Prospecting is the initial stage of any outbound sales process.

It’s your job to recognise probable customers who have shown an interest in your products or services (prospects), before delivering an array of highly-targeted communications to further attract, convince and convert them into paying clients.

Your engagements must be personalized to succeed.

“We know that personalization can deliver 5 to 8 times the ROI on marketing spend, while lifting sales by 10% or more…”
(Source)

Remember: We are bombarded by constant distractions and promotions each and every day. You need to rise above this noise to be first in mind.

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Consider:

• Their unique pain points
• company structure
• Decision makers
• Competitor wins
• Growth / decline

While contacting them at:

• The right time
• Via the most effective channels
• On their preferred devices

Your B2B prospects should be treated no differently than an exemplary consumer brand would gracefully cater for their potential customers and individual buyer journeys.

Easier said than done when you’re targeting companies with tens, hundreds or even thousands of employees, right?

Fear not. I’m going to unveil 3 slick methods to answer your question: Exactly how to personalize your B2B prospecting?

Method #1: Take Advantage Of Sales Intelligence

Firmographic data is your first step to classifying, prioritising and personalizing your communications to prospects.

You need to be aware of everything that’s happened, due to happen, and happening right now in your prospects’ organizations.

“75% of B2B professionals said that accurate and complete data is critical for achieving their goals.”
(Source )

But how do you obtain this data?

Sales Intelligence software is your best bet for a completely automated approach.

Such tools allow you to scale the entire research process — saving your sales managers the pain of investigating, gathering and assessing company information themselves. It’s a labour-intensive job, so using robust software that intelligently updates in real-time (using AI) is a no-brainer.

This means your people can focus more on the activities that are directly driving your bottom-line.

Furthermore, manual firmographic research is so cumbersome; you may actually miss sales opportunities altogether…to your competition!

(Source)

Using Sales Intelligence, your salespeople are:

• Better informed
• Well-prepared
• NEVER annoying

Skilfully apply Sales Intelligence and you can kiss goodbye to awkward phone calls where there is ZERO connection, ZERO knowledge of the prospect’s company and ZERO chance of winning them as a new client!

Method #2: Utilise Marketing Automation

So, now you know how to easily discover which of your prospects are hot to trot (and why)…

Now you need to know how to scale your sales team’s personalized communications.

Again, software is your ally.

“74% using Marketing Automation said the technology’s ability to save them time was its largest benefit.”
(Source)

In sync with your Sales Intelligence software, here are two more awesome tools for you to use in your quest for a fully-automated sales process (also very helpful when deploying (ABM) Account Based Marketing):

SendBloom: Creative personalization for your outbound communication

This is an email segmentation and personalization tool originally built for Salesforce and Gmail users.

It removes the burden of repeated prospecting by automating the process, including personalization on a 1-to-1 level. You can 100% tailor your messaging based on prospect data and their historical engagement.

No matter your total number of target accounts, you can quickly see how software transforms your communication — whether you are ABM’ing to cold potentials or prospecting to develop those already interested in your offerings:

(Source)

Reply.io: Enabling 1:1 conversations at scale

This tool is able to create a seamless connection with your CRM.

Not only does it offer all of the above SendBloom features, it includes more in-depth email analytics and A/B tests to identify best-performing campaigns.

Additionally, you are able to connect with your contacts, prospects and customers on the phone directly through the tool via VoIP. This makes international calling a breeze without all the typical complications and hurdles we experience!

Hurdles that can quickly dissuade prospects.

BONUS: Crystal is another incredible tool that holds vast amounts of data to guide you toward better communication with individuals, based on their unique personalities!

Now, once prospects are nicely progressing in your sales funnel; you need to encourage them in the right direction (down to the bottom) using even more personalization…

Method #3: Nurture Your Prospects (The Right Way)

Closely intertwined with Marketing Automation, a process known as Lead Nurturing involves identifying (and encouraging) those who are most likely to buy at any given time.

It works by automating the process of scoring your leads and prospects based on their behaviour in relation to your website and communications.

Of course, this is incredibly personal when delivered correctly…

There is one caveat: Lead Nurturing is only as good as its scoring system — which assesses and alerts you of red-hot, sales-ready individuals.

Spend enough time creating a lead scoring matrix and you’re onto a winner!

You will soon turn leads into prospects — and prospects into sales.

Just because prospects may not click on all your links or buy straight away, this isn’t to say they aren’t still keen. Be the first in mind and build a relationship. It’s a journey, not a sprint.

To effectively nurture your prospects, you need to ideally combine your outbound emails with personalised content and smart CTAs (call-to-actions), which dynamically alter depending on their stage in your sales funnel.

Clever, huh?

Remember to provide prospects with highly-relevant content (likely in this order):

• Blog posts
• eBooks
• Whitepapers
• Webinars
• Case studies
• Demos
• Free trials

All driven by personalised landing pages!

Happy prospecting…
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