Social Selling - LinkedIn - Storytelling

1. Michael Kausch
22th of June 2016
Social Selling
Do the hot new thing
and forget cold calls

2. 01
What is social selling?
03
LinkedIn as a social selling
platform
05
Challenges facing
social sellers
02
Why social selling?
04
A social selling campaign
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3. 01
What is social selling?
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4. “Social selling is a sales strategy
using the social media
marketing mantra of directly
connecting with potential
customers and partners, their
expressed needs and interests.
It focuses on sustainable
customer relationships, not
quick one-off purchases.”
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What is social selling?
Definition

5. Basics of social selling
Social media CRM
Content marketing
Functions of social selling
Lead generation
Cross selling
Avoiding cold calls
B2B and B2C
The more complex and high-end
a product, the more relevant
social selling becomes
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How does social
selling work?
Lead identification
Lead monitoring
Content creation
Lead contacting
Relation management

6. 02
Why social selling?
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7. In an age of informational overload
and increasing sales pressure,
potential customers actively seek to
avoid offers for dialogue.
Cold calling gets harder.
Needs are less often clearly defined,
but developed during communication.
Sales success depends increasingly on
relationships of trust, which means
establishing sustainable customer
relationships.
In the age of referral marketing,
open dialogue has to start with
personal lead generation
for 1-to-1-relations.
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Why use social selling?

8. Titelmasterformat durch
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We are being barraged by more and
more branded messages.
? brands daily
Up to ? acts of
communication per day
We become over-saturated.
We hate and avoid advertisements.
We react poorly to arrogance,
ignorance and bad service.
We react emotionally.
We place our trust in peer groups.
We are online and socially networked.
We are „Customer 2.0“
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The foundation:
referral marketing
1,000
10,000

9. Internet and social media are
becoming dominant sources of
information.
Everybody is talking to each other,
all the time and everywhere.!
Around 50 percent rely on personal
recommendations when making
purchasing decisions.
This is why „Experience“ and
„Stories“ are playing such a large
role today.
All this is true for B2B as well.
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The foundation:
storytelling
Tell me a fact
and I’ll learn.
Tell me a truth
and I’ll believe.
But tell me a
story and it will
live in my heart
forever.

10. Our communication structures itself
according to the media
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The „good old days “
By the fireside
Modern, pre-internet
Broadcasting
Web 1.0
The websites
Web 2.0
Social media

11. From customer communication to customer experience
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Customer
communication
Customer
satisfaction
Customer
lifecycle
Customer
experience

12. 03
LinkedIn
as a social selling platform
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13. Global: 408 million members
Europe: 102 million members
Germany: 5.280 million
Switzerland: 1.845 million
Austria: 0.776 million
UK: 21 million
France: 11 million
USA: 117 million
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LinkedIn is the leading
global business network

14. Germany
LinkedIn: 5.3 million
Xing: 8.2 million
Switzerland
LinkedIn: 1.8 million
Xing: 0.7 million
Austria
LinkedIn: 0.8 million
Xing: 0.7 million
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LinkedIn is firmly established
alongside XING in DACH

15. LinkedIn usage leads in 26 out
of 30 enterprises
Exceptions:
Commerzbank
Daimler
Deutsche Post
Fresenius
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LinkedIn dominates among
large German corporations

16. Owners: 186 thousand
Vice presidents: 155 thousand
Executive board: 69 thousand
Directors: 129 thousand
----------------------------------
All leadership positions: 1.46
million
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LinkedIn dominates among
German CxO-level

17. LinkedIn is integrated into
numerous independent tools
Slideshare
Hootsuite
Outlook
Soon: Microsoft Dynamics (?)
Superior social selling
Sales Navigator
Pulse
Multilingual personal and
company profiles
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LinkedIn has the better
social selling tools

18. Recruiting and employer branding
(Employee) branding
Advertisement (targeting)
Corporate publishing (incl. blog)
Lead generation and -nurturing
Lead identification
Lead generation
Opinion leader identification
1:1-communication with
Leads
Customers
Partners
Opinion leaders
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LinkedIn is a
multifunctional tool

19. Pull Communications
Employee profiles
Multi-lingual company profiles
Showcase pages
Look up personal profiles
Request referrals
Publish Pulse articles
Push Communications
Groups: dialogue oriented
Post news to specific target
audiences
No edge rank
LinkedIn campaigns
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Options in lead
management

20. 04
A social selling campaign
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21. Lead identification
Lead generation
Opinion leader identification
1:1 communication with
Leads
Customers
Partners
Opinion leaders
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Goals of a social selling
campaign

22. Business or casual
Focused profile picture in front
of a neutral or out-of-focus
background
Smiling won‘t hurt
Head tilted to the left (center
screen)
Looking at camera or imaginary
communication partner
Optional: vivid gesture
Optional: truncated
Steer clear of green background
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Step 1: Optimize personal
portraits

