Archives des Méthodes commerciales

59% of a salesperson's time is not devoted to selling*.

Prospect information research, administrative tasks, sales follow-up...

So how can you save your sales force time and optimize their performance?

*Sales Insights Lab study

KEY No. 1: Surround yourself with the right tools

You're probably familiar with the different stages of the sales cycle:

So many steps a sales person needs to master! But salespeople are not alone in this process... Thanks to the advent of marketing automation and Sales Enablement, numerous solutions have emerged to make your salespeople's lives easier!

These tools are mainly used during the lead generation and prospecting phase, a stage which does not represent the real added value for your sales force.

Chez Kestio, nos équipes utilisent au quotidien différents outils d’automatisation tels que :

Sparklane: ultra-targeted lead generation!
Dataananas: personalized e-mails
Ringover: optimize your sales force's prospecting sessions

With more than 2,000 marketing automation solutions available in Europe by 2022, you can find a tool to meet every need!

But to help you find the perfect match, we have prepared a guide presenting 14 solutions, which you can download free of charge by clicking here:

KEY No. 2: Use a CRM

Implementing a CRM (Customer Relation Management) strategy is a key asset for companies.

From lead generation to optimizing return on investment and increasing sales, it offers a host of opportunities that make it an essential element in ensuring the successful development of companies and providing the best possible support for sales teams.

Improve your sales performance

A CRM strategy can significantly improve the productivity of your sales force.

This is particularly the case with the use of software such as Salesforce, Microsoft Dynamics CRM or Zoho CRM...etc. For example, they enable you to work offline or via a mobile application.

The fully customizable aspect of these CRM tools enables sales teams to save time by automating certain processes, such as data entry, allowing them to concentrate on their expertise: SALES!

How do you choose your CRM software?

By taking these three criteria into account, you'll be able to choose the best tool for your customer portfolio management strategy.

Et si cela reste toujours flou pour vous, sachez que Kestio peut vous aider à choisir la solution la plus pertinente pour vous.

KEY No. 3: expert advice

Beyond the "recommendation" effect, developing and animating a customer community has many advantages, including being a real lever for innovation, and a highly effective substitute for customer service. Certain sectors, such as fashion and retail, have made no mistake about it.

And what if software publishers decided to take inspiration from it to boost their business?

Here's everything your customer community could do for you.

1. Make people want to choose your solution

From TripAdvisor to Trust Pilot, today it's hard to choose a product or make a purchase without first sifting through comparisons and customer reviews! The software world is no exception, with platforms such as appvizerto name but one.

The difficulty is that you have no control over what happens on these platforms...

Creating and animating your own customer community means offering your best supporters a place where they can express themselves and say all the good things they think about you.

And that's not bad. Judging by the results of a clothing brand like ASOS, for example, which observed a 45% increase in spontaneous mentions of its brand among ASOS Insiders...

2. Ensure the success of your next modules

Another good thing about customer communities is that they can be a veritable goldmine of inspiration and good ideas to fuel internal innovation and guide R&D investment.

Toy brand LEGO, for example, has developed a strategy via social networks and its LEGO Ideas platform to identify its future bestsellers. New models are chosen through a consultative and collaborative process, including the Beatles' "Yellow Submarine"!

Others, like Décathlon, go even further in co-designing their products with their community of customers, establishing direct collaboration between development teams and users, who sometimes propose very specific ideas for solving a technical problem or an unsatisfactory use case.

This is a field in which software publishers are generally quite at ease, as developers are often very committed to working alongside users to resolve any bugs or limitations they encounter, and to taking note of requests for improvements.

3. Test and improve your new applications

In the same vein, Société Générale has chosen to rely on its customers to create "the LAB", a community of beta-testers to optimize the operation of its mobile application.

As soon as the bank wishes to integrate a new feature into the app, the developers first put it online on the LAB. Users can then try it out for the first time and give their feedback.

They can also give their opinion on design, color, etc. The aim is to develop the solution that comes closest to the needs and expectations of its customers.

