Tag: Technology

Copper CRM – Everything You Need to Know

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Copper CRM – Everything You Need to Know

Copper is a niche but powerful CRM that lives entirely inside your Google Workspace. If you’re a Gmail and Google Calendar super-user, Copper CRM is definitely one to consider.

That said, every customer relationship management (CRM) platform has strengths and weaknesses, and Copper is no exception. Knowing the potential pros and cons of the CRM you’re looking to purchase is an essential part of the research process. Read on to learn more about Copper CRM.

Copper CRM features worth noting:

Customizable sales pipelines – Create visual drag-and-drop sales pipelines with as many pipeline stages as you need to represent your sales process.

Workflow automations – Make your sales process more efficient by using workflow automations to change deal stages, schedule follow-up tasks, update contact profiles, and more.

Custom reports – Leverage custom sales reporting and build your own sales reports using Copper data.

Activity insights – Create visibility into your team’s activities across any sales methodology for better transparency and accountability.

Lead scoring – To make the most of your team’s sales skills and optimize lead management, use lead scoring to easily identify the leads that are most likely to convert (requires Business tier).

Email templates – Make your email responses more consistent and improve sales rep efficiency with custom sales email templates.

Merge fields – Help automate sales processes by automatically personalizing emails using merge fields that pull from Copper data.

Email sequence & drip campaigns – Put your follow-up emails on autopilot by enrolling contacts in an email sequence or drip campaign.

Website tracking – Get insight into what your prospects are looking at on your website (Business tier only).

Mobile app – Access all contact activity while on the app. Calls and texts are logged automatically so every interaction is tracked and information is always up to date.

Copper CRM Strengths & Weaknesses

Strengths of Copper CRM:

Seamless Google Workspace integration

Copper was designed for Google Workspace – which in addition to Gmail and Calendar includes Google Drive, Google Docs, Google Sheets, and other Google apps. It is unmatched in terms of its integration with Gmail and the rest of the Google ecosystem.

If this is what you value more than anything else, look no further. Copper is the only sales CRM recommended by Google, and they’re a Google-backed company. There’s really no competition when it comes to Google Workplace/G Suite integration.

Copper is a full-scale CRM

At first glance it’s tempting to write it off as a niche Chrome extension, but it has robust functionality and is capable of more than many other standard CRM platforms.

Copper CRM is easy to use and intuitive

CRM software is a critical sales tool for your team, and one of the most important things to look for is the combination of scalability and user experience. In other words, your sales CRM should be easy enough to use that your reps will like it and commit to using it.

Copper may be the easiest CRM solution to get employees to buy into using since it’s a familiar user interface and everything is a click away from their Gmail inbox. Plus, it eliminates manual data entry by automatically populating Google data into its records. Copper doesn’t score as high on scalability, but more on that later.

Weaknesses of Copper CRM:

Not everyone is a Google Workspace super-user

While this isn’t a weakness per se, it’s important to realize that if you’re not really into Google products, Copper CRM probably won’t be a good fit. Copper was created for a niche group of Google Workspace users, and there’s not a lot of value for people outside of that group.

Scalability is an issue for Copper

Copper lacks many of the advanced capabilities you’d find in an enterprise CRM. Unlike the HubSpot Sales CRM which will scale well with your sales team as it grows, if you’re using Copper CRM when it’s time to scale you’ll likely need to find a new CRM software.

While you can use integrations to add in other sales tools you need like calling, quotes and proposals, and in-depth automations, using multiple integrations to fill in for missing features is expensive and quite often a hassle.

Copper CRM pricing is expensive

Copper’s basic plan is extremely limited, so many users need to start with the Professional or Business tier plans. Subscriptions are per person (regardless of roles) so even a small team with just a couple of sales reps, a manager, and an operations rep can end up costing over $500/month when paid monthly. At this price it can be tough to justify Copper’s lack of scalability and enterprise-level tools.

Bottom line:

If you’re a diehard Google Workspace user searching for effective sales solutions and want a solid full-scale CRM inside of your Gmail inbox, Copper is worth considering. While it won’t be enough for those looking for advanced workflow automations or scalability, Copper’s seamless Google Workspace integration and familiar user interface make it a good option for teams that are fully committed to the Google ecosystem.

