Social media sales strategy for B2B businesses: Stop selling. Start engaging.

March 31, 2019

We intentionally chose the “wrong image” to highlight the mistake that many business owners make.

“Social selling” is not the purpose of social media. It’s the beginning of a dialogue, not a monologue.

Award-winning sales and marketing professional, Patti Pokorchak is a sought-after sales coach helping individuals and companies boost sales dramatically. Patti is a thought leader on how to use social media to sell and practices what she preaches. Thanks, Patti for writing this educational blog.

By Patti Pokorchak, MBA

First of all: STOP SELLING! Start ENGAGING!

While this might sound surprising coming from a sales coach, but social media has ONLY replaced paper directories and direct snail mail as a way to find new prospects. It’s not a buy me now for B2B businesses.

B2C is different with its lower purchase value and can lead to a spontaneous sale. So don’t get the two markets confused. What works with B2C does not work with B2B, especially for higher priced products and services

Do you really expect to sell a million-dollar order via a tweet? Get real.

Many trying to sell on social media are like that annoying networker who shows up and “sprays and prays” a room full of business cards expecting to get a new client.

“Hi, I’m Patti – buy me!” will never work no matter what that realtor thinks. Spreading around hundreds of cards will rarely get you a new client.

What does work – becoming an expert and thought leader in your field by sharing your content and wisdom.

I keep telling my clients that social means “SOCIAL like a dialogue” it’s not a monologue. Avoid the following:

• Shouting out, “BUY ME, BUY ME, BUY ME!”
• Making it all about you, “Look at me! I’m so special.”

Who cares? No one cares about you until you show that you care about them.

Show how you can help your ideal target market, and you’ll start getting attention from this audience. Social media also enables you to start connecting with others in your industry.

Only one out of five posts (20%) should be a self-promotional post.

The other four posts should be about sharing value, showing your knowledge, and most importantly, sharing other experts’ content that is of value to your target market too.

If you only post via a social media scheduling tool such as Buffer or Hootsuite, and that’s your extent of using social media, then you are missing out on starting a conversation with strangers who could turn into prospects and eventually clients.

It’s like doing one bad ad and thinking “advertising is not for me, it’s a waste of money” when you really need to test, test and test some more until you find out what works. Social media is a long game; don’t expect overnight results from one post.

I hate that those social media tools let entrepreneurs pretend to ‘do social media’ when all they’re doing is spamming the platforms. There is a huge difference between activity and effective actions.

• Can imagine in real life someone coming up to you and doing a non-stop monologue of how great they are?
• How long would you want to listen to them before leaving?

That’s what you’re doing if you’re only posting one-way (you know you’ve done that – the scheduled posts so you can pretend to be ‘active’ on Twitter or Facebook) and not engaging on other experts’ posts.

Save yourself the time and effort in scheduling those useless ignored posts. Set a timer and spend 15 quality minutes a day; ideally first thing in the morning. Choose only the one or two social media platforms where your clients and potential clients hang out.

Share valuable content from others. Comment on their posts with added value – not just ‘good post’ that again is a useless thing to do.  You can write a comment. Here are a few ideas:

• What did you learn?
• What do you dispute about it?
• What’s your point of view on the topic?
• How it inspired you to write your post or a blog

Social media marketing or social selling is not a monologue but the beginning of a dialogue that can lead to off-line conversations.

Get engaged and stop spamming!

Thanks again, Patti, for writing this educational article, which is part of McCabe Marketing’s Thought Leaders series.

Connect with Patti Pokorchak, Small Business Sales Trainer and Coach. She’s passionate about “selling smarter, not harder, to grow your business fast.” You can follow Patti on LinkedIn.

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