4. Nurture interest in your solution

As already mentioned, customer communities are also formidable vectors of visibility, notoriety, legitimacy and influence!

By mobilizing their customers around the design of their products, LEGO and Décathlon not only ensure that these products "meet their public" when they are released, but also create a real teasing effect for the future product, generating a strong sense of expectation around it!

Without going that far, sometimes rewarding your best customers for their loyalty or diligent use of your solution is enough to create a buzz around your brand: this is whatthe start-up Tilkee did perfectly when it sent its "Black Card" to its 100 best customers., well relayed on social networks.

5. Supporting your users

Finally, customer communities are a real asset when it comes to customer care. User forums can be more responsive than support teams, and your regular users can be the best Happiness Managers!

The most active self-help communities can come from unexpected quarters: every day, for example, over a hundred questions are answered on average four times by enthusiasts on the fishing tackle online sales site pecheurs.com!

The SNCF and BlaBlaCar community self-help chats are led by experienced users, with a proven positive impact on the transformation rates observed on their sites!

One of our customers, a manufacturer of photovoltaic panels, saw its customer community on what's app become its best support and meet with immediate success with the craftsmen who install its products : the speed and relevance of the answers provided was unrivalled when it came to solving its customers' technical difficulties. This enabled the company to quickly identify areas for improvement.

These are all approaches that can be widely applied in the software publishing sector, helping you to grow your business.

In any case, the success of a customer community depends on a few good practices and key steps:

Define an objective for your community: what should it contribute (to my company and its members)?
Define a target (What type of customer? How to identify them? Recruit them? Build loyalty?)
Choose the channel: social networks, specialized platforms...? (Which channel will be the most relevant for animating this community? Make sure that its members "live" it autonomously).
Define transparent rules (for leadership, participation/contribution)
Reward and value the most active customers (points/benefits systems, gift vouchers, highlighting, rewards, etc.).
Set up an effective internal organization to lead the community and use the feedback generated (product/service improvement, customer relations).

The examples cited in this article were largely inspired by these sources:

https://www.pellerin-formation.com/7-marques-qui-ont-su-creer-de-nouveaux-services-produits-en-impliquant-leur-communaute/

https://potion.social/fr/blog/communaute-de-clients-4-exemples-concrets/

Here are a few examples (and a comparison) of platforms dedicated to animating online communities:

https://www.feverbee.com/communityplatforms/

To go further and learn more about targeting and building a customer file, you can also watch our webinar:

Even professions that don't traditionally prospect, such as lawyers and notaries, are gradually looking for ways to attract new customers!

However, there are ways of optimizing your actions and attracting customers without (too) much effort!

To know, to like, to trust!

Being known, being appreciated and having a capital of trust- these are the three indicators that need to be in the green to conclude a sales conversation positively. So, if you want to minimize your prospecting efforts, you'll be looking first and foremost to initiate a sales approach with a target who already trusts you, who already knows you or to whom you've been recommended.

To achieve this, you need to rely on your networks, both online and offline. If your aim is to find new customers in a relatively short space of time, you might as well start with those who already like you!

8 ways to attract customers effortlessly

1. Take inventory! Take a list of all the people you are or may have been in contact with, classify them by relationship history, and identify those who could become customers. Don't forget that you may have relations in your network, even close ones (friends, sporting or cultural context...) who may never have asked themselves what you can offer them professionally, simply because this was not the context in which you met. And yet...

2. Adopt an attraction approach: this involves meeting your contact to get to know them better, make contact, warm up the relationship and share information. Be interesting before you're interested!

3. Look for connectors, those with a culture of networking. Because getting in touch with them also gives you access to their network. They're easy enough to identify: just look at how they came to you. These connectors are relationship-builders, and they love it: they work like hubs!

4. Multiply your contacts. Every time you meet someone, ask for a recommendation, 1 or 2 names that your contact can contact! If you have 10 lunches, you could end up with twenty names!

