If you want to close more, convert more prospects and close deals, you need to attract them through various marketing and lead generation campaigns and get them at the top of your sales funnel. If you don’t, all other efforts after that will be difficult.
But before we delve into the nitty-gritty of things, let’s define what the “top of the funnel” is. More too often, when executives and salespeople talk about the top of the funnel, they’re really talking about the top of the bottom of the funnel.
In other words, it’s the awareness stage — the phase of learning, understanding, and engaging. It’s about your perfect future client profile and his/her world. It is not about your products, solutions, sales pitches, or claims.
The top of the funnel is where demand is generated, so adding the right-fit leads at this stage is extremely valuable. The top of the funnel is also the best place where you separate your brand and offerings from your competition so that they won’t look at your competitors and other alternatives.
If you’re not adding new right-fit leads to your top of the funnel, you are losing a significant amount of revenue opportunities. As a sales rep, here are some tips on how to create this kind of value for your company.
Ask for conversations and introductions
Top-performing sales reps will tell you that if you want to increase your sales, you should not focus on sales at all.
Don’t be confused — generating sales is extremely important, of course. However, if you want to get your future ideal clients, you need to focus on having good conversations with the right people at the right companies.
In order to achieve this, you need to ask for introductions instead of referrals. If you have enough conversations with the right people, sales will just follow and it will be much easier.
It will put more people at the top of your funnel where you can nurture and educate them as well as solidify your relationships with them.
Help prospects first before selling
If you want to generate good conversations and attract only the right people, focus on helping your prospects first. Being helpful means not expecting anything in return.
When you focus on being helpful, prospects:
- Stop resisting
- Initiate the sales conversation faster
- Tell others about you. As a result, you get more conversations.
Being helpful, you engage with more people. And combine that with the right process, you get more leads at the top of your funnel.
Related: 5 Sales Enablement Strategies You Can Implement Within A Week
Use Emails to Create Top-of-the-Funnel Opportunities
A lot of businesses miss a lot of opportunities to produce top-of-the-funnel activity because they do not incorporate it in their emails. Billions of emails are sent by salespeople every day to acquire new sales opportunities. However, less than one percent of those emails are relevant to those who are not actively engaged in a potential buying process.
One of the most effective methods to attract right-fit leads is to include a top-of-the-focus in the prospecting emails you send. Focus on the key parts of content that are aligned with the focus on the email. Not only will you generate high-quality leads but increase open click and conversion rates.
Related: 8 Reasons Why Your Emails May Not be Converting
Ask More Questions
When you talk to a prospect who is full of objections, don’t hang up immediately. Instead, ask questions (not sales-related) that will help you understand them more. After that, offer them relevant content that will help them. If they agree, ask if they mind being added to your distribution list. Asking them more will also help you to personalize your message much better.
Build Relationships Using Social Media
If done properly, social media can be quite an effective tool to generate top-of-the-funnel engagement.
Instead of focusing too heavily on promotion or direct prospecting, focus more on being human. Share insights that will add more value to your prospects and create more meaningful conversations. Use social media to build relationships and soon it will pay off with more sales and opportunities.
Related: How to Improve your Sales Prospecting on LinkedIn in 3 Simple Steps
Turning Opportunities into Sales
The tips above are very helpful but proper execution is critical in turning opportunities into revenues. To make it happen, your sales rep should know the process that’s going to be used. That will help them be aware of the process as well as its impact and value. Your sales team has more opportunities to produce meaningful engagements at the top of the funnel.
