Sales prospecting is a must for B2B companies if they are to create a steady revenue over time. It is not just used to kickstart sales. Adopting the right prospecting strategy goes a long way toward improving conversion and close rates. A study found that compared to sellers who don’t prospect at all or are low performers in prospecting, top performers generate nearly 3X more sales meetings.

Prospecting is basically a way to identify, qualify, contact, and engage potential buyers who are a good fit for your business or product. While prospecting is not the easiest of all sales tasks, you can attain great success by using the best practices and right techniques.

Let’s take a look at some of the top actionable ways to prospect better.

#1 Don’t stick to just one type of B2B prospect data

Successful sales prospecting requires you to have a complete view of your prospects. If you only use firmographic data to prospect, you’d be losing out on the opportunity to benefit from a lot of other key insights. For example, you can add intent data to your prospecting strategy to identify which prospects are ready to buy or searching for a product your company offers.

With psychographic data, you can create a psychographic profile of your prospects. You can also understand their personality traits, interests, attitudes, values, and opinions. All of this data is highly useful to tailor prospecting campaigns to achieve better results.

Technographic data is another powerful tool used in prospecting. It allows you to engage prospects based on their technology adoption behaviours and propensity to purchase a particular type of technology. It also enables you to know whether or not prospects are using a competitor’s technology product.

Other data types like demographic, location-based, and behavioural are also quite effective in strengthening your prospecting efforts.

#2 Enrich your contact database and add new contact data

Did you know? $1 is enough to prevent a duplicate record. However, if you leave it untreated, it will cost you $100. Before you start prospecting, be sure to maintain a contact database that is regularly cleaned, updated, and verified. This will not only help you save prospecting time but also avoid unnecessary data-related expenses.

Using data enrichment or implementing a data integrity management program is a proven way to keep your database enriched and healthy. Besides, ensure that you keep adding new contacts to your database or refresh your contact lists. Partnering with a leading B2B sales intelligence provider like SalesIntel is a great way to achieve this goal.

With SalesIntel, you can get 95% accurate prospect contact data, which is reverified every 90 days. Known as an affordable ZoomInfo alternative, it can give you access to the highest number of human-verified mobile numbers in the industry.

#3 Use LinkedIn and other prospecting tools to reach prospects

LinkedIn is one of the best prospecting intelligence tools to use. Statistics show that 50% of buyers turn to LinkedIn when making B2B purchasing decisions. Furthermore, salespeople having a strong social selling index on LinkedIn get 45% more sales opportunities compared to those who don’t.

With advanced LinkedIn search filters, you can find prospects from specific industries, locations, or with specific job titles. Additionally, you can join groups, tag prospects in your posts, publish articles, send InMail, or comment to engage prospects. Not to forget, Sales Navigator helps identify, target, and capture key insights on relevant accounts and contacts.

If you’re unable to view or export certain contact information of prospects on LinkedIn, use an additional prospecting intelligence tool. There are several free Chrome extensions available that can reveal the contact data of prospects through LinkedIn and even company websites. Most importantly, they allow you to export the revealed prospect contact data to your CRM.

#4 Use direct mail or gifts to stand out from the competition

It’s quite a challenge to get in front of high-value prospects when they receive hundreds of emails, calls, and social messages from multiple businesses. Solely relying on digital channels may not be the best approach to prospecting. In addition to digital prospecting, try using direct mail prospecting or gifting to introduce your company, develop a human connection, and stay top of mind with prospects.

Direct mail is more personal compared to online interactions, according to 70% of consumers. Furthermore, 66% of people have bought a product because of direct mail. With direct mail, you can also surprise prospects with a handwritten note or gift card to create a memorable experience. Moreover, direct mail allows you to build credibility and trust with prospects and uniquely present your product as an applicable solution to their problem.

#5 Request referrals and reach out to former customers

Asking for referrals is a feasible way to ensure a continuous flow of prospects and achieve low-friction sales if you do it right. Some B2B companies prefer doing business with a brand that’s referred by someone they trust. They do this to speed up and add a level of security to their buying decisions. And it’s one of the reasons why requesting referrals from satisfied customers works well for prospecting.

Besides referrals, don’t forget to explore prospecting opportunities with your former customers. It becomes easy to prospect when the contact or company you’re targeting is already familiar with your brand or product.

Before contacting former customers, make sure you’ve done your groundwork. Find out why former customers decided to choose your competitor. Know if your product or brand has evolved to meet their needs now. Plan how you can attract them or spark an interest in them again.

A Final Word

There are several ways to prospect. However, not all of them yield the expected results. Nevertheless, with the five actionable tips explained here, you can be sure of taking your prospecting campaigns to the next level.

Before you start to prospect, know that personalization plays a key role in effectively attracting and engaging a target audience. Statistics reveal that 80% of people are more inclined to buy from a brand that offers tailored experiences.

Lastly, create an accurate buyer persona or ideal customer profile to know exactly which prospects to go after. This will also help you avoid investing your prospecting time, efforts, and resources in pursuing less valuable prospects.