5. Get back on track with a high-impact approach, i.e. think about what you can give in exchange, and look for reciprocity. Being too self-centered is counter-productive and will undermine the bond of trust.

6. Set yourself a few benchmarks, not in terms of results, but in terms of means. For example, time spent per week, number of contacts, lunches...

7. Prepare the ingredients for success! Know how to pitch your products or services, prepare a brochure, a website or at least a business card. Be prepared!

8. Adopt a logic of follow-up: even if it doesn't work from a commercial point of view, maintain the relationship of trust.

Online: volume with less effort

With digital technology, the relationship between effort and efficiency is changing dimension: social networks, and in particular LinkedIn (see our article "4 tips for increasing sales through social selling").), make it possible to reproduce your actions ad infinitum and at no additional cost. In the real world, you can do 200, 220 lunches a year at best. With digital, there's no limit.

With the help of a well-turned post offering interesting content, you can reach your entire level 1 or even level 2, for a rapid impact on 500 to 2,000 people. ! Of course, this won't be as engaging as a lunch, but repetition will help you increase your "to know", "to like" and finally "to trust" indicators.

As you can see, attracting customers effortlessly may not be possible, but if you do it the right way, you can do it cost-effectively!

The advent of new technologies has enabled business to evolve in many areas, not least in communication and prospecting. To optimize your business, it's essential to integrate these new prospecting methods into your strategy. Find out how with this webinar:

A godsend for a company!

The idea is to be present on social networks, disseminating relevant content that will arouse the interest of web users as they search for information. This approach, driven by the company, doesn't mix personal and professional content, as we saw in the first post on the subject, "4 tips for increasing sales with social selling".. It's set up and managed by marketing, with a view to generating inbound contacts. To exist on social networks, there are three levels of action corresponding to three levels of involvement:

- react to other people's publications (likes, comments, sharing...); consumes few resources, generates few results, maintains activity.

- choose curation, a practice that consists in selecting, editing and sharing the most relevant content on the Internet for a given query or subject; consumes a little more resources, brings visibility, but doesn't contribute to building an identity.

- produce your own content ; consumes a lot of resources, requires a strategy, but brings significant results.

It's this third point that deserves a little more attention. To succeed, there are a few rules to observe:

1 > Be interesting

To attract attention, to be perceived as a valuable resource providing useful content, it's better to talk about what interests the interlocutor than about yourself, i.e. to talk about subjects in which the company is an expert from the potential customer's point of view. In other words, prefer "How office furniture improves productivity" to "We sell desks at the best quality/price ratio".

2 > Know your target

To address your target properly, you need to know who they are. Ideally, marketing and sales departments should work together to describe these targets, addressing the following themes: their profiles, their career paths, their responsibilities, their objectives, their challenges, their stresses, their constraints, the projects they're working on, their decision-making processes, the types of customers they serve, and so on: Their profiles, their career paths, their responsibilities, their objectives, their challenges, their stresses, their constraints, the projects they're working on, their decision-making processes, their beliefs, their constraints, what's important to them... It's understood that we're describing a typical profile that doesn't exist per se, a bit like the "average French person" in INSEE statistics. However, by clarifying these points, we can better visualize the target, employees will have a shared representation, and we'll become more audible thanks to adapted content.

We can do this for every type of customer.

3 > List themes

It's time to work on the editorial line, to find the points of convergence (content and form) between the company's offering and the expectations of the targeted Internet users. At this stage, it's a good idea to organize a brainstorming session with your collaborators, producing a maximum number of content themes on post-it notes, with a very broad exploratory work, and then synthesizing them by asking everyone for the 10 most important. This shortlist becomes the backbone of the editorial line. This is an exercise to be repeated every 6 months, with a mix of news and cold topics. Based on the chosen themes, all that's left to do is come up with article topics and organize production.

4 > Writing content

For the editorial department, there are two possible solutions.

Or the workload can be shared between several editors, but not everyone is comfortable with the written word. In this case, you still need to appoint an editorial manager to validate the articles and ensure a certain degree of consistency.