Boost Email Engagement with Video

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Boost your email open rates by 19%, click-through rates by 65%, and cut unsubscribes by 26% with one tool: video. Video, especially in emails, has become a powerful marketing tool because:

  • It’s now affordable and accessible to produce high-quality content.
  • Videos can simplify complex topics better than text.
  • They showcase the brand’s personality, fostering familiarity.
  • They naturally grab more attention than plain text, boosting visibility and engagement.

For prospecting, videos are invaluable. Start with an email introduction and then offer a personalized video. This makes your video anticipated and tailored to the recipient, increasing engagement.

Example strategy:

  • Email 1: “Thanks for downloading our Commission Modeler. What challenges do you face in selecting the right commission structure? Reply, and I’ll provide a personalized video with recommendations.”
  • Email 2 (if no response): “Here’s a video about selecting the right commission model for various sales models. If you want personalized insights: <insert link to sales page>”

Thinking of using video? Here are tips:

  • Personalize: Address specific issues of the prospect.
  • Keep it concise: Aim for about 30 seconds. Anything longer than that, and viewers drop off.
  • Be clear: Have a succinct message with a defined call-to-action.
  • Prioritize quality: Even smartphone cameras work, but ensure good lighting, minimal background noise, and stability.

Expand video use to social media, post-event emails, testimonials, and demos. Incorporating video in your email marketing not only boosts engagement but also effectively addresses prospect needs, paving the way for conversion.

HubSpot Sales CRM – Everything You Need to Know

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HubSpot Sales CRM – Everything You Need to Know

If you’re in the market for customer relationship management (CRM) software, you’ve probably heard of HubSpot. There’s a reason this sales management software has such widespread recognition – it’s the only enterprise-level CRM that’s affordable and scalable for small to midsize sales teams.

After completing numerous HubSpot Sales Hub implementations for our clients, and using it for our own CRM needs, we’ve developed an in-depth appreciation for all that HubSpot has to offer. We detail these below, along with a few things that you should know before purchasing HubSpot Sales Hub software for your team.

HubSpot Sales Hub Strengths & Weaknesses

HubSpot is a CRM software that offers six different hubs: Sales Hub, Marketing Hub, Customer Service Hub, CMS Hub, Operations Hub, and Commerce Hub. Each hub has a Starter tier, Professional tier, and Enterprise tier. Hubs can be combined for a significant discount in HubSpot’s CRM Suite bundles. Nearly all sales capabilities are contained within HubSpot’s Sales Hub, so that’s what we’ll be discussing today.

Every CRM platform has strengths and weaknesses, and HubSpot Sales Hub is no exception. Knowing the potential pros and cons of the CRM you’re looking to purchase is an essential part of the research process. Read on to learn what we’ve discovered as experienced HubSpot users.

Strengths of HubSpot Sales Hub:

Great user experience from Sales Hub Starter to Sales Hub Enterprise

When choosing a CRM software, one of the most important things to look for is the combination of scalability and user experience. In other words, your sales CRM should be easy enough to use that your reps will like it and commit to using it, and it should be scalable enough to still be a good choice as your business grows.

HubSpot is the only enterprise CRM that includes every capability you could ever need, along with a great user experience for every team size and price point.

We don’t recommend other enterprise CRMs like NetSuite and ACT because of how clunky and outdated they look and feel. Salesforce and ZohoOne are not much better. We’ve found that sales teams who use these tools just don’t like using them as much as non-enterprise CRMs, and find them all to have steeper learning curves. HubSpot gives you the strength (and scalability) of an enterprise CRM without jeopardizing buy-in from your team.

Nearly unlimited sales automation capabilities

HubSpot has just about every workflow and task automation you’d ever need. Sales Hub Professional is enough automation for most teams and costs a maximum of $500/month for five users, whereas Sales Hub Starter ($20/month) is just enough automation for small teams just starting out. Either way, this is far more automation options than a non-enterprise CRM like Pipedrive.

Because HubSpot Sales Hub is one of the largest sales CRMs, there are options for integrating with nearly every software you use in the HubSpot App Marketplace. This doesn’t mean every integration will be useful to your workflow, but you have more options than you would with a non-enterprise CRM.

