Sports Marketing Examples: 12 Campaigns That Scored Big
Social selling has become a powerful tool for marketers, salespeople and entrepreneurs to connect with new leads, build relationships and build buzz around their brands.
However, many businesses still aren't utilizing social selling strategies or don't know where to start because the amount of information can be overwhelming. So, we’ve come up with this ultimate guide to help you get started with social selling.
At the end of this article, you will have all the top strategies, tools and examples you need to get started and succeed with social selling.
Social selling is a marketing strategy that focuses on leveraging social media to create meaningful connections with prospects and customers. It can also be used by companies that want to increase brand awareness, generate leads and drive revenue through social media.
In simple words, social selling is embracing social media instead of traditional selling techniques like cold calling, emails, follow-ups and telemarketing.
The Social Selling Index (SSI) is a social selling metric established by LinkedIn and is part of the LinkedIn Sales Navigator dashboard. The SSI has four elements that add up to your index number. They are:
The higher your social selling index, the better your results will be on LinkedIn.
Are you still wondering whether to include social selling in your sales or marketing funnel? Let's discuss the benefits of using social selling to help you decide.
It's easy to sell when you have the right tools, but it's even easier when you have a relationship with your prospect. When they know, like and trust you, they will be more likely to buy from you.
By engaging with your customers and prospects on social media and showing that you are interested in their lives, you can gain their trust more quickly than if you were trying to sell them something right off the bat. This can help when it comes time to make those sales calls later down the road.
As a business owner, you know the key to success is building your brand. By staying in front of your customers and prospects, you can ensure they are always thinking about your company. This will help them remember who you are when they need something or require personal services again.
By staying in touch with your customers and prospects, you can maintain a steady stream of leads to nurture in the future. When you have an opportunity to make a sale, you will already know who these people are and how they feel about your company.
This can help you avoid wasting time on dead ends or trying to sell something that isn't a good fit for the client's needs.
Social media makes it easier than ever for potential buyers to find information about your company online, which means more leads for your salespeople. According to Social Media Examiner, 72% of marketers with 5+ years of experience say social media helps them generate leads.
But social media isn't just about generating leads. It's also an opportunity for cross-selling and upselling by connecting with customers who have already purchased from you or similar products or services.
You can use social selling techniques to create a community around your brand. This helps people feel like they're part of something bigger. The more active you are on social media, the more you will likely build relationships with people who care about what you say. You can then cultivate these relationships into sales opportunities.
A social selling strategy is a plan for how you're going to use social media, like LinkedIn and Twitter, as part of your sales process. It should include specific tactics you can use to connect with prospects and customers to build trust and rapport.
Here are the top 4 social selling strategies that you can get started with:
One of the most effective social selling strategies is to become a thought leader in your industry. About 92% of B2B customers are more likely to do business with people who have positioned themselves as an industry thought leader.
Start by writing blog posts and articles and creating other types of content that provide value to people in your field. You can also curate content from different sources and post it on LinkedIn or Medium, which will help build your credibility as an expert in the space.
Here is an example of a LinkedIn post from Visme's founder establishing himself as an industry expert.
Collaboration with industry influencers is another excellent social selling strategy. It involves partnering with people who already have an established following on social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
When you partner with influencers, they'll promote your brand across their networks in exchange for compensation (such as free products or services). This will help build relationships that can lead to more business later on.
Here is an example of Visme partnering with influencers on Instagram.
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There are many different platforms for social selling, including Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, YouTube and more.
You can use built-in features like LinkedIn Groups, Facebook Groups and Twitter chats to connect with people who are interested in your industry. This will help you get more leads by reaching out to people who may still need to learn about your company.
We will discuss the social selling features of each social media platform in the next section of this article.
To reach new customers, utilize social media advertising such as Facebook Ads, LinkedIn Ads and Twitter Ads. These platforms can help you target your audience based on different demographics, interests and behaviors.
You can then use this information to show relevant ads that resonate with them. This can help you get more leads by showing people who are interested in what you have to offer!
Here is an example of how Visme uses Facebook Ads to reach its customers.
Social selling isn't about shortcuts; it's about listening and engaging with your customers. This doesn't mean you need to be everywhere on social media; it just means you must pick your social platforms wisely and use them effectively.
We've identified the 10 best tips for successful social selling and would like to share them with you now.
One of the best ways to increase your social selling success is to do a social media audit. This means taking an honest look at your current platforms and figuring out which ones are working for you and which aren't.
It's critical to determine whether or not each channel is helping or hindering your overall sales efforts. That can help you decide how much time and energy you want to put into each one.
A Social Selling Index is a set of metrics that helps you quantify the effectiveness of your social selling efforts.
The goal is to create a benchmark that will allow you to measure your progress over time and compare it against other companies in your industry. The Social Selling Index (SSI) is calculated using four metrics:
One of the most effective ways to sell on social media is to engage in the comment section. This means finding a post on Facebook or another platform that you can comment on and then sharing your thoughts with a question or insight related to what was shared.