Soit un rédacteur interne ou externe qui pourra se charger d’interviewer les experts pour produire ensuite le contenu. Cette solution a été retenue par Kestio. Il s’agit ensuite de varier les formats pour apporter de la diversité et intéresser encore plus largement sa cible avec des formats longs (articles…), des témoignages, des infographies…

This is how a company, start-up or SME can initiate high-quality communication with its potential targets and then trigger sales conversations.

Eventually, digital tools will make it possible to check the effectiveness of what is produced, to ensure that what is produced is well aligned with the problems faced by web users. We'll be able to measure impact and audience by looking, for example, at interactions such as shares and comments, and then fine-tune if necessary.

To develop your company's communication tools, think Webinar! Webinars are a great way to showcase your company's activities. However, there are a few rules to follow: in this webinar, you'll learn how to organize a webinar that will generate more participants and leads.

Le Social Selling c’est donc une vitrine digitale visible par son audience directe et indirecte.

Pour créer et développer ces liens, il faut une approche long terme, structurée, active, organisée et tournée vers la cible et ses enjeux.

Et respecter les étapes-clés.

4 étapes incontournables pour un Social Selling gagnant

1 : Soigner son profil

Le profil c’est la vitrine qui expose la valeur ajoutée que l’on propose. Il mêle du contenu personnel (mais d’un point de vue professionnel) avec celui de l’entreprise (un exemple ici :www.linkedin.com/in/dominiqueseguin ).

L’objectif est d’être crédible et attractif : il est nécessaire de soigner cette présentation et de faire attention à la photo, à la présentation des expériences, des motivations. Le ton doit être sincère, le contenu complet et pertinent, authentique, chaque information devant être utile, intéressante afin de donner envie d’entrer en contact. Sur la forme il faut partir des besoins du visiteur. Par exemple préférer « J’aide les commerciaux à transformer les leads » à « je forme aux techniques de ventes », ou encore « j’aide les dirigeants à analyser leurs chiffres et prendre des décisions » sera plus percutant que « je suis contrôleur de gestion ».

Le profil, c’est une vitrine statique qui doit donner envie d’entrer dans la boutique et qui est tournée bénéfices pour son audience !

2 : Développer ses contacts

Deuxième étape : connecter tout l’écosystème, de près ou de loin (ce qui se fera d’autant plus facilement que le profil est de qualité) et déployer à partir de ce point central un maximum de connexions, comme des ronds dans l’eau.

Il faut chercher partout dans son réseau, ses relations professionnelles, amicales, ses partenaires, ses fournisseurs, ses rencontres etc. Dans l’absolu il n’y a pas de limites, hormis celles imposées par les plateformes des réseaux sociaux.

Développer ses contacts réclame une logique de quantité : à partir du moment ou on dispose d’un point d’entrée, on connecte.

3 : Passer du statique au dynamique

Il s’agit d’être actif, d’animer son réseau en adoptant une stratégie de contenu que l’on va diffuser auprès de son audience, soit en autoproduction soit en curation (comme relayer une information vue sur le web). Interagir sera aussi important, c’est-à-dire commenter et partager des contenus de votre propre réseau.

Pour tout ça mieux vaut avoir sinon une ligne éditoriale du moins un axe cohérent, comme par exemple partager des éléments intéressants qui vont aider vos contacts à atteindre leurs propres objectifs, grâce à votre production.

Le Social Selling est un outil de communication qui permet d’être présent dans l’esprit de vos contacts et des contacts de vos contacts sans avoir besoin d’être présent ou de gérer un planning d’appels téléphoniques. Soyez inspirant autant qu’inspiré, développez votre présence en tant que personne plutôt qu’en tant que marque.

4 : Entrer dans une logique de conversation commerciale

On peut alors passer au « to trust », entrer dans une logique « one to one ».