Affordable Sales CRM for small sales teams, with nearly unlimited capability to scale as you grow

While the entry tier CRM technically offers free tools, anyone serious about sales will want the HubSpot Sales Hub Starter plan. This is $20/month for two users ($10 per additional) and provides great sales tools for an entry-level CRM. It won’t give you automated tasks or prospecting, but it’s easy to set up, learn, and use to your advantage.

High quality sales training and resources

Regularly updating your sales skills is important, and HubSpot’s training academy and onboarding services offer incredible value. Not only are the courses for learning how to use HubSpot great, but they also have some of the best online sales training courses we’ve ever seen, and this all comes included with your subscription. The free HubSpot blog has up-to-date articles for every feature and process, as well as sales and marketing skills, concepts, methodologies, and more.

Weaknesses of HubSpot Sales Hub:

HubSpot Sales Hub is not ideal for automated prospecting

In order to get automated email sequences, you’ll need Sales Hub Professional, with a price tag of ~$500/month. Even then, you’ll have less automated prospecting capabilities and settings than you would with a dedicated prospecting tool.

This is why we often recommend combining Sales Hub Starter with Reply, which comes out to ~$90/month for both applications and includes a good native integration between the two. One of the other sales engagement tools we recommend is Growbots, which includes both prospecting and targeting tools and also works well with HubSpot.

To do full-blown prospecting in HubSpot you’ll need Sales Hub Enterprise ($1,200/month). This HubSpot Sales Hub tier is loaded with features but is not at all worth buying if you only need it for prospecting.

HubSpot’s buying process can be annoying

HubSpot is a large company, and the sales experience can be hit or miss depending on which sales rep you get. They are open to a lot of negotiation, which can be a good thing or bad thing depending on your needs. While we appreciate when a SaaS company makes the buying process easy, being able to negotiate can play to your advantage if there’s only one feature you need from a different tier or Hub, or if you’re willing to bundle product Hubs, pay annually, or sign a long-term contract.

With a lot of marketing contacts, HubSpot Marketing Hub can be expensive

The vast majority of companies won’t experience this scaling issue. If you want to actively market to 10,000+ contacts you’ll end up spending ~$3,600 per month. Fortunately, Sales Hub doesn’t have this same problem and is much more affordable for marketing teams at scale (~$120 per user for 10+ users).

HubSpot CRM features that will revolutionize your sales process

To be successful, sales teams must have a written, enforceable, transparent, and efficient sales methodologies. The last two qualities, transparency and efficiency, are not possible without CRM features like the ones we’ve listed below.

HubSpot CRM features that help create transparency:

1. Two-way email sync through the HubSpot Sales Extension

This feature, which is available for both free and paid users, is one of the simplest ways to create transparency for your team. When enabled, the HubSpot Sales extension automatically syncs all incoming and outgoing email, whether through Gmail, Outlook, or any other provider, to the corresponding contact or company in the CRM. Once this is running in the background, conversations with leads and existing customers are all recorded and accessible, making it easy for anyone to get up to speed in less time if needed.

2. HubSpot Calling and/or VoIP integrations

HubSpot calling can be a great option if outbound calls aren’t a huge part of your sales process. Each HubSpot Sales Hub tier includes a block of minutes each month (HubSpot Sales Hub Starter – 500 minutes, Sales Professional – 3,000 minutes, and Sales Hub Enterprise – 12,000 minutes), so if you’re only occasionally reaching out to customers or prospects, this might be enough to meet your needs.

When call recording is enabled, HubSpot will record every call and attach the recording to the contact record, which allows for call review and coaching, as well as the ability to listen to past conversations, which is ideal for transparency.

If you have a sales team making hundreds of calls per day, you’ll probably want to go with a VoIP that integrates well with HubSpot, like Aircall or Kixie. These more robust platforms create transparency through automatic call logging and recording, along with queues, power dialers, and other high-volume calling tools.

HubSpot Sales Hub easily connects to HubSpot Customer Service Hub to provide real-time customer support with live chat or chatbots.

3. Detailed sales analytics and custom reporting

HubSpot has solid reporting tools for both the free CRM tier and Sales Hub starter. HubSpot Sales Hub Professional and Enterprise users have access to even more robust reporting options, along with sales analytics that will help you to keep a pulse on the effectiveness and productivity of your salespeople.

Detailed activity reports and customizable dashboards mean that every member of your sales team can stay in the loop and aware of the personal and team activity metrics that will directly lead to their success.

