Articles on sales prospecting

Cold when necessary

I’m a huge advocate of using human relationships to get into accounts. I really believe it’s a small world. As I’ve shown before you can get referred into 1,000’s of accounts without needing to use a cold approach.

However, sometimes you may be faced with no choice. If you’ve exhausted all your connections, and all the connections of your connections, and nothing is leading you closer to getting into the account, then you may need to resort to a cold approach. But if you do have to go in without a referral, make your chances of success as good as they can be.

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Spearfishing vs shotgun

by Nigel Edelshain

I was asked a great question during a recent conversation with a founder: When should you take a spearfishing approach to finding new customers and when should you use a shotgun?

It depends on what you’re hunting.

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Off-Road vs On-Road Prospecting

by Nigel Edelshain

Prospecting is hard. There’s no need to make it even harder.

I’ve run dozens of experiments over the years on how to get through the door and start working with a new account. In every experiment, I’ve found that the number one factor that influences a successful outcome has been a human relationship.

The smartest piece of content has never beaten a warm introduction from another person. In my own experiments, I’ve found a referral of any kind (not necessarily from a client) to be 3.25 times more effective than a cold approach (based on time spent–it’s even more effective in terms of conversion rates.)

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Grandma in the elevator (GPT version)

by Nigel Edelshain

It can happen in an elevator, or at a networking event, or when you write a prospecting email. You need to say what you do.

Unfortunately, what many people say, especially if they work with tech, does not mean much to the listener, or it sends the other person into a mild snooze. Here are some tips to change that.

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Reps need to self-source leads

by Nigel Edelshain

According to recent research from SalesLoft best-performing senior salespeople (like Account Exectuives) need to self-source around 48% of their pipeline–rather than having leads come from a sales development rep (BDR, SDR etc.) or inbound via the efforts of their marketing department.

This uptick in the need for AEs to self-source deals has likely been driven by economics, the need to “do more with less”, but is I trend that may continue as AI tools free up AEs from admin tasks.

If AEs are going to self-source their deals, I believe they are going to have to be good at certain skills.

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Sales climate warming?

by Nigel Edelshain

We may be entering a “new, new era” of selling—an era that takes us back to good old-fashioned relationship selling.

Up to this point many of the tools available to sales teams have encouraged volume-based sales techniques, like mass emailing and cold calling. But as more and more salespeople use these tools, buyers have become inundated with low value communication. Inevitably connection rates and conversion rates have dropped quickly.

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