Après avoir créé le « to like » et le « to know », les conditions sont réunies pour générer des conversations commerciales tout en restant totalement et sincèrement décentré sur son interlocuteur c’est-à-dire, comme on l’a vu, en restant en mode intéressant plutôt qu’intéressé.

Passer à la vitesse supérieure !

Le Social Selling est un outil puissant qui permet de communiquer du « one to many » au « one to one », autrement dit qui rapproche respectivement le marketing et le commercial.

Knowing how to reposition your business can be vital in a difficult situation. Discover the different stages of this process in this webinar:

You'd think that Social Selling would be a natural part of the marketing and sales landscape... But it's far from obvious.

Indeed, the prevailing culture in many companies is at odds with the very philosophy of social networking. Discover the contradictory injunctions of Social Selling and the fundamental transformation required to use this formidable lever.

1. Social Selling & Social Media: the "open, globalized one-to-one

The infinite possibilities offered by "globalized" and "open" social networks are based on new rules of communication and on a certain number of "values" conveyed by these new media. Which values?

- First and foremost, "trust": every member can speak out publicly and widely share what they want with their contacts. The company, its organization and internal rules must be based on the same principle! Have confidence in the ability of individuals to take responsibility for their speech, and the exchanges they make on their own behalf and on behalf of the company. It's impossible to imagine motivating a sales person to speak to HIS network, while controlling what he's going to say!
- Secondly, individual initiative: on social networks, everyone is a medium, and anyone can take the initiative, both in terms of developing their network and speaking out. And this applies regardless of function or level of responsibility within the organization. As Orange, for example, does, it's best to offer employees a guide to good social media practices, giving them very concrete points of reference and practical advice, to enable them to make the most of social networks without damaging their image, or that of the company^.2Accompany rather than control, then.
- Finally, "social" sharing: social networks are based on a collaborative approach and the notion of "community". Asking a question, requesting a service/help on a subject, sharing an experience, getting in touch with people around the same topics of interest, gathering contributions around a cause... these are all powerful actions that social networks make possible immediately, but whose results are not always directly measurable in terms of immediate commercial results. Using social networks from a business perspective therefore requires the introduction of new indicators for measuring sales performance, which were previously the domain of marketing.

2. Social Selling and organization: "Hierarchy and silos" versus "initiative and collaboration".

And it has to be said that the organization that prevails in many companies today, and the way marketing and sales departments currently operate, is in fact quite radically opposed to these principles:

- 90% of companies are organized according to models defined in the 60s: a hierarchical organization, imbued with a logic based on "command and control": delimited responsibilities, actions to be carried out and means of control to ensure that these actions are carried out properly. In this context, it's hard for managers to imagine their sales reps speaking out autonomously on their own behalf and on behalf of the company... It's also hard for the sales reps themselves to take the initiative, without fearing negative feedback from their management or the marketing department on what they say on social networks!
- In this type of organization, marketing departments have often tended, until now, to apply their old operating models to the new social media: marketing initiates campaigns, produces content, and positions itself as guarantor of message integrity. Sales people are then "used" as mere "channels" or relays for disseminating the brand's messages, designed upstream. We know this doesn't work! When a sales rep's page relays word for word the same content as the Corporate page, his or her network quickly notices and simply turns away.
- Similarly, in sales management, the last two decades have seen the introduction of measurement processes designed to optimize overall performance and ensure that the activities carried out by each individual are in line with what has been defined. The new measurement indicators specific to social networks therefore come up against the measurement of sales process efficiency as it has been thought up until now... and this can bother some sales managers, especially when the salesperson devotes a significant amount of time to it: building his or her profile, making it attractive, developing his or her network, identifying and following up interesting prospects - all this takes time!

So it's urgent to change the paradigm, as Social Selling invites us to do! How can we do this? Why not start by trusting your sales people! For example, by implementing the necessary measures to train and support your teams; or by supporting positive individual initiatives and disseminating best practices internally... in short, by giving them the means to make social networks their own.