HubSpot CRM features that improve efficiency:

Efficiency is the effort required from sales reps when moving deals through the sales process, from lead scoring to the moment you close deals. Too often, sales reps end up spending too much time on repetitive or even unnecessary tasks. By becoming more efficient, your team will be able to spend more time actually selling. Time and time again, we’ve seen that sales team efficiency translates into increased revenue.

HubSpot Sales Hub offers multiple tools to improve rep efficiency. Below, we’ve listed a few of our favorites.

1. Streamline sales emails with templates and snippets

Unlike mass email marketing templates, HubSpot sales email templates and snippets are designed for personalized, one-to-one sales emails. Creating templated emails instead of re-inventing the wheel every single time you need to reach out to a lead or customer is one of the easiest ways to increase efficiency. Canned snippets are similar to templates, but are intended for bite-sized chunks of information like specific legal terms or responses to frequently asked questions.

2. Keep leads from falling through the cracks with automated follow-up

When it comes to sales, it’s all about the follow-up. On average, only 2% of sales are made during the first point of contact. That means if you don’t follow up, even with a simple follow-up email, you’re missing out on potentially 98% of your sales. That’s no small amount.

But even knowing that follow-up is key, it’s far too easy for reps to let leads fall through the cracks. Fortunately, with HubSpot Sales Hub it’s easy to automate follow-up tasks based on time since last contact, lead behavior, and even deal stage. Sales automations are available for Sales Hub Starter to Enterprise users, so there’s no excuse for not using them to create tasks and follow-up reminders.

3. Be more consistent with sales outreach using sequences

Out of all the sales engagement tools that HubSpot Sales Hub offers, sequences might be one of the most underrated. Many confuse sequences with an auto-drip campaign, but in HubSpot sequences are actually semi-automated cadences that enable you to reach out to leads in a varied and intentional way throughout your sales process.

Basically any sales outreach activity – 1:1 emails, calls, texts, and LinkedIn messaging, along with other task reminders, can be added to a sequence with natural delays between each step.

Here’s an example:

  • Day 1: Send LinkedIn connection request + send first cold email
  • Day 2: If LinkedIn connection is accepted, send first LinkedIn message
  • Day 5: Send second cold email
  • Day 8: Send second LinkedIn message
  • Day 10: Send third cold email
  • Day 11: Make first phone call
  • Day 16: Make second phone call

If a lead responds to an email, or schedules a meeting from your scheduling link, HubSpot can automatically unenroll them from the sequence so that you can continue the conversation organically.

Sequences are only available to HubSpot Sales Hub Professional and Enterprise users, but are definitely worth considering if your team is doing a high volume of sales outreach.

More HubSpot Sales Hub features we love to use:

  • Custom properties – this allows you to track and report on the specific sales and customer data that matters to you and your business.
  • Multiple deal pipelines – you can use each deal pipeline for a different product or sales process.
  • Meeting scheduler – send contacts a link so they can easily book meetings at a time that works for their schedule.
  • Personalized emails – use dynamic fields in templates to easily create personalized emails in seconds.
  • Email tracking – get unlimited notifications when contacts view and click on tracked emails.
  • Lead rotation automation – distribute incoming leads fairly to each member of your sales team.
  • Sales pipeline automation – automatically create deals and move them through the sales pipeline based on pre-defined criteria.
  • Document library – store and share documents with trackable links so you have clear data on which pieces of sales collateral are converting.

How to choose between Sales Hub Starter, Professional, and Enterprise

With all of the bells and whistles that HubSpot has to offer, it’s not always obvious what Sales Hub tier will best serve your needs. While each situation is unique, there are some general guidelines that will help point you in the right direction.

HubSpot Sales Hub Starter

This extremely affordable HubSpot tier gives you everything you need in a basic CRM, while allowing room to grow and expand down the road.

Choose HubSpot Sales Hub Starter if:

  • You only need basic CRM functionality without automations or in-depth reporting
  • You’re working with a small team and limited budget
  • You’re just starting out, but want to be prepared for significant growth in the near future.

HubSpot Sales Hub Starter might not be the right fit if:

  • You need to automate sales processes or create custom reports
  • You need multiple deal pipelines

HubSpot Sales Hub Professional

While this HubSpot tier jumps up in price, there’s also a significant increase in what you can do with Sales Hub Professional.

