Social selling is the use of social media to find, connect with, understand, and nurture sales prospects. With social selling it is crucial to build a community and not just be looking after your own business but helping others and sharing knowledge along the way.
You will need to research, identify, and engage with prospects on social networks, such as LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook, to build relationships and ultimately drive sales.
If you’re ready to learn more about social selling, how it can help your business and get practical advice to build your strategy and setup your social channels then take a look at our latest book review.
Book: Social Selling Techniques to Influence Buyers and Changemakers by Timothy Hughes
Read this book for:
An introduction on how to sell via social media
Guidance on how to influence via social media
Help to create a social selling strategy because strategy is key here
This book is a practical guide to help you understand what social selling really is, how to create a social selling strategy and influence people via social channels. The book is aimed at business owners, entrepreneurs, marketers and sales professionals.
The introduction takes you through the selling revolution, looking at how things have changed over the years in the sales process and how the introduction of technology has impacted sales. Even over the last 5 years traditional marketing methods such as cold calling, advertising, email marketing have drastically reduced.
Hughes then gives you a detailed introduction to the meaning of social selling as well as some case studies to see real life examples which are dotted throughout the book.
In the second chapter Hughes discusses the importance of community. Community is not just about the amount of people you know and are following you, but the key is to share for the common good of the group. A balance needs to be struck with how much you give to be able to receive back.
The chapter ‘Your identity within social networks’ looks at the main social channels in detail and gives you a good understanding of how to set these up, the types of audience typical and the benefits of each platform. This chapter could be useful for entrepreneurs and sales teams who are not so familiar with social media.
Changemakers are looking to solve problems with new solutions and searching social media for answers is becoming common practice. So, sharing your knowledge on the right channel can have a big difference.
A chapter that really stood out to me was ‘Moving from analogue to social signals’. In this chapter the first point I want to highlight is the discussion around social signals. Giving you an explanation into social listening and how this can help you position yourself better. A detailed explanation is given into the social signals and how this helps to tell if your potential customer needs your support.
Hughes gives you practical advice for your social content discussing the 4-1-1 rule and how this helps you to build awareness and engage your audience. The idea is to share 4 pieces of content from others, 1 self-serving and 1 that shows the human / personal side to you.
The last few chapters look at how you can create your social strategy and how to evaluate your current position. Increasing social media activity will mean going through a period of change and what those stages could look like. Finally giving you 5 steps to getting started, looking at how sales and marketing can work together for a common purpose.
Quotes from the book:
“The balance of power in any sales today is with the buyer, who can go online and research a business, watch the YouTube videos and probably get pricing. All without the seller organisation knowing. Social selling addresses the balance of power.”
“Social selling is a reaction to this change in buyer behaviour. It proposes a way of getting the salesperson back into the buying process so that they can once again control and influence the buying decisions of the business.”
“Remember that you only get out of a community what you put in, and if you are taking and not giving in at least equal quantity then you won’t grow your follower base or community and you won't get to create the leads and revenue you want.”
Summary of Social Selling Techniques
Hughes has created a comprehensive guide to social selling, helping you to understand the journey of sales, what social selling is, how to setup social channels, creating a social selling strategy and practical hint, tips and case studies along the way.
A book useful for marketers but not centrally focused on them. The wider sales and business teams will get a lot of benefit from this book. An easy read that’s not full of tech jargon and enables you to get started on your social selling journey and building that community straight away!
Book: Social Selling Mastery by Jamie Shanks
Read this book for:
Sales techniques for social media
Strategic and practical advise
Ways to reach and engage customers online
This book is heavily focused on developing sales techniques and scraps those quick tips and tricks for social selling to look at building real long term trust and relationships with buyers. Social selling isn’t a quick win approach, Shanks talks about the long-term strategy you want to be achieving.
The book looks at how you need to bring the whole company onboard to implement a social selling strategy efficiently and looks at this as a digital transformation process. Social selling is a team activity and should be achieved collaboratively. Getting senior leaders onboard with this concept is crucial as they must be the ones to support and drive social selling to ensure it scales across the organisation.
Shanks believes that the relationship between sales and marketing needs to be strengthened for social selling to work. Marketing can assist with the insights, creation of assets and measure engagement whilst the sales team can analyse the response and nurture the leads to conversion. The two working together and sharing knowledge is key here.
What the outcome and success of social selling looks like needs to be defined early on and agreed by all. The success might look slightly different for each team involved but it will all feed in and contribute to the greater goal of the business. Remember this is a long term strategy so time and care needs to be taken to plan correctly.