23. Header image
Create multi-lingual profile
Create Pulse entries
Add work examples (ideally:
Slideshare)
Generate attention with private
interests
Include contact data and
publications
Create team projects
Confirm skills and expertise, get
acknowledged.
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Step 2: optimize personal
profile pages

24. Search options depend on account
type
Name
Keywords
Company
Location
---------------------------------------
Industry
Experience
Function
Carrier level
Interests
Company size
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Step 3: find potential leads

25. Premium search:
Search incl. CRM
Create accounts for target
enterprises
Create lead profile for target
contact
Benefit from lead
recommendations
Evaluate news and updates for
triggering contact
Use new job notifications
Analyze profile visitors
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Searching with Sales
Navigator

26. Keep track of LinkedIn activity
of leads or their companies
For identifying the topics
relevant to target audiences
For determining the best
moment for contacting
Tools:
Top updates on „home page“
Top accounts on HP
Social index
Last viewed
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Step 4: Monitoring

27. Based on potential leads‘
researched topics
Platforms:
Own LinkedIn updates
Own LinkedIn Pulse entries
Own Slideshare publications
Company profile and updates
Showcase pages
External links
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Step 5: Publish original
content

28. Central tool for initial lead
contact
News to non-contacts
Number of inMails depending
on accounts
Refer to original content
“I liked your update about xy. This
might be of interest to you: I myself
published this about the issue…”
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Step 6: contact through
InMail

29. Pulse = the LinkedIn blog system
Option 1
Publish long-form entries through
profile page
Target audiences
Own contacts
Pulse topic subscribers
Option 2
Using the company page as a
publication platform
Integrate InShare Widget in website
Apply for publisher status in LinkedIn
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Tool 1: LinkedIn Pulse

30. Slideshare is LinkedIn‘s publishing
plattform
Powerpoint files
Pdf files
Video files
Integration
In LinkedIn profile
In Pulse entries
In websites and blogs
Advantages
High Google visibility
Native search
High LinkedIn visibility
Integrated lead generation
Good statistical analysis
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Tool 2: LinkedIn Slideshare

31. Own LinkedIn groups can keep
track of activated leads.
LinkedIn groups can be an asset
for lead identification.
German LinkedIn groups are
not among the most active.
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Tool 3: LinkedIn groups

32. “Contact auctions“ similar to
Google Ads
Advantages
Adresses up to date
Targeting
Safe from litigation
Recommended price
CPM 2.50 € - 3.65 €
CPC 2.34 € - 3.15 €
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Tool 4: LinkedIn campaigns

33. A multi-platform publishing
tool
Using content on and beyond
LinkedIn without additional
effort
LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook,
Google+, Instagram, YouTube …
Automated and optimized
scheduled distribution
Team process
Incl. monitoring tools
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Tool 5: Hootsuite

34. Workings of a social selling campaign with LinkedIn
Overview
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Company profile
Pull
Mktg
Showcase pages
Pull
Mktg
Personal profiles
Pull
MV
LinkedIn Pulse
Pull
Sales
Lead identification
Push
Sales
Lead management
Push
Sales
Company
Potential customerGroup mgmt.
Push
Mktg
Publishing
LinkedInAds
Mktg
Push
LinkedIn Slideshare
Pull
Mktg

35. 05
Challenges facing
social sellers
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36. Sales must generate leads for itself
Marketing must prepare content for
sales
Customers and partners define issues
and topics
Topics become more diverse
High demands on emotionalization
and personalization
Storytelling is more complex than
egocentric marketing
Boundaries between sales- and
brand-oriented communications
dissolve
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Social selling is
communication 4.0

37. Social selling is storytelling and demands “issues
sophistication”
From egocentric to issues leader
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Autistic PR
Products
Companies
Trade fairs/events/
awards
Partner oriented
PR
Customer Win
Reference stories
Co-operations
Employer Branding
CSR
Issues oriented
PR
Industry issues
Industry trends
Technological trends

38. It is about
The corporate identity
The corporate story
The story needs to fit like a
tailor-made suit
Whoever designs the story acts
as style consultant for the
corporation
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Social selling requires
emotion

39. Brands gain credibility
As a measure of credibility in
the age of informational
overload
As a vehicle of emotion
As amplifiers in a multi-tiered
(sales-) decision process
Employees become brands
They own the most valuable
channels
They own the “contacts”
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Social selling makes brands
out of employees

40. A new approach to
communication
New competences for
employees
New internal business
processes
A new distribution of tasks
among sales and marketing
New tools
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The requirements for social
selling are high

41. © vibrio 2016 http://vibrio.eu 41

42. @all images vibrio except as stated
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