Choose HubSpot Sales Hub Professional if:

  • You want to increase sales rep efficiency by automating follow ups and task reminders
  • You need sequences, sales analytics, and playbooks
  • You need lead scoring and automated lead rotation

HubSpot Sales Hub Professional might not be a good fit if:

  • You want to organize users in teams
  • You need custom objects, custom goals, or predictive lead scoring
  • You’re integrating with Salesforce or a custom API

HubSpot Sales Hub Enterprise

HubSpot Sales Hub Enterprise allows you to do pretty much anything you can imagine with your CRM, but it’s not cheap. HubSpot Sales Hub Professional will meet the needs of 99% of non-enterprise sales organizations, but there are a few reasons you may want to choose enterprise.

Choose HubSpot Sales Hub Enterprise if:

  • You have multiple sales teams and sales managers
  • You need conversation insights, custom objects, or custom goals
  • You want to automate almost everything from sequence enrollments to predictive lead scoring
  • You need to integrate with Salesforce or a custom API

Bottom line:

Whether you have an established sales team or are just starting out, HubSpot Sales Hub has the functionality and tools you need to manage your sales team, improve sales performance, and scale effectively.

AI Meeting Assistant Reviews

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I’ve been looking for the right meeting assistant for years. Excellent ones like Gong.io lead the industry but cost thousands per month and aren’t affordable for many startups or small businesses.

For the last month I’ve been testing out two new AI meeting assistants: Read.ai and tl;dv. Fully loaded, both cost $25 per month, per user (when billed monthly).

Here’s what both apps do:

  • Automatically record calls on Zoom and Google Meet by joining the meeting as an attendee.
  • Transcribe calls using GPT to make the transcriptions much more accurate than anything pre-AI.
  • Automatically save meetings with timestamps for takeaways, topics, or questions covered in the call. Click on what you’re interested in and it plays that portion of the call.

Here’s what you need to know about Read.ai:

  • Seems like it’s designed more for enterprise teams, or for managers reviewing rep performance en masse. Scores meeting performance and participation. Gives feedback on attendee engagement, talking pace, interruptions, non-inclusive terms, bias and more.
  • For each meeting it documents: summary, chapters & topics, action items, key questions. The chapters & topics are usually accurate and helpful, but nothing else.
  • Meetings often don’t record, or nothing besides the transcript is documented. Each time, support told me it was a bug they’re fixing.

Here’s what you need to know about tl;dv:

  • Simpler approach: meeting reports contain “takeaways” throughout the call. AI does a good job of recommending these, plus they place a button in your meeting client so you can manually set markers with one click during a call. Great for when you know in real-time that something is important.
  • Integrations for automatically logging calls and highlights in HubSpot, Salesforce or Slack.
  • Easily create clips of takeaways or other key moments and share them.

The Verdict

tl;dv is my new everyday meeting assistant. It’s reliable, accurate, and has already saved me hours of sifting through sales/client calls to find information.

Read.ai is good too but worked on less than 75% of my calls. It also seems like it’s made for monitoring employees. These features don’t take away from the experience, but the bugs do. I’ll try it out again in a few months to see if they’ve ironed out the issues and improved the quality of action items and key questions.

tl;dv is offering 30% off your first 6 months if you click this link.

Read.ai did not offer a discount for our subscribers.

How will AI impact the sales industry?

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Artificial intelligence (AI) is all over the news. Ever since the arrival of ChatGPT and AI art like Journey, everyone is asking one of two questions:

  • Will I be replaced by AI?
  • How can I use AI to get an edge?

Human sales reps won’t be replaced by AI anytime soon. AI can’t compete with humans when it comes to making phone calls, giving presentations, or providing a personal, confidence-inspiring sales experience. At least not yet.

Today’s buyers are the primary reason sales reps are safe for the time being. The technology will come, but when will humans be willing to interact solely with AI agents to close 6-figure deals? Similar to driverless cars, even if you’re told they’re safer, are you comfortable sharing the highway with 80,000 pound trucks driven by robots? People still prefer the company of other people.

So what is sales AI good for?

Today’s AI is incredible at comprehending language. This includes spoken languages and programing languages. This boils down to conditions and rules that, with enough training, AI can master. Since ChatGPT trained its AI model using pretty much the entire history of human text, it’s safe to say it’s receiving enough training. AI is excellent at researching as well.