Sources:

: Source Invox
: Social Media Guidelines, Orange, http://www.orange.com/sirius/smg/FR_Guides_Medias_Sociaux.pdf

Voici donc le second article à destination des startupers né de cette jeune collaboration, proposé cette fois-ci par Fabien COMTET – fondateur et dirigeant de KESTIO – sur le thème “5 conseils de commerciaux pour vendre votre projet”.

Les commerciaux chevronnés le savent mieux que quiconque : pour vendre votre projet (ou vos produits et services) et vous différencier face à vos concurrents, vous devez activer le “cerveau droit” de vos interlocuteurs (siège des émotions) plutôt que le gauche (le cerveau dit “rationnel”). Le corollaire, c’est que vous devez être à l’écoute de leurs attentes et de leur ressenti, comprendre ce qui fait écho chez vos prospects, clients ou partenaires potentiels… et établir rapidement une relation de collaboration avec eux.

Exit l’argumentaire produit, donc, et place à l’écoute active et à la co-construction !

Voici les 5 astuces à retenir pour mieux vendre vos projets de l’article ” 5 astuces inspirées des (bons) commerciaux pour vendre son projet “ publié sur Les Echos Start :

1.   Dépassez la conviction, et suscitez l’émotion
2.   Arrêtez de parler : questionnez et écoutez
3.   Adaptez le ton à votre interlocuteur
4.   Démarquez-vous pour retenir l’attention
5.   Misez sur la co-construction

Read other related articles published on our blog:

Enfin, pour aller plus loin sur le sujet de la performance commerciale, téléchargez notre livre blanc “Homos Sapiens Commercialis” dédié aux méthodes commerciales et aux opportunités à l’ère du Digital :

So how do you go about it?

Why not simply take a step back and take a fresh look at your sales activity? In the current context, with the social tools available, do all sales reps have to be out in the field? Aren't the costs of visits prohibitive? Can't we make the strategic choice of a sedentary sales force? To ask the question is to answer it. A choice already made by many sales managers. But the real question is "how?

In this orientation, we're not talking about an off-shore call center or an unskilled hotline. We're talking about real, experienced salespeople, trained in distance selling techniquesWe're not talking about an off-shore call center or an unskilled hotline.

We're talking about men and women with solid experience in the field, bringing real added value, understanding customer needs, providing answers and making a difference.

There are, of course, many questions to be answered upstream, as it involves not only creating a new team, with different methods, but also redefining the division of roles between mobile and sedentary salespeople, and even with the marketing team:

- Do sedentary sales representatives work in support of field sales representatives or independently?
- Are they focused on the prospect base or the customer base?
- Do they only do account follow-up or also sales?
- Are current tools up to the task?
- How to size the team?
- How to position it?
- The manager?...

To prepare the ground and provide pragmatic answers to all these questions, we support sales managers in this upstream definition and construction phase. Firstly, to estimate the ROI of such a project, then to define its operational dimensions and, in some cases, to ensure its implementation.

So, if the equation seems complex to you, don't hesitate to reconsider your certainties about salespeople: when they're in the office, they can be extremely profitable!

To find out more about the use of specialized tools, discover this webinar on optimizing the return on your commercial assets:

Are you fed up with your salespeople ignoring the relational techniques essential to their success?

To help you raise your teams' awareness of good interpersonal practices, the importance of active listening and effective questioning techniques, we've created this infographic for you, which presents "The 6 deadly sins of listening in a sales meeting", and provides tips on how to remedy them!

Distribute it to your sales teams, display it by the coffee machine and apply it without moderation!

Did you find this article useful? Please share it! It's the best way to thank us 🙂

Is optimization your watchword? Then find out in this webinar how to maximize your sales force's performance by saving them 50% of their time:

KESTIO is a consulting and training company specializing in Sales Performance and Customer Experience.

For over 10 years, we have been helping companies and their managers - from SMEs to major corporations - to improve their profitability by activating all the levers of customer acquisition and loyalty.

