How Social Selling Influences Businesses

Social Selling – Time to Get Down To Business

The following Social Selling in 2015 infographic from Sales for Life is full of eye-opening statistic highlighting that social selling is no longer limited to buzzword-bingo or techno-scrabble.

The statistics it contains clearly demonstrate that social selling is a maturing sales discipline used by successful salespeople to crush their competition and close deals.

After reviewing the Social Selling into 2015 Inforgraphic, you will be in a much better position to understand the impact that social selling will have on influencing the buyers journey in coming months and years.

Social Selling Takeaways

Here are some of the most striking social selling statistics from our perspective:

• 72% of B2B buyers used social media to research their purchase decision in 2014 (Source: DemandGen)
• 79% of sales people use social media to outsell their peers (Source: Forbes)
• 53% of buyers said they rely on peer recommendations when making a purchase decision – up from only 19% in 2012 (Source: DemandGen)
• 54% of salespeople said they closed a sale directly because of social media (Source: McKinsey)

Based on these statistics, what is shocking is that 93% of sales executives have not received any formal training on social selling! (Source: McKinsey). Dooh!

Content Marketing With The Right Ingredients Makes the Social Selling Cake

For B2B, the top content tactics in order of effectiveness are:

1. Webinars/webcasts,
2. Videos,
3. Blogs,
4. Case studies.
5. and research reports.

For B2C, the top 5 content tactics in order of effectiveness are:

1. Social media content,
2. eNewsletters,
3. Articles on website,
4. Illustrations/photos,
5. Videos.

Two statistics that further demonstrate the role that content marketing plays in social selling include:

•  65% of buyers felt that a vendor’s content had an impact on their final purchase decision.
• Nearly 85% of buyers viewed between five and eight pieces of content from a winning vendor.

As you can see, these kinds of statistic drive home the need to have an effective mix of content tactics to influence buyers as they are researching their purchases, both on social media and other channels such as a vendors website.

Summary

Today, Social Selling is more than a buzzword, it is a sales reality. For now, perhaps a competitive differentiatior. In the not too distant future, it will likely become table stakes.

The key is to provide social selling training to your sales executives so that they can become part of the 79% of salespeople who use social media to outsell their peers.

If you need help with you social selling strategy, then contact us today to see how we can help. The contact is free and the feedback you receive will be high-value and immediately applicable.

Also check out our affordable social media services to see how we can fill a social media needs in your organization.

Contact for Social Selling Strategies

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