How to get an introduction


when prospecting for B2B services?


Little nightly thoughts
by Business Exploration

Dear Fellow Innovator,

You reached Flavio's blog on Business Exploration.

Ask


"You get only what you ask for"
Ask, if you want more hints!

When your B2B services purchase is decided by only one person,
that decision impacts mainly his/her goals:
whether long term ( career ) or short term ( user experience ).

In this case, the options to reach this person out,
squeeze down to "get an introduction".

This map may help to spot the main ways to grab
your decision maker attention.

Hope this helps,
Flavio


Getting an introduction to the purchasing manager:

If you are targeting a "single" decision maker, you are basically:

competing for his/her attention, :

You just have two options:

  • You get an introduction
  • You leave it to the competition
    wheter the "do nothing" or the actual Competition.

(and, by the way, if you do have competition, then you can observe how do they get an introduction...)

You can be introduced or you can introduce yourself:

You can introduce yourself by:

  • Cold Calling
    not recommended if you are not a cold call professional and/or you have a huge customer base, for your learning curve.
  • e-Mail
    on top of being a professinal copywriter, your proposition shall be a Unique Selling Proposition.
  • Direct Mail
    also here you need a professional, well experienced in Direct Mails campaigns, but you can count on the lure of the hardware envelope - almost unresistable to openinig
  • Jumping in
    as strange as it may sound, I have seen big orders land because a sales manager popped in the reception of a Company without appointment.

Or you can be introduced by a trusted channel:

A trusted media is a trusted channel, if trusted by the decision maker:

  • Social media
    In today's world, everybody is within the 3dt ring of reach.
  • Platforms
    once called paid media, they require professionals to get results
  • Venues
    Hunting at expositions, conferences, celebrating events is still a seller favorite sport.
  • Distributors
    a market (place) can be online or offline.

The goal is not to use the media, but to get an introduction by the person in charge of the media. Ask the conference organizer an introduction!

A trusted person is a trusted channel too. Think to:

  • Buyer's colleagues
    A collegue may introduce you, if your service simplify his work, or is part of a larger scope in his work.
  • Former colleagues
    you can tap in to retired personnel, for an introduction.
  • Peers: who have experience of your services
    can be existing customers or belonging to a Community that you are committed to.
  • Peers: Allies that have an interest in packaging your service
    like VAR - local value added resellers, HR providers, infrastructures providers, pure distributors
  • Peers: Distributors of the same category of services
    when and if this applies.
  • Veterans
    a long standing practice, hiring a customer's industry Veteran lends you his/her reputation and credibility, even if coming from a customer competitor.

Whatever channel you choose to be introduced,
you must have done your homework:

Address one market niche at time:

becomeing a recognized (trusted) player in each niche before to jump on the next:

  • Identify the targets
  • Leverage the industry Veteran to exploit the niche
  • Saturate the niche before to go mainstream
  • Use niche references to convince the next niche

Now that you have reached your Customer do not waste all the efforts you made:

Build an offer with a cue:

Your offer should alwasy include a "cue" of services capable to leave the door open with the client, whether or not you landed the main order:

  • Recurring training
    that can help the buyer's team grow and the buyer reach the MBO
  • Webinar series
    on latest trends and topics
  • Membership Access
    to inspiring ideas and usefull tools


Don't miss the next hint:


300 more templates and ideas:

find them in our booklet: "The Human Sales",
that Engineers, PHDs, Data Scientists an Technical People use since 2009
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