Shanks talks about the subscribers to social channels as advocates. The more subscribers you have the more you will be able to influence and shape the buying decisions. You want to become a digital resource for them so they keep coming back. In turn subscribers will help you to increase exposure over time, increase virality and increase mindshare.
As well as strategic and leadership advise shanks drills down into the individual channels to give practical advice. He discusses how to find your audience on the channels and reduce time spent doing this by clever filters you can utilise. This helps to build your network with the right audience, giving step by step instructions and how to be alerted of change.
A routine should be established with social selling and fixed time so you don’t end up wasting time. Shanks says 30-60 minutes is adequate and setting a good routine helps you to become more informed in your sales process and keeps you laser focused. Social selling shouldn’t take over your job if you have a clear routine and limit time.
The buyers journey is discussed so you can put yourself in the buyers shoes to find better ways to engage with them. Three questions are asked:
Why do I have a problem?
How do I solve the problem?
Who do I choose to help solve the problem?
As we understand the buyers journey and problems we want to link this into the content we create to engage with them. Any content created to assist social selling should be aligned with the following goals - brand awareness, brand affinity, lead generation and lead nurturing.
One piece of content can have many uses for example developing a whitepaper can be turned into a blog and many social media posts. Its good to track all of this content and review it on a regular basis to see performance and variety.
Quotes from the book:
“I’m going to start with a very bold statement. The success or failure of your social selling mastery program, especially its becoming scalable, is predicted on senior leadership buy-in!”
“Your CRM and marketing automation platforms aren’t going to change behaviour. I believe that only proper coaching and training can alter the trajectory of proper digital transformation inside an organisation.”
“Organisation has been and always will be a critical part of sales success. I also find it to be one of the first stumbling blocks for sales professionals, and a reason why social selling doesn’t accelerate their business like it should. There are so many things to do socially, but where to start?”
Conclusion
Social Selling Mastery provides a framework for engaging buyers and building relationships through social media. It creates a key resource for sales and marketing professionals seeking a better way to connect with customers online.
A strategic and practical guide helping you to understand how to plan and prepare for social selling as a business, creating a joint goal for the organisation and getting everyone onboard.
Online review
“It was a pleasure to read this excellent book. I have been following Jamie Shanks blog for some time and am a huge fan of his work. This book provides tips, instructions and a a road-map of how to implement social selling by either an individual or an organization to create a robust internal lead generation system. The advice he provides, while candid, is supported by data, experience and measurable results. If you want to learn how to design and execute social selling into your daily activities this book is for you. It will save you from learning through the school of hard knocks and it will be a resource that you will refer to often.”
Book: The Ultimate LinkedIn Sales Guide by Daniel Disney
3 Reasons to read this book:
1. Proven strategies: Learn actionable LinkedIn strategies used by top sales professionals.
2. Lead generation: Unlock practical methods to turn LinkedIn connections into sales and revenue.
3. Comprehensive guide: It covers everything from profile optimisation to advanced sales tactics.
Overview of the Book
In "The Ultimate LinkedIn Sales Guide," Daniel Disney provides a step-by-step framework to maximise LinkedIn's potential as a sales tool. The book delves into optimising your LinkedIn profile, building valuable connections, and utilising LinkedIn’s features to generate leads. Disney also shares personal insights and real-world examples, making the content accessible and actionable for all skill levels. From understanding LinkedIn algorithms to crafting compelling content, this guide equips sales professionals with the tools needed to thrive in digital and social selling on LinkedIn.
Five Things You Will Learn
1. How to create a LinkedIn profile that attracts leads.
2. Best practices for building a high-quality network.
3. Techniques to turn connections into sales opportunities.
4. How to leverage LinkedIn’s features like Sales Navigator and InMail.
5. Content strategies that drive engagement and conversions.
Who It Is Recommended For
This book is ideal for sales professionals, entrepreneurs, and marketers looking to leverage LinkedIn for lead generation and revenue growth. Whether you’re new to social selling or an experienced LinkedIn user, this guide offers valuable insights that can help boost your online sales efforts.
Online Review:
"The Ultimate LinkedIn Sales Guide: How to Use Digital and Social Selling" by Daniel Disney is an indispensable resource for anyone looking to leverage LinkedIn's potential for successful sales techniques. This book is a comprehensive and practical guide that unveils the power of LinkedIn as a sales tool in the digital age."
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