Public Relations & Social Marketing Insight

When I discovered these two facts, I was shocked.

44% of salespeople give up after one follow-up.

80% of sales require five follow-ups.

In other words, 44% of salespeople aren't putting in 1/5 of the effort needed to close the deal. Too often we give up after one follow-up email, despite data proving that multiple follow-ups are required.  Yet persistence is only one lesson that can be learned from the following 107 sales statistics. There are countless others to be revealed.

Check out this SlideShare to sell smarter, stop wasting time on useless tasks, and start closing more deals in less time:...

According to a 2016 study from HubSpot Research, “Buyers Speak Out: How Sales Needs to Evolve,” prospects want to work with salespeople who can offer advice and expertise beyond just a description of product features.

Sixty-one percent of buyers say reps can provide a positive experience by providing relevant information. Roughly half of buyers appreciate when salespeople recommend multiple strategies beyond their business offering, and 45% want salespeople to be invested in their goals.In other words, prospects want to work with reps who understand their unique priorities, challenges, and industry landscape.

You can learn some of this information through traditional methods, such as asking your prospects directly and reading their company websites and blogs. But these sources won’t lead to all the answers you need. In addition, you can earn trust by beginning the sales conversation with an intimate understanding of the buyer’s business -- rather than relying on your meeting to get the facts. These five unexpected places you can research prospects will clue you in....

“The right thing at the wrong time is the wrong thing.” - Joshua Harris

Have you ever called a lead on a Tuesday morning and heard nothing, but tried that same lead two days later and they responded back almost immediately? That’s not luck -- there’s some science behind why this happened.

According to research from James Oldroyd and InsideSales.com, effectively reaching out to prospects comes down to one thing: timing. For example, did you know 4-5 p.m. had a 164% better connection rate than 1-2 p.m.? Or that connection rates drop by 400% if you respond in 10 minutes instead of five?

The following infographic reveals the best times and days to connect with respond to prospects. Science and data are starting to dominate sales. Are you keeping up?...

Most prospects have tens (or even hundreds) of pending LinkedIn invites to respond to -- which means that when they finally get to yours, it’s only getting mere seconds of attention.

And in such a short span of time, a single bad line can condemn your invite to the “ignore” pile. If you want your invites to get accepted, check out nine clunkers to never use again...

The Harvard Business Review reported cold calling is ineffective 90% of the time, and more recent research shows that less than 2% of cold calls actually result in a meeting. Assuming a 0.3% appointment-booking rate and a 20% win rate, it would take 6,264 cold calls to make just four sales.

15 Lead Generation Alternatives to Cold Calling

What can the modern business do to protect its future and get new leads without cold calling? The good news is that it doesn’t involve a circus act or shameless begging of any sort. The bad news is that it requires a completely different way of thinking and some serious energy and hard work. Here are 15 alternatives to cold calling salespeople can use to generate leads....