipes to photos and videos. The campaign, which was a resounding success, had 32 million potential impressions, 71,000 engagements and returned a conversion rate of 34.2%.

Wrap-up

Image by Thomas Ulrich from Pixabay

Novelties and shifts in the digital landscape are the new norms. And all ambitious companies who want to stay at the top have to keep up with those trends. 

Though strategies constantly change, influencer marketing is here to stay (just like social media platforms). As long as you work closely with influencers who have a trusted reputation, relevant appeal, and a community of loyal followers, influencer marketing can be your new secret to success.

The post Understanding the Relationship Between Influencer Marketing and Social Selling appeared first on Social Commerce.

Even though cannabis has been an illegal recreational drug for decades, it is now recognized as a medicinal plant. This has led to it being legalized in many different countries and in some US states.

This legalization has caused an increase in cannabis usage in certain countries while also having a significant economic impact. It is predicted that in 2025, legal marijuana sales will earn as much as $23 billion in the US alone.

Cannabis brands are now looking for ways to improve customer satisfaction and grow revenue in this new market, which isn’t a hard task to accomplish if you know all the necessary steps. To help you grow your business in this competitive industry, we listed these strategies below.

Importance of customer experience and satisfaction in the cannabis industry

Image by Tumisu from Pixabay 

As cannabis is legal for both medical and recreational use, brands need to think about how to satisfy both types of customers and provide them with the best possible experience.

Recreational cannabis users often look for cannabis that will be enjoyable but not something that will lead to an overly intense experience. Medical cannabis users, on the other hand, can look for a product that can help them with issues ranging from anxiety relief to the prevention of epileptic seizures.

This is why brands are currently investing in research and development so they can meet specific customer needs.

As cannabis wasn’t legal until just a few years ago, there hasn’t been enough time to create an accurate picture of an average cannabis consumer. Adding to the fact that everyone has different needs from the experience, it’s impossible to create one specific customer persona.

However, you still need to think of all the different people who may buy your products. 

5 tips for improving customer experience as a cannabis brand

Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay

If you truly want to improve customer experience, read on. What follows is five effective ways to improve customer experience as a cannabis brand.

1. Identify the most profitable customers

Your products will attract a couple of different types of cannabis consumers which you need to segment into groups:

• People who only smoke flower
• People who only vape and don’t smoke flower
• Those who only consume edibles
• Customers who want to smoke shatter
• People who only consume CBD oil
• Customers who consume different types of CBD products

When you know who your customers are, you’ll be able to create strategic marketing campaigns.

2. Use email marketing

With email marketing, you can keep your customers updated on all your products, attract new customers, and upsell to existing customers. Email marketing is a very profitable marketing strategy, as every $1 you spend has an average return of $42.

As long as you keep your emails relevant, consistent, and filled with useful information, your campaign will be successful.

3. Create a loyalty program

Loyalty programs have been used in retail for years to create repeat customers by offering rewards and incentives when they complete a purchase. With a loyalty program, you can retain customers, make them feel appreciated, and get relevant customer data.

To create a loyalty program in the cannabis industry, you need to offer something valuable and unique to your customers. You can offer gifts, store credit, free samples, or anything your customers may appreciate.

4. Offer special deals

Special deals can attract a lot of customers and they serve as a great customer experience. You can create a 2-for-the-price-of-1 deal, discounted bundles, and run conditional promotions to draw in customers and increase your sales numbers.

5. Use the right CRM tool

A Customer Relationship Management software (more commonly known as a CRM) is a tool businesses use to improve customer loyalty and retention. When you use a CRM tool, you can convert one-time buyers into regular customers.

You can use a CRM tool to build customer loyalty by doing the following:

• Promote your latest products to generate higher demand.
• Create targeted offers for each of your customers.
• Run loyalty programs for your customers to ensure you’re always their number one pick.
• Create an inventory and keep track of your stock.
• Offer coupons to customers.

Success story: How DirectScale helped a cannabis brand scale its efforts

A few years ago, while still at her old job, Mari Jo was acquiring world-class knowledge about customer relationships that would later help her start her own business. Having started SimpleInSite, she wanted to help other direct selling companies but struggled to find the right platform.

She found it when one of her clients migrated to DirectScale, an Exigo company. Taken aback by all the features of DS such as the platform’s openness and customizability, she realized that was all she needed to launch clients quickly and successfully. 

