With the whole world going digital, selling has changed dramatically. Fewer in-person meetings, conferences, and trade shows mean sales teams are pivoting to digitally driven models.
What's the #1 way selling has changed? Simply put, sales teams need more touches. Without those face-to-face opportunities, they need to get creative and persistent about authentic touchpoints that happen before engagement and a close.
Historically, we have noted it takes between eight and 10 touches before a prospect is ready to engage with your pitch. Now, in this more digital era, prospects are taking their time to research and decide if your service is the right fit for them, for now.
What Do Sales Teams Need For Digital Sales?
We believe sales teams need four things to be successful in the digital sales arena: branded collateral, narrative tools, integrated outreach campaigns, and referral communication.
Branded Collateral
Always a valuable marketing deliverable, sales teams are requesting even more marketing collateral to visually help them close deals. This includes documents as well as videos. Sales teams are telling us they need visually branded collateral to paint a picture for their prospects. These pieces can do the work for them when they aren’t there physically to sell, work a boardroom, or network in the same kind of way.
Narrative Tools
Sales teams need digital marketing tools that can float up through companies’ communication channels to leadership and decision-makers, because without in-person meetings, they don’t have the opportunity to sit across from these people. These tools need to communicate company values, high-touch service, and overall excellence. And they need to be thorough enough to do the talking when sales teams can’t be there.
Integrated Outreach Campaigns
We are also seeing a lot more email outreach, with increased number of touches. You have to get in front of your prospects in a genuine way. Right now, people are at their computers more than ever. We’re seeing email campaigns, integrated with targeted paid ads, being used to stay top-of-mind with prospects—that one-time outreach isn’t going to cut it. Prospects have to keep seeing your company, again and again. This is especially true if it's a high-dollar sale that requires a lot of trust building.
Referral Communication
Lastly, we're seeing a lot more referral partner outreach. Referral partners have always been a valuable asset for any service-based organization. But staying top-of-mind with your referral partners is especially key in a pandemic, when you can’t grab lunch or drink. We are seeing increased communication with referral networks and creative ways being used to stay in touch with them.
Authenticity Matters Above All In Digital Marketing
The key to all of this isn’t about hitting the right number of touches; it’s hitting the numbers in a genuine and authentic way. This is much easier said than done. You’ll miss touches two through 13 if touch one sounds like a car salesman and is a turnoff. The prospect or referral partner will just see your outreach as distasteful. Keep it classy.
If you have any questions about trends we’re seeing in this hyper-digital COVID world, don’t hesitate to reach out. We’re happy to chat to help you build up your 2021 pipeline.
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