17 Tips to Take Your Prospecting Skills to the Next Level

to Take Your
Prospecting Skills
to the Next Level
17 Tips

2 | 17 Tips to Take Your Prospecting Skills to the Next Level ©️ RAIN Group
It’s challenging
for me to get into
prospecting mode
50%
Change Your Prospecting Mindset
Sixty-six percent of respondents agree that people in their organization
don’t dedicate enough time or energy to prospecting, according to our
Top Performance in Sales Prospecting research.
This means the majority of sellers believe their teams don’t prospect enough
while actively avoiding prospecting themselves.
When successful prospecting means stronger pipelines, more qualified
opportunities, and increased closes, our goal is to help sellers like you change
your mindset.
Use the 17 tips that follow as a roadmap to carve out time and focus on the
most impactful prospecting activities.
I procrastinate when
it comes to my
prospecting activities
56%
Prospecting is the
least appealing part
of what I do in sales
66%

01. Focus on quality, not quantity
To some degree, sales is a numbers game. But it’s not just about the
numbers. The key is to create quality conversations.
The best sellers have strict qualification criteria and don’t waste their time
with prospects who aren’t at the right level, companies that aren’t the
right fit, or buyers who don’t have the funds to spend. Top performers
work hard to find out this information early on so they don’t spend their
precious time on prospects who aren’t going to go anywhere.

02. Target effectively
The strength of your list and the precision of your targeting will determine
how successful your prospecting efforts are. Sellers often skip calling
decision makers in an effort to target someone lower on the organizational
chart and work their way up.
Instead, start with the person who can make the decision about purchasing
your products or services. Make sure your list is clean and ready to go
before you start or you’ll find that your day is lost in fits and starts.

03. Do your homework
Doing your research is essential to making the sales discovery
process as valuable as it can be.
For the meeting: Gather information from the buyer by asking
them to respond to a few questions sent in an email or survey so
you can make customized recommendations for their situation.
For the prospect: Review your contact’s LinkedIn profile, read the
company’s website and news coverage, check out public-facing
social media pages, and ask contacts who know something about
the company so you can deliver a high-impact experience.
For your tool box: Buyers may trust your offerings or company,
but if you don’t have a strong understanding of both your industry
and theirs, they won’t be likely to trust your guidance. You need to
know, for your industry and the buyer’s, the:

O Industry itself, including the players, associations,
and companies

O News of the day, and the competitive landscape

O Details of who’s rising and falling, and who’s
acquired whom

O Strengths of each competitor
Join groups, mailing lists, and associations; read what you should;
and make it a habit to become a well-informed industry insider.

It typically takes just as much time to seal a $25,000 deal as it does to sell a
$100,000 deal (or whatever the equivalent is for you). Why not invest your
time in getting more of the larger deals? Focus on bigger fish in your sales
and prospecting efforts.
04. Manage your time

When you’re selling virtually, every element of the interaction contributes to or
detracts from the buyer’s experience. This means you must carefully orchestrate
the entire experience from selling to technology.
Using visuals, audio, and content—such as video, screen shares, screen
annotation, and virtual whiteboards—creates an engaging experience for buyers
and helps you gain a virtual advantage over other sellers.
When prospecting virtually, think about:

O Video: Turn your video on. Even if the buyer doesn’t have their video on,
it’s easier for them to feel a connection with you when they can see you.

O Lighting: Reduce shadows on your face using purpose-built ring lights
and be aware of lighting changes from windows during the day.

O Sound: Get a high-quality microphone, test your sound, turn off
notifications, and remember to unmute.
05. Create your virtual advantage

Establishing a natural flow and space for conversation will help you build
personal connections in person and virtually. Start with the basics: say
hello, make eye contact, and break the ice with small talk. If you’re meeting
with multiple people, fill time with conversation while you wait for others to
show up.
Unless you can tell the buyer wants to jump into business with military
precision, do what you can to build rapport early in your time together. 
Learn more about building rapport in sales. 
06. Make time for rapport

No one wants to hear your capability pitch, your history, or your life story
right off the bat. They’re looking to find out how their lives can be enriched
by working with you. So give them something of value—information, industry
insight, expertise, or something else they can use—in your very first meeting.
Eventually you’ll sell your company, your offering, and yourself. At first, sell
the idea that their time will be well-spent if they elect to speak with you.
07. Offer value from the start

08. Answer the “why?” questions
In your communications and conversations, “why?” questions are circling
around your buyers’ minds. Specifically there are four whys you need to
answer for buyers:

O Why act? Why do I need your product or service?

O Why now? Why should I stop what I am doing to listen to you?

O Why us? Why is your product or service better than the competition?

O Why trust? Why should I believe you?
By being proactive and addressing these four whys, you build a strong value
proposition for why they should buy…now…from you.

