B2B prospecting requires a B2B prospecting tool, or many! Catering to your audience takes methodical strategies and tips, simply because you cannot cater to businesses the same way you would to consumers. Using these 8 B2B prospecting methods, you are sure to notice a difference in your prospecting process!
What Is B2B Prospecting?
B2B prospecting is the process of identifying potential buyers for your product or service. B2B prospecting is between a business and another business, in which communication can take place through online marketing, cold calling, email campaigns, and more.
Difference Between Leads and Prospects
Prospecting vs Lead generation: is there a difference?
Absolutely, there is a difference. Simply put, a lead is not qualified, but a prospect is qualified. Once a lead has been converted into a prospect, they will be implemented into the sales cycle in hopes of making them a customer.
B2B Prospecting Methods
While we have a list of 8 wonderful and effective B2B prospecting methods, not every single one will be necessary or beneficial for your company. Using your understanding of your company’s target audience and your company's goals, you can determine the best ones to use.
Revisit Your Ideal Customer Profiles
If you don’t have a firm grasp on who the ideal customer is, what their needs are, etc., you will want to revisit that. By looking at current customers, analyzing any trends you see within your customer base, and tracking similarities in your customers will help in determining the ideal customer profile.
Cold Call
You might be questioning if or why cold calling works, but the data doesn’t lie. Cold calling is still a highly effective way of prospecting. Studies show that over 57% of C-level B2B buyers prefer to be contacted over the phone.
In business, it is always about building relationships and creating partnerships that benefit both parties. It would make sense why speaking with a live agent is preferred as opposed to an email or an online ad.
Another benefit of cold calling is the ability to answer any questions they might have or resolve any concerns they might have. Cold calling has and will continue to serve as a great opportunity to be personable, hear the prospect's needs, and offer the prospect a solution.
Send Emails
Email campaigns also serve a purpose in B2B prospecting. Not only is this a great way to quickly notify leads of your products, but it is a great way to contact many leads at any given time. The beauty of email campaigns is the time and effort saved.
Engage on Social Media
A shocking, or not so shocking, 91.9% of USA companies use social media. Social media is a necessity in the modern USA, therefore, engaging on social media is highly beneficial to you. This can look like paid promotions, following potential prospects on their pages, daily posts about the deals you offer, etc. Regardless of however you choose to engage on social media, it's important that you do it.
Connect on Quora
Quora, for those of you who don’t know, is a question-answer website. Although you may very well have a Q&A on your website, there are still industry questions that your customer might have. By interacting on websites like Quora and answering industry questions, potential customers will have more trust in your company's ability to meet their needs. Alternatively, if you don’t answer these leading questions, the competitor will, resulting in loss of sales.
Do LinkedIn Outreach
LinkedIn, although it is similar to social media, is its own category. LinkedIn is strictly businesses and business professionals, therefore, different marketing strategies are necessary.
Connecting with potential prospects via LinkedIn not only gives you insight into the business, but it will also lead to more potential prospect discoveries through their connections. Users expect to make connections on this platform, and better yet, they expect to be contacted by other users or businesses. It makes for an easy way to market to many!
Ask for Referrals
By far the simplest and most old-fashioned way of prospecting, but still a prospecting favorite. Asking for referrals isn’t guaranteed to produce a prospect, however, the likelihood that your customer knows someone else in the industry needing similar services is high. This is especially true for B2B prospecting, where the customer needs to be informed about the industry and likely has partnerships within the industry too.
The best part about referrals is they are little to no cost. If you are already on the phone with a customer, what will another 15 seconds on the phone cost you to ask?
Don’t Forget Inbound B2B Prospecting
Yes, you can prospect from within by using webinars, white papers, blogging, etc. According to the Search Engine Journal, over 25% of people click the first Google search result. The purpose of inbound prospecting is to be at the forefront of the competitors online. You want your customers to search for a solution or ask questions and have your blog be the first thing they see.
B2B Prospecting Tools
There are tools for everything nowadays and the same is true for prospecting. By using the top predictive dialers in the industry, you will be able to handle calls quickly, set follow-up appointments, set the lead status and much more!
B2B Prospecting Lists
Eliminate the need to find leads and get business lists instead. Getting a targeted business list from a trusted lead broker, so you can start calling!
