1. Personalization - #1 Trend Personalization of every outreach message and interaction with your prospects is the number one trend companies need to keep their eye on, as 2020 is expected to be
the year of personalization in lead generation. This technique has been gaining popularity in the past few years but there is still not a very high level of personalization seen in outbound prospecting.
Smart Insights reports that it is "
key to improving lead generation quality for 60% of marketers". According to another survey,
47% of marketers will be focusing on improving the quality of their leads through personalization in 2020, making it the most popular strategy to explore (SageFrog Marketing Group).
To leverage the full power of this approach, companies need to be truly personal in their outreach to prospects. But where to start? Get to know your prospects and customize your message for each one accordingly. If there is one thing you should remember, it's that the days of one-size-fits-all sales prospecting are over.
2. Build Recognition It's far easier to sell a product to someone who already knows you, right? Luckily, fostering relationships with customers is not that hard when everyone's on social media.
Being active on your prospect's social media feed will help you engage them and establish trust before your initial outreach. Keeping track of their social activity can aid not only your personalization efforts, but if you consistently drop comments under their posts, you can really show that you are investing in the relationship.
Just getting your name and company logo recognized will give you a big advantage over competitors in the eyes of prospects. We believe we'll be seeing a lot more attempts of building recognition on social media in the upcoming year by most B2B companies.
3. Build Trust This is one of those things that are easier said than done. However, having trust is an integral part of sales success. A foolproof way of establishing trust with your customers is by investing your time and effort in
building your personal brand on social media. More and more sales leaders are turning to personal branding, especially on
LinkedIn, to create credibility that will boost their conversion rates. When done successfully, the benefits will extend to the whole company, which will then be associated with the sales leader's expertise and brand.
According to Social Examiner's 2019 Social Media Marketing Industry Report, more than
70% of marketers who've been using social media for more than 12 months report it helped them
improve sales and more than
91% see an increase in exposure. That's why building trust through developing your personal brand on social media is something to consider when re-evaluating your lead generation strategy for the next year.
4. Personalized Video As sales professionals are constantly coming up with creative messaging ideas to differentiate themselves, we foresee personalized video being on the rise in 2020. Personalized video is all video content that relates specifically to your prospect, their professional interests and needs.
One-to-one videos hold a great deal of potential for the communication between companies and sales prospects. It provides the opportunity to
deliver a unique message tailored to the customer and
present your business in an engaging way. It's
next level personalization. Salespeople need to be ready for this new trend if they want to stay relevant. A high-quality individual video can go a long way and make prospects legitimately excited about your offering!