The more we’re in front of our prospects, the easier it is to stay top of mind and increases the chance they’ll think of us when they’re ready to purchase from us.
For years, this has meant salespeople have to make the time to research their prospects, get them on the phone and provide value.
Unfortunately, that outreach model limits the amount of prospects a salesperson can be in front of. Instead, systems-based salespeople are taking the time to download the ways their product or service benefits the lives of their customers and not waiting for a prospect to call with questions. Instead, salespeople can take the initiative with a value-added campaign to be in front of prospects with insights into their industry instead of simply asking them to buy what you’re selling.
We sat down with the Ed ‘The Rainmaker’ Robinson to discuss how to scale being in front of more prospects in a way that makes them want to hear from us. Ed recommends establishing up to 52 separate messages that educate and improve the lives of prospects, allowing for a new message each week. Less-ambitious salespeople can of course scale back how often they want to be in front of prospects but we recommend being in front of qualified prospects with these types of messages no less than twice a month.
Because we’re trimming hope from our sales strategy, we’ll use the acronym TRIM to guide us through creating a system with a trigger, ensuring it’s repeatable, building in ways to improve it and of course, ensuring it’s measurable and getting us results.
T – Trigger: Once we’re fairly certain a prospect is experiencing a pain point that our product or service solves, we can trigger them into this value-added campaign. That means setting google alerts for our prospects’ businesses, keeping abreast of the industry by reading the news and industry publications, and of course listening during prospect conversations for the challenges you know your value-added campaign addresses.
R – Repeatable: To catalog 52 separate items that you can educate prospects on, Ed recommends starting with your company’s value proposition (how your product or service improved the lives/businesses of your prospects). Each of those items can generate a half dozen separate ideas or tips to include in your communications.
These value-based communications need to be short, so stick to the strategy of each tip and don’t dive too deep into the ‘how-to.’ If your prospect wants to know the details of any point, encourage them to pick up the phone and give you a call.
As always, don’t rely on just one method of communication, either. Mix up how you deliver this value across video, email, social media messaging and even direct mail.
A great way to start this type of value-added campaign is with the language, “I had another client in a similar situation as yours and here’s what we were able to help them do ….”
Using a CRM and/or an email database allows you to map out the messages, touches and topics you want to ensure you communicate with prospects and track opens on the emails you send.
I – Improvable: Having executed this campaign and coached hundreds of clients in how to implement it, Ed recommends regularly collaborating with customers to learn what they were concerned with/struggling with/looking for before they decided to purchase your product or service. This allows us to keep these messages relevant for prospects who live in a rapidly-changing world. Because you’ve mapped out your messages ahead of time, you can update or edit one of those messages to include what you hear from customers.
M — Measurable: In order to measure the effectiveness of a value-added campaign of education-based messages, Ed says to reverse engineer the sales process and work these messages into the number of calls/email/prospect contacts you know you need to make each month or week to meet your goals. That way, a salesperson knows how many prospects need to be in this value-added campaign and can measure success against larger sales goals.
Another thing to measure is which messages/videos/emails are generating conversations. Those topics may be worth front-loading into the sequence as a test to see if it’s number of touches or quality of content that’s generating the results you’re after.