Using LinkedIn to Supercharge Your Sales Prospecting

Published: February 9, 2017
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  1. Tweak your profile page:
    There are three key elements of your profile that you should focus on to improve your chances of sales success:

    • Your headline – make your headline a value proposition, rather than a job title (as is the LinkedIn default). Focus on how you help your clients and bring value to them. If you sell IT training courses you might say, ‘I help organizations develop their staff to work more efficiently’. Make sure what you write is attention grabbing and solves one of the typical problems your clients face.
    • Your current job description – rather than listing tasks that you do, think of your job description as a sales pitch. Focus on how you and the organization your work for can add value to prospective clients.

    Links – add links to your organization’s website and social media media accounts (including the LinkedIn page). Make it easy for people to follow you – it will help keep you in their minds.

  2. View other people’s profile pages:
    What do you do when you receive a notification that someone who you don’t know views your LinkedIn profile? If you’re like most people you take a look at their profile page to see who they are, what they do and how you’re connected. If someone looks are your profile page it’s a good excuse to send a connection request.Alternatively, use LinkedIn’s search field at the top of your profile page to view other people’s profiles in your target area. This can be a very powerful tool, especially if your profile is optimized (see ‘tweak your profile page’ above), as a certain proportion will always look back. If they do this then you have an opportunity to send a connection request and start building a relationship with new prospects who you might be able to convert into clients at a later date.
  3. Add you existing clients to your network:
    If you have your clients in your network, it makes it easier to ask for a referral to another prospect when the time comes. If you have a list of prospects, look at their LinkedIn profiles and see whether you share any connections with your current clients. If you do then you have an opportunity to ask for a referral.Also, don’t forget that clients don’t stay at the same organization forever. When they move you have another new opportunity to sell to them.
  4. Turn cold calls into warm calls
    LinkedIn is filled with information that you can use to have much more productive and effective telephone conversations with your prospects. Just the fact of mentioning that you’ve looked at their LinkedIn profile can help break the ice and show your prospect that you’re serious.Get your detective hat on and start gathering useful information that could help you build up a profile about who your prospects are and what challenges they face. Keep an eye out for changes in profile, status updates, connections, anything you have in common or comments they’ve contributed to a group.
  5. Get search savvy
    LinkedIn has a powerful search facility located at the top of your profile page. With the advanced search (click on ‘advanced’ next to the main search field) you can find people by title, company, location or keyword. If you have a paid account and you can also add extra filters e.g. company size and seniority level. By using the different filters you can identify key prospects quickly and easily – freeing up your time to work on other tasks.From the results page you can save your search (look at the top right-hand corner of the page) and even set up weekly email reports listing anyone new who matches what you’re looking for – taking the hard work out of prospecting and giving you useful leads straight into your inbox.
  6. Follow company LinkedIn pages
    Click on ‘interests’ at the top of your prolife page and select ‘companies’. This will allow you to choose companies to follow. Focus on following the pages of your prospects and clients. Keep an eye out for people leaving, people joining or any big announcements they make. These could all present an opportunity for you to sell.

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