B2B Prospecting: How to Improve Your Sales

What is B2B prospecting?

Starting with the basics, B2B prospecting is the process of identifying potential customers in a business target market and attempting to build relationships with them. It’s a critical part of the sales process as it allows you to reach out to potential customers and get an understanding of their needs.

Why are we focusing on the difference even though you’re still selling to a person on the other end?

Well, B2B transactions are more high value and involve multiple decision-makers. Plus, the B2B sales process is more complex as you need to build credibility and trust through multiple touchpoints. What we mean is that it requires different approaches.

But it’s also because there are specific things you can or shouldn’t do when your main sales segment is a business, we’ll get to that in the best practices part!

What’s best is that you can use a tool such as LaGrowthMachine, for your B2B lead generation and prospecting needs.

With the help of accurate data from your target market and top-notch features, our tool allows you to reach out to potential customers wherever they are. More on that later! 😉

Why do you need B2B prospecting?

If you’re speaking to a company, your approach will be different not only with a consumer, but even your methods, accessibility/privacy laws, and even tone will change!

Prospecting in the B2B world is all about developing better and long-lasting relationships with your prospects.

These relationships provide the foundation for long-term success. Especially since these types of sales typically take anywhere from 1 to 6 months. If you’re consistently building that relationship, buyers will think of you when in the market for your product. And when they’re ready, you’ll get the sale.

Plus, B2B buyers are more informed and have higher expectations than ever before. By using the right data and approach, you can position yourself as a trusted partner — or even an expert in your field.

Another benefit of these methods is referrals. Businesses almost always have partners and vendors they can refer to you if they’re happy with you and what you do. But how exactly do you get those high-quality leads?

B2B prospecting best practices

Before we get into the nitty-gritty of how to actually prospect in the B2B world, let’s first look at some key best practices that you should keep in mind.

Tip 1: Target the right persona

First and foremost: Determining who exactly is your ideal prospect and eventual customer. If you don’t know who exactly they are, you’ll be hard-pressed to find them.

Identify an ideal customer profile of a great customer you have or invent one if you want to target a new market.

Start by defining their demographic, such as job title and industry. You should also identify their needs, interests, and challenges. This will help you craft a message down the road that resonates and meet their needs directly.

Each of these details also determines the foundation on which you build your pipeline strategy since they will define who you should target, as well as the offers you might send their way.

Basically, we at LaGrowthMachine recommend that your targeting goes through these 3 phases:

• Step 1: Define your personas and ICP
• Step 2: Segment your market properly
• Step 3: Know where to find your leads

We are a team of outreach specialists and we have helped 5000+ companies launch 36000+ multi-channel campaigns. We share our best practices and insights.

Based on 36000+ outreach campaigns and 5000+ clients

Tip 2: Work on the best channels

Speaking of where to find your leads, you want to choose the best channels for prospecting. This could include email, LinkedIn, networking events, etc.

On the other hand, if you mainly conduct your activities online, LinkedIn is basically your best friend. Having a LinkedIn sales profile that’s up-to-date, building a strong network and engaging with decision-makers is key to success!

Why? Easy, for 3 simple reasons:

1. One, it is the main source of B2B leads for most businesses.
2. Two, because it’s still essentially a social media platform, you gain access to a world of potential partners you can connect and engage with.
3. Three, you get access to Sales Navigator, thanks to which you can use strategies such as Account-Based Marketing on LinkedIn.

Nevertheless, for many types of companies, cold calling a prospect is no longer an option and they have turned to the cold email approach.

Both of these tactics are great for B2B prospecting – but you always want to make sure your messages are adapted to the channel and target persona.

For calls, be sure to have a well-structured script, keeping it as personal and direct as possible. Make sure your lead feels they’re being heard and guarantee you’ll be able to provide value to them.

When it comes to emails, craft a personalized sales copy that speaks directly to the needs of the prospect and the value you can offer.

The best thing you can do is to actually use multiple channels in combination. This will help you achieve 3x the results in a third of the time!

And remember, always use data and insights whenever possible to add more weight to your message.

Tip 3: Create the right messages

Since you now know who to target, and where to find them, let’s talk about what to say.

Remember that you have one chance to make a good first impression – so choose your words wisely!

When creating a message for your prospects, make sure it’s short and concise. People are busy and they want to get the gist of your message fast.

Also, be more focused on the needs of your prospects and how you can help them, not how great your product or your company is. Focus on their pain points and which features does your product/service provide to solve them.

Furthermore, try to be creative and find ways to stand out from the crowd – use storytelling tactics or even humor if it fits your message.

So what does our message look like?

Or, if you want something less obvious, more on the curious side:

Our goal here is to pique the interest of our prospects and start a conversation – not make a sales pitch.

This is exactly why we promote multichannel not just in our tool, but in our practices as well! Because we know that sending just one long email with a full sales pitch will get nowhere! Instead, we start with a small LinkedIn message to get our foot in the door, followed by an email with additional information.

By combining our tactics in this way, we get the best of both worlds – a personal touch combined with a powerful offer of value.

Elevate your B2B prospecting with LaGrowthMachine:

Now that you know how to approach your B2B prospecting, it’s time to take your outbound game to the next level with LaGrowthMachine!