Other articles you may be interested in:

Indeed, with millions of registered members (LinkedIn announced it had passed the 11 million member mark in France in early 2016[i], overtaking Viadeo), it's possible to find your targets and engage with them. How do you go about prospecting on social networks? Do you have a strategy? If you're a sales manager, how do you guide your teams in using this platform? A structured approach is essential for successful digital prospecting.
In this article (the 1st episode in our series on social selling), discover some of the keys to turning a simple contact into a future customer .

1- To prospect with LinkedIn, start by targeting your contacts and stop the "network race".

It's an unfortunate fact of life that too many sales reps are still adding people they don't know to Linkedin. What do you hope to achieve by doing this? The law of numbers! Out of every 100 people added, one of them will one day do business with us! Unfortunately, it doesn't really work that way. Worse still, frantically adding contacts and racing to see who can "network the most" weakens your image with your contacts. A sales rep from an unknown company with 5,000 contacts? These are all signs of heavy prospecting and the promise of unwanted advertising messages. We're here to help!

Adding contacts on the fly, or conducting a basic search and adding people who seem relevant to you in a few seconds, or "who have a good head", is not a strategy. What happens after this untargeted addition? Usually nothing. If you send an advertising message right away, nothing either. In reality, we're on the verge of a SPAM approach, the opposite of an interesting conversational approach. In fact,approving a contact request does not imply an immediate need for a product or service. Some people are looking for help, others are on the lookout, and some are in an advanced purchasing process.

To send the right message from the outset, you need to find a communication angle that initiates the relationship and helps contacts build their thinking, regardless of their level of knowledge of your company. You need to accompany them whatever stage of their research they're at, without rushing them.

It'snot about having one more contact, it's about having one more reader who sees you as an asset to their thinking, one more person to whom you can provide an answer.

In practice :

- You don't connect to social networks at random. Whenever possible, it's best to use a common contact to make the connection;
- Always write a message explaining why you want to be put in touch with someone. Nothing is worse than an unmotivated request that has no basis in fact;

2- Get approval for a contact request on LinkedIn

As we've just seen, you can connect via a shared contact, who introduces you to someone, or choose to contact another user directly. In all cases, use the InMail function, i.e. LinkedIn's internal messages.

In practice :

- "Pitch your request so that the person you're talking to sees the advantage of accepting it;
- Ask yourself the right questions before writing a message: what problems this person may be experiencing, what could help them produce more value for their own customers, help them in their day-to-day life...

Contact request accepted? The job's not over yet. On the contrary! Once you've "connected" via your network or InMail, the last thing you want to do is contact the newly added person in an intrusive way.

Quietly build your relationship by helping your new contact and providing value, focused on their objectives, not yours.

Suggest a white paper, a customer testimonial, something relevant to read. This is where marketing managers have a key role to play alongside sales, providing well thought-out communication elements to ensure that contacts gleaned from LinkedIn enter the engagement funnel in the best possible way.

Build your credibility, your legitimacy, and be perceived as an expert. Be patient. This is often a long-term approach, not the push approach used in traditional outbound prospecting, which aims to land an appointment in a matter of minutes. A well-selected LinkedIn contact can bring you business weeks or months after the first exchange.

And remember: it's much better to have a few contacts with a good conversion rate thanks to the construction of a quality online conversation, than to issue invitations by the dozen, which will not produce any results!

Discover the following episodes of our social selling series on this blog, which will teach you :

- What LinkedIn groups are (really) for and how to run your own
- How to develop an "interesting, not interested" sales approach and distribute quality content tailored to your targets
- How to develop and animate an engaged community around your brand's values

To find out more and learn more about the concept of social selling, and the different tools available for communication, you can watch this webinar:

KESTIO regularly trains the sales teams of many companies in digital prospecting (social selling), and in particular in the use of LinkedIn, which is the social network preferred by company directors and therefore the most suitable for BtoB prospecting.

Read our previous articles on this topic:

[i] http://www.journaldunet.com/ebusiness/le-net/1172473-linkedin-atteint-11-millions-de-membres-en-france/