Use a mix of broad open-ended, specific open-ended, and specific
closed-ended questions. You may already know what you need to know,
but asking open-ended questions can reveal opportunities you and the buyer
didn’t know existed. Plus, the questions you ask can help you demonstrate
your knowledge of the buyer’s industry, company, or issue. 
If possible, ask questions ahead of meetings, via email or survey. This will
get buyers thinking about their needs and equip you with information to dig
deeper in your meetings.
Ask both afflictions-based questions (pain) and future seeking, aspirational
questions about hopes, goals, and objectives. This will allow you to uncover the
broadest set of buyer needs.
09. Ask the right questions

10. Be an active listener
In recent research, only 26% of buyers report sellers are effective listeners. Yet,
buyers say this is one of the top factors influencing their purchase decisions.
Practice active listening by restating, inquiring further, and acknowledging the
implications of what the buyer says.
You don’t have to wait for a sales call to do this. Practice active listening in
your next meeting with a colleague or even over dinner with family or friends.
Active listening helps building connections and trust, as well as identifying
and solving problems.

Ultimately, your offer might be a particular type of software, technical
instrument, building materials, financial product, operations plan, or
marketing plan. But the interim offers—the offers you make, and they
accept, before they buy from you—must be crafted with the utmost care.
11. Make the right offer

12. Plan and secure your next step
Never leave a meeting or a conversation without a solid next step that’s
been agreed upon. Otherwise, you risk the buyer going silent and not
returning your calls or emails. Instead, schedule the next step on the spot.
If the next step is to send a proposal, let them know you’ll put a proposal
together, but you need to schedule a time during which you can walk
them through it. When a buyer makes a commitment on the spot
(putting the next meeting on their calendar), they’re much more likely
to follow through.

13. Avoid gimmicks
Always opt for a high-integrity approach. There’s no need to use tricks,
bend the truth, or cut corners to generate an initial conversation or close
the sale. Doing so will kill trust, which is essential for sales success. Don’t
do anything you wouldn’t feel comfortable telling your children when you
tuck them in bed at night.
14. Keep trying
It takes more attempts than most people think to get through to top
prospects. Sometimes you need to reach out seven, eight, nine, or more
times to get through to someone. That number goes up and down across
different industries and when you reach out to different titles.
One thing is true: it takes more attempts to get through to your buyers
than you think.

15. Test different approaches
You may need to try different forms of outreach to get through to prospects.
In our research, 82% of buyers reported accepting meetings with sellers who
proactively reach out to them. Cold calling can work well alone, but when
combined with mail (yes, we’re talking snail mail here), email, and LinkedIn,
your success rate typically increases.
Use a variety of touches to reach out to and warm up your prospects—and
make sure each touch has value in and of itself.
DOWNLOAD NOW
Download our guide, 5 Sales
Prospecting Myths Debunked.

16. Connect digitally
Strike up a conversation with buyers via email, LinkedIn, text, or other
messaging media. React to or comment on their public social media
posts. If you notice they belong to an industry group, consider joining
yourself—you might make even more contacts.
Building rapport virtually can be challenging.
Here are 20 Virtual Sales Relationship-Building Tips. 

17. Keep prospecting
You’ve heard the ABCs of selling: Always Be Closing. But just as important is
ABP: Always Be Prospecting. The best way to get over a lost sale is to move
onto the next sale in your pipeline. If your pipeline is empty, it’s much more
difficult to recover. Top performers are always working to fill the front end
of their pipelines by creating new conversations every day.
For prospecting tips, read 6 Keys to Prospecting Success. 

RAIN Sales Prospecting:
Create Conversations with Ideas and Insights
Nothing has changed more in sales in the last decade than prospecting. It’s more
difficult than ever to get through and set meetings with your buyers. If you want your
team to achieve top performance in sales prospecting, this is the program for you.
RAIN Sales Prospecting is designed to balance learning and application so your sellers
aren’t out of the field too long, plus it’s contextualized for your business and the sales
situations your sellers regularly face so it’s immediately applicable on-the-job.
Your team will:

O Apply learning in real-time to connect with prospects and set meetings

O Develop attraction campaigns that we work with you to develop for phone,
mail, email and social media

O Have access to cases, examples, and exercises tailored to your industry
and your buyer profiles
Click here to request a complimentary consultation 
RAIN Group Delivers
World-Class Sales Training

O Modular, multi-modal, and purpose-built for
the modern learner.

O Unique approach to driving behavior change
through training that we call Execution
Assurance.

O Focused on driving the business results
important to you.

O A transformational experience that
ensures the development, adoption, and
implementation of new skills.

O Action-oriented coaching prepares sellers for
real situations and provides direct feedback.
©️ RAIN Group

We help organizations:

O Enhance sales capability with award-winning sales training

O Design and execute strategic account management initiatives

O Increase effectiveness of sales management and coaching
Best IP: We study buying and selling relentlessly through the RAIN Group Center
for Sales Research. Our research and field work allows us to create industry-leading
intellectual property to help our clients achieve the greatest success.
Best Education System: We use the best education approaches, methods, and
technologies to make training work, stick, and transfer to the job.
Best Results: We make it our mission to drive value and achieve the highest client
satisfaction through excellence in quality and producing transformational results for
our clients.
raingroup.com | info@raingroup.com | 1-508-405-0438
Inc.
5000
Honoree
2021
RAIN Group Unleashes
Sales Potential

17 Tips to Take Your Prospecting Skills to the Next Level

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