LaGrowthMachine is a multichannel sales automation tool that can help you automate your B2B prospecting process. It allows you to:

• Import your leads from any source. You can use LaGrowthMachine to import your leads from various sources, such as LinkedIn, CSV files, or other platforms. If you don’t have a list of leads yet, you can use LaGrowthMachine’s interface to connect to LinkedIn and find leads using advanced search filters.
• Create and send personalized sequences. LaGrowthMachine has hundreds of templates that you can customize and send to your leads. You can choose the templates based on your goals and the channels you want to use. You can use LinkedIn, email, and Twitter to reach your prospects. Just make sure you connect all your accounts to your identity.
• Select your audience and write your copy. You can add your leads to the campaign and write your own copy for each message. You can also use variables to personalize your messages and make them more relevant and engaging.
• Manage your leads effectively with a multi-channel inbox. LaGrowthMachine has a multi-channel inbox that lets you see all your conversations with your leads in one place. You can filter, sort, and track your messages across different channels. You can also sync your actions with your CRM or other platforms.

Multichannel B2B prospecting is the way, and for the sake of the argument, here are the results of one of our prospecting campaigns:

One lead out of two responded to one of our messages, a conversion rate of +50%… and all of this is automated. Crazy, right?

Lastly, LaGrowthMachine also lets you follow your prospect’s engagement with reporting and analytics. You can see where your prospects are in the pipeline, how engaged they are, and which messages work best for you!

Best of all, if you’re using other tools (like a CRM tool) with LaGrowthMachine, you can connect them and run your whole campaigns all from one place. This will make your prospecting process so much smoother!

Although it may appear overwhelming at first, especially for beginners in sales prospecting, LaGrowthMachine is actually one of the most adaptable and all-inclusive sales automation tools.

Create hyper-personalized outreach sequences

Try LaGrowthMachine for free

What is the best B2B prospecting method?

We’ve gone through everything there is to know about B2B prospecting so far, except for your strategy. This is because your B2B prospecting strategy should be tailored to match the needs of your business.

That said, there are methods that have proven to be successful across many businesses. Though we touched on a lot of them throughout this article, here’s a quick overview of which B2B prospecting strategies are the most successful:

Method 1: Cold emailing (Your OG digital marketing tool)

Cold emailing is one of the oldest and most effective B2B prospecting methods out there.

It allows you to reach out to potential customers who might not know about your solution yet, and spark their interest with a relevant message.

But don’t think that cold emailing is just about blasting out generic emails to a huge list of contacts. That’s a surefire way to end up in the spam folder or get ignored!

To succeed with cold emailing, you need to do your homework and follow some of the best practices we outlined earlier:

• Focus on your sales targeting and segmentation
• Collect data
• Use the data to make your message as personalized and personable as possible

Here’s an example from one of my outreach campaigns:

Now not to toot my own horn (maybe a little), but this message works on many levels as it:

• Is personalized and relevant to the receiver
• Leverages knowledge of their current tool (lemlist) and where it fails (pain point)
• Offers an alternative solution in LaGrowthMachine with a valuable comparison.
• Speaks to the lead on a personal level and encourages engagement

Try using this approach when you craft your own B2B prospecting messages – it might just be the key to getting more leads.

Method 2: Inbound marketing (The new kid on the block)

Inbound marketing is pretty much the opposite of cold emailing; instead of reaching out to prospects who might not be ready to buy from you, inbound marketing attracts prospects who are actively looking for a solution like yours.

It does this by creating and distributing valuable content that educates, entertains, or inspires your target audience and helps them solve their problems.

Inbound marketing can take many forms, such as:

The key is to provide useful information that showcases your expertise and builds trust in your brand.

By doing this, you can easily generate B2B leads that are already interested and familiar with what you have to offer. Plus, content creation and distribution are much more cost-effective than traditional methods, making inbound marketing the go-to choice for many B2B companies.

That said, Inbound Marketing is seldom used alone. It should be part of a bigger strategy that encompasses other methods such as cold emailing, social media marketing, and targeted ads.

But it’s still a worthy contender to consider when you’re coming up with your B2B prospecting strategy.

Method 3: Sales automation:

We went through all the good sales automation can do in the earlier sections, so here’s a quick recap:

Though it’s a relatively new concept in the world of B2B prospecting, sales automation is quickly gaining traction. It allows you to automate your sales processes, from lead generation, nurturing, and lead qualification to email outreach and follow-up.

But what makes sales automation so powerful is that it allows you to find and qualify leads faster, while making sure they receive the type of personalized communication they need.

And it does all this at scale!

With the right sales automation platform -like LaGrowthMachine perhaps, you can automate your campaigns and save time that would have otherwise been wasted on manual tasks.

Plus, you can use data-driven reports and insights to refine your approach and make sure that each communication is personalized and tailored to the lead’s interests.

Method 4: LinkedIn presence and online events:

Building an online presence for your B2B brand is essential in today’s digital world.

Not only does it allow you to reach prospects through multiple channels and at scale and set yourself out as an expert, but it also adds a human touch and allows you to build relationships that may turn into future customers.

As we said earlier, if you’re in B2B, then LinkedIn is your best friend. From publishing quality content and engaging in discussions to joining relevant groups and promoting events, there are many ways you can use LinkedIn for prospecting.

Attending, and especially hosting, online events is another great way to generate B2B leads, as it gives you a feel of what your prospects are interested in and how they interact with you.

Similarly, by maintaining a strong LinkedIn presence, be it on LinkedIn groups or just simply within your network, you create an opportunity to reach out directly to prospects, build relationships and generate leads, and more importantly, stay top-of-mind with those leads.

Get to (B2B) prospecting!

Following this path will help get you to where your business needs to be in a much more seamless and effective way.

Prospecting doesn’t have to be a chore. With the right strategies in place, you can make the process much easier and maximize your ROI.

All that’s left is for you to get started! Good luck.

Happy (B2B) Prospecting! 🙂