Understanding language means AI can make the predictable aspects of sales much easier.

Digital sales experiences will change quickly. Well-trained AI can soon replace inbound reps who only work chatbots or inbound emails.

The same thing goes for operational sales processes like targeting or workflow automation. Targeting is a research task and automation is programming.

To clarify, the AI technology is already here (and improving rapidly), we’re more so waiting for companies to harness it and train it.

You can go on ChatGPT right now and teach it about your product, common objections and ideal responses, then have reps use those chat prompts to respond to leads. But, while that may improve response quality for some companies, it’s not convenient enough to be used at scale. We need products that interface with AI in order to use it at scale.

Here are some areas to keep an eye on:

  • Live Chat & Inbound Email — One of the most frustrating aspects of inbound sales is when reps find a way to mess up easy deals that should’ve been a quick close. AI does best with specific scenarios, reading and comprehension. So if buyers are coming to you ready to commit once you answer a few questions, AI can make a serious impact right away. One of my favorite prospecting tools, Reply.io has a conversational AI feature powered by ChatGPT that’s worth taking a look at.
  • Outbound Email — Writing personalized emails or introductions is time consuming, and most sales reps aren’t great writers. AI can do this much quicker than all sales reps, but the quality is inconsistent and therefore only better than some sales reps. Projects working on this include SalesGPT and Coldreach.ai but they’re not quite there yet. HubSpot is also working on an AI content assistant for prospecting emails, marketing emails and blogs.
  • Targeting — Check out this Twitter thread that uses ChatGPT to provide similar (if not better results) than a marketing research firm.
  • Operational Processes — Read.ai and tl;dv are AI meeting assistants that outperform non-AI competitors. Bardeen integrates in many ways that Zapier and Make can’t hack. Browse.ai replaces costly scraper bots capable of tracking your competitors websites and pricing. HubSpot’s ChatSpot (in beta) gathers reports and sends follow ups. All of these tools buy back more time for sales reps to sell.

This How Smart is ChatGPT graphic shows where AI lands in all major academic exams (99th percentile in the verbal GRE, around the 90th percentile in the reading & writing SAT, LSAT and bar exam.) I noticed a response saying this means AI is “only as good as a smart college kid.”

But hey, as long as it’s predictable and consistent, that’s not so bad.

How to Boost Your Sales on LinkedIn in 2023

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With over 900 million members worldwide, LinkedIn has become the go-to platform for professionals looking to network and connect with others in their industry. But did you know that it’s also a powerful tool for businesses looking to boost their sales?

That’s right! LinkedIn can help you reach potential customers, build relationships, and ultimately increase revenue.

Let’s go over six cutting-edge strategies to help you unlock the full potential of LinkedIn and take your sales skills to the next level in 2023.

1. Make your profile shine

In the world of business, first impressions matter, and your LinkedIn profile is no exception. Since your LinkedIn profile is frequently the initial interaction between you and prospective customers, optimizing it to leave a lasting impression is crucial.

To optimize your profile, start by ensuring that it’s complete. That means filling out every section, including your education, work experience, and skills. Make sure to include your current job title and a clear and concise headline that accurately reflects your area of expertise. This will help potential customers quickly understand what you do and whether you’re the right fit for their needs.

Next, it’s essential to use a professional photo. Choose a high-quality headshot that portrays you in a positive and professional light. Avoid using photos that are blurry, low-quality, or inappropriate. Remember, your photo is one of the first things people will see when they view your profile, so make it count.

Another key component of optimizing your LinkedIn profile is to write a compelling summary that highlights your unique selling proposition. This is where you can showcase your skills and experience, as well as your passion for your industry. Use your summary to demonstrate your expertise and explain how you can help potential customers achieve their goals.

Lastly, use relevant keywords in your profile to make it easier for people to find you. Think about the terms your potential customers might search for when looking for businesses like yours, and include those keywords in your profile. This will help your profile appear in search results and increase your visibility on the platform.

2. Smartly cast your net(work)

Connecting with your target audience is crucial to building meaningful relationships on LinkedIn — and you can’t make sales without establishing relationships first.

The first step is to use LinkedIn’s search feature to find potential customers who fit your ideal customer profile. This can include people in your industry, companies you want to do business with, or individuals with whom you share common interests.