For example, if someone shares an article about content marketing strategy, you might ask them how they use their blog posts as part of their overall sales strategy. You can do this with your own social media posts too.
While it's not as effective as providing customer support via email or phone, you can use social media to offer your customers the support they need.
For example, if a user posts a question on Facebook about how to use your product, you could respond with an answer and then link them to additional resources that might help them out even more.
Explainer videos are a great way to introduce a concept or subject in the most efficient way possible. So, you can use them to describe your product, service or company quickly and succinctly.
Here's a quick example of an explainer video from Visme's template library.
Visme offers a wide range of explainer video templates like the one above, making it easier to create explainer videos than ever before.
A buyer persona, also called a user persona or customer persona, is a fictional representation of your ideal customer. It helps you to empathize with them and understand their needs, wants and behaviors better so that you can position your product or service accordingly.
The more defined your buyer persona is, the easier it will be for you to create content that meets their needs while also creating brand loyalty.
If you haven't created your buyer persona yet, use Visme's customer persona templates to create one. Visme's library features 50+ persona templates you can customize to create your own.
Here is an example of a customer persona template from Visme.
Read this article about creating a buyer persona, or watch the video below to learn more about it.
To be successful at social selling, you need to post relevant content regularly. This means having a plan and schedule in place so your business doesn't miss opportunities to engage with potential customers.
The key is to post frequently enough that your audience sees your content on a regular basis but not so often that you become annoying. You want your customers to be excited about what you have to say rather than feeling bombarded by advertisements.
The best way to do this is by using Visme's social media scheduler. With this tool, you can schedule posts in advance so they go live at specific times and days. Here is a comprehensive guide that will help you create a social media calendar.
The most important thing you can do for social selling is create content people want to share. This could be a blog post, an infographic, a video or any other type of content. If it's valuable and useful, people will gladly share it with their network, which is exactly what you want.
If you need help creating this type of content, start with your expertise and experiences. You don't have to reinvent the wheel every time you write a blog post or create a video.
And as we have already mentioned, you can create almost all types of social media content using Visme's social media graphic templates.
Plus, you can also take advantage of Visme’s AI features to create unique AI image-generated images and AI-generated text.
The Visme AI image generator can help you create visuals that look special and unique while the AI Writer will help you formulate copy that you can then finalize with your brand tone.
Keep tabs on your brand's competitors by reading their blogs, watching their videos and following them on social media. This will give you insights into what they're doing right (or wrong) and how you can improve upon it.
For example, if one competitor posts an infographic that gets a lot of shares, create one similar to theirs but more detailed or easier to understand.
On a daily basis, you should be looking at what's being said about your brand and its competitors. This is called social listening and it can help you identify opportunities to improve your content strategy. Use tools like Google Alerts or Mention to track mentions of your company name and blog posts on the internet.
You can use this worksheet template from Visme to record the data collected by analyzing your competitors.
UTM refers to URL tags that allow marketers to track every piece of content that their team shares with prospects and customers on social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn.
It allows you to measure the effectiveness of your content marketing. You can use this data to better understand what kind of content performs best with your audience and optimize future campaigns.
For example, if you notice people clicking on an image but not reading the article, consider replacing it with a different one in future posts.
Social media analytics not only help you see how many people are engaging with your content but also the type of engagement you're getting and what posts were most successful. This data can be used to identify trends in your audience behavior, helping you create better content in the future.
You can use this weekly report template to track progress, assign tasks and more.
Do you still have questions about social selling? Here we answer some of your most pressing questions.
Choosing the best social media platform for your brand is the key to success in social selling. In this list you’ll find each social platform and what type of content is best for it. Choose your platform according to what you wish to achieve with social selling. You can use Visme to create content for any of these platforms.
Here’s a practical list of things you must do to optimize your profiles for social selling:
Here are a few ways to execute social selling:
Here are three examples of effective social selling from known brands:
The 5 Cs of Social Media can also apply to social selling and they are opportunities to Contribute, Comment, Conversation Collaborate, and of Community.
Contribute=Sharing information easily
Comment=Your opportunity to have a say
Conversation=Getting involved in discussions
Collaborate=Work with anyone, anywhere to achieve a common goal
Community=Building relationships online
What is the difference between social selling and social marketing?
Social selling is done by the sales team, and it involves engaging directly with prospects on social platforms for the purpose of selling. Social media marketing, on the other hand, focuses on achieving branding and marketing goals through content sharing.
Once you understand how to create content for different channels, you will see that social selling is simple. With the ability to personalize your messages across major platforms like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, you can easily sell more to your audience and generate more revenue.
If you're just getting started with your social selling content strategy, Visme is an easy way to create stunning visuals and start building your network. It has thousands of social media graphic templates you can use to create any social media content in no time.
Sign-up for Visme and start creating content for social selling today!
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