Our world and our lives are hardly imaginable without social media and social networks such as LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp and Xing. We often use them for several hours a day, be it professionally or privately.
In connection with social media, social networks and marketing, the term “social selling” appears again and again. But what is social selling? Is it social media marketing? A sales strategy?
Sales Strategy – Yes, in a way.
Social Media Marketing – No.
Social selling isn’t about endlessly expanding your mailing list or bombarding strangers with unsolicited tweets, ads, or private messages.
By no means! Nobody enjoys advertising that they haven’t asked for.
It is rather about establishing business contacts and customer relationships on social networks and maintaining them. It’s about gaining trustworthiness as a business on social media and achieving it in a natural way by interacting with customers / potential customers by commenting, liking and sharing their posts. Of course, it is therefore also important for a company to build up a good image and create a professional appearance (complete, appealing and convincing profile) on social media.
Make a good first impression. Create high-quality content that interests the readers of your target group and offers them added value. Because the goal of a good social selling strategy is to expand your network and generate your own, high-quality leads. In the best-case scenario, this will result in satisfied customers.
To achieve this goal, you must first and foremost listen! Listen carefully, follow conversations, find leads like PainPoints or BuySignals within them. This gives you the possibility to enter a conversation at exactly the right time to present suitable solutions.
A lot can be accomplished with social selling and if done right, it can even replace the dreaded ColdCalls.
Have you already had experience with social selling?
Image credit: Header- and Featured image Biljana Jovanovic on Pixabay