Learning more about the platform’s user-friendliness, she has understood how simple it actually is to complete tasks like adding coupon codes or a merchant account, and even building a digital library without even having to talk to programmers.

“One thing I love about DirectScale is it’s usability.” Mari Jo said. “It’s surprisingly user-friendly. I can do things other platforms don’t offer out of the box so clients can launch quickly and efficiently. Things like changing colors and company logos are simple. And I can build custom pages and widgets by myself! No other platform can do that!”

Before the COVID pandemic, she worked on creating a full line of CBD hemp-derived products for her client NuHemp. The collaboration is more than successful, having launched the brand’s Amazon storefront and eCommerce platform.

If you want to learn more about how DirectScale and Exigo helped this cannabis brand achieve its goals and improve customer satisfaction, read this success story.

How to use CRM to boost cannabis sales

Image by Nattanan Kanchanaprat from Pixabay 

A good CRM tool can be crucial to boosting your cannabis sales. If you get the right tool and know how to use it, you’ll be impressed with the results. Here are just a few ways you can use your CRM tool to boost sales.

1. Acquiring better leads

A CRM tool gives you access to valuable customer data which you can use to segment your target audience based on demographics, psychographics, as well as behaviors. With this information, you’ll be able to identify ideal customer profiles and run marketing initiatives to find matching leads.

2. Selling to new customers

Your sales team can use this tool to make new deals and track customers as they go through the entire sales funnel without missing any milestones or important tasks. They will also be able to gain invaluable insights into which marketing campaigns are successful and which aren’t, so you’ll be able to focus on those that are more profitable.

3. Increasing customer loyalty

Your marketing team will find it easier than ever to keep consumers engaged with your brand and lead them through the marketing funnel as they transition from leads to customers. If you combine your CRM tool with email marketing, you’ll be able to create an unforgettable digital brand experience that will distinguish you from your competitors.

In addition, the data you collect with your CRM tool can be used to get a better insight into all the challenges and problems your customers face. Once you know all of these issues, you’ll be able to connect to your customers on a deeper level by providing them with relevant and interesting content.

4. Cross-selling and upselling

It’s much cheaper to sell to an existing customer than spend money trying to acquire a new one, so when someone shows that they’re interested in your products, you need to keep them around. You can use your CRM to create a variety of automated communications that give you the opportunity to do business with customers again and again.

One way you can approach this is to set up an email marketing campaign that is triggered when a customer purchases something from your store. That customer will then receive emails in which you will offer them complementary products that go well with the one they just purchased.

5. Creating personalized communications

Personalization is of great importance in the retail world, as it allows you to connect to your customers and show you care about them, not just their money. When you use a CRM tool, you can send targeted personalized messages to all of your customers.

These personalized messages will include much more than just the recipient’s name. Your CRM tool will help create tailored messages based on demographics and behaviors as well. As you’ll have access to a plethora of data, you’ll be able to customize communications to be as personal as possible.

6. Providing better customer service

Customer service becomes a breeze with a CRM tool, as your team will have access to all past communications and the customer’s history with your company as soon as they contact you. This will make communications more efficient and agents will be able to solve all problems much faster.

7. Increasing sales and ROI

A CRM tool allows you to automate communications, marketing, and sales processes, all of which will lead to your sales and marketing ROI increase. Since your team will have access to data that allows them to create better strategies, you’ll attract more quality leads and close sales much faster.

One of the things you can do with your CRM tool is to analyze data to determine what time is ideal to communicate with customers and when you’re most likely to get a reply. This will save a lot of time while also minimizing the cost of every sale.

8. Boosting employee productivity

Automation is something every business needs to implement. As soon as you find the right tool and create repeatable processes, your team will be able to be much more productive. They won’t have to focus on menial and repetitive tasks, so they will save a significant amount of time.

Summary

Even though the cannabis industry is still relatively new, its steady growth isn’t surprising at all. If you run your own cannabis business and are hoping to improve sales, you need to realize that your customers are the key to your success and their satisfaction should be your number one priority.

As long as you work hard on improving customer experience and strive to turn one-time shoppers into loyal customers, you won’t have to worry about anything else. And don’t forget to find the perfect CRM tool, because it could be the thing that will make or break your business. 

Speaking of which… feel free to check out the DirectScale tool. It may be the last piece of the puzzle you need to find success in the cannabis industry.

The post How Cannabis Brands Can Improve Customer Satisfaction and Revenue appeared first on Social Commerce.