When sending a connection request, it’s important to include a personalized message that explains why you want to connect. Avoid using generic messages, as they are less likely to be accepted. Instead, take the time to research the person you want to connect with and personalize your message accordingly to show that you are genuinely interested in connecting with them and increase the likelihood of them accepting your request.

Once you’ve connected with your target audience, it’s essential to engage with connections regularly. Comment on their posts and share valuable content that they will find interesting and relevant to establish yourself as a thought leader in your industry and build trust with your connections.

However, it’s important to remember that quantity doesn’t always equate to quality when it comes to LinkedIn connections. It’s important to manage LinkedIn connections carefully and keep your network relevant. You should regularly review your connections and remove those who are no longer relevant or active on the platform. That way, you can ensure that your network is focused on your target audience and increase the effectiveness of your sales efforts.

3. Ignite engagement with valuable content

Sharing valuable content on your LinkedIn profile is a great way to establish yourself as an industry expert, build trust with your connections, and ultimately boost your sales. When sharing content, it’s important to make sure that it is valuable and relevant to your target audience.

One effective way to share valuable content is to create and share your own blog posts, articles, and videos. These types of content allow you to showcase your expertise and share insights on relevant topics in your industry.

Another way to share valuable content is to curate content from other sources. Share articles, blog posts, and videos from reputable sources that are relevant to your target audience. When sharing content from other sources, be sure to add your own commentary or perspective to the post, which can help establish your own expertise and point of view.

4. Utilize the power of LinkedIn Groups

LinkedIn Groups is a powerful tool for businesses looking to build relationships with potential customers and establish themselves as thought leaders in their industry. Joining relevant groups helps you connect with others who share your interests and engage in meaningful conversations that can help you grow your business.

To utilize LinkedIn Groups effectively, first search for groups that are relevant to your industry or niche. You can do this by using LinkedIn’s search feature and filtering the results by group. Once you’ve found a group that looks interesting, join it and start participating in conversations.

Engage in conversations by commenting on posts, sharing your opinions, and asking questions. Engaging with posts in LinkedIn Groups will help you build relationships with other group members and demonstrate your expertise in your field. Additionally, sharing valuable content, such as articles or infographics, can help establish you as an industry expert and attract potential customers to your profile.

5. Add more value with LinkedIn Ads

LinkedIn Ads are a great way to reach your target audience on the platform. With LinkedIn Ads, you can target your ads to specific industries, job titles, and locations, making it easier to reach the right people. This targeted approach can help you save time and money on your advertising efforts and increase the effectiveness of your sales strategy.

When creating LinkedIn Ads, it’s important to use compelling ad copy and visuals that grab your audience’s attention. Your ad copy should be clear and concise, and highlight the benefits of your product or service. Additionally, your visuals should be eye-catching and relevant to your ad’s message. By doing so, you can increase the likelihood of your target audience engaging with your ads and ultimately converting into customers.

Finally, it’s important to set a budget for your LinkedIn Ads and monitor your spending carefully. This will help you ensure that your advertising efforts are cost-effective and align with your overall sales strategy.

6. Don’t forget to measure

Measuring your results is an essential part of any successful LinkedIn sales strategy. Tracking your engagement and reach allows you to determine what works and what doesn’t, and adjust your approach accordingly.

LinkedIn’s analytics tools provide valuable insights into your profile’s performance, allowing you to track your engagement and reach over time. These tools enable you to see how many people are viewing your profile, engaging with your content, and clicking on your links. When you monitor these metrics, you can identify which content performs well and adjust your strategy accordingly.

It’s also essential to track your conversion rates, which can give you insight into how effective your sales strategy is. This means tracking how many of your LinkedIn connections convert into customers and analyzing what factors may be influencing this conversion rate.

In addition to tracking your analytics, it’s also essential to pay attention to feedback from your connections and customers. Customer feedback will help you identify pain points, concerns, and opportunities for improvement in your sales strategy.

Wrapping up

LinkedIn can be a powerful tool for businesses looking to boost their sales in 2023. By optimizing your profile, connecting with your target audience, sharing valuable content, utilizing LinkedIn Groups, using LinkedIn Ads, and measuring your results, you can build relationships with potential customers and increase revenue.

With these six tips, you can make the most of LinkedIn in 2023.