1) How to generate leads in B2B sales
Trying to generate leads in B2B sales can be tough, when it comes to how to generate leads in digital marketing – especially if you’re not confident about your abilities using the phone. It really doesn’t help that despite being one of the most important skills in business, telemarketing lead generation, in other words, using a telephone to connect with new buyers, is widely considered the most disliked activity in business.
The introduction of technology to the telemarketing toolbox certainly didn’t help in the 1990s when speed diallers and robotic calls became a must-have for companies who favoured quantity over quality in the way their brand reach performed. We’ve learned a lot since those days. Not least that companies like Blue Donkey, who’ve always maintained a staunchness for intelligent calling, have sustained and grown.
Taking a fiercely determined stand for quality, individualised calls, that are built around the needs of the buyer, rather than the need to sell, is still the only enduring way to generate leads in B2B sales
2) Regulation
Regulation – how to generate leads in sales, regulation; like CTPS, TPS, and GDPR has helped regulate and control the behaviours of operators who failed to take customer experience and the reputation of whole industries into account when attempting how to generate leads in B2B sales. The face of financial services and telemarketing particularly has changed forever. Such organisations have, by and large, been eradicated.
Fortunately, once again we’re returning to a place where the phone is just a phone. It’s a good guy. It’s a communication device, and only as good or bad as the skills and intentions of the companies and people using it. To generate leads in B2B sales these days, you have to know your products, your market, and be able to get under the skin of buyers well enough to really understand what they need from their supply partner.
3) So – How to generate leads in B2B sales? Differentiate!
Throughout a call, you should be building a compelling case for your business when building a B2B sales leads database. It’s not enough to ‘align’ with what buyers in your market normally need. These days, to generate leads in B2B sales, especially those that go on to become high spending, committed client relationships, you have to connect – pretty much from the get-go. That means asking the right open questions, listening really attentively to the things your buyer indicates they need, prefer, or desire.
That’s not always evident from their words, sometimes the really big stuff is delivered unwittingly, and you have to be sensitive enough to pick these flags up, confirm what you think, and show them how your product is different to all the noise in the market. Whatever the ultimate objective of a call, one basic rule applies: the more informative and intelligent your discussions are, the more you’ll increase your chance of winning clients confidence, and their business.
Knowing your strengths, differentiators and USPs all count towards creating a mosaic of features and benefits, so your calls are loaded with a narrative that peppers the buyer with great reasons to engage.
4) No one wants to be in a funnel
While the temptation might be to try and throw all this rich information at every potential buyer on every call, that’s not helpful. To learn how to generate leads in B2B sales that become game changers for your business, who spend more, provide you with interesting work, and value your contribution to their business, you’ll need to hand-pick precious data from the mass of prospects available.
You’ll impress a buyer if it’s clear you’ve targeted them for a reason, and the call they receive sounds and feels like the only call you made. In fact, it IS the only call you had with them, so work it. A call will resonate well, and capture attention when it feels and sounds unique.
Seeing a person in your mind’s eye will help. So will sitting up straight, working away from distraction, and remembering to breathe! When people are nervous, they often don’t take enough breaths, which is unlikely to improve the quality of your call or your thinking.
