How to get more Yes’s and less No’s in your sales outreach and generate more leads with each conversation.

Life is all about ups and downs. Sometimes it might seem like we are more down than up, but whatever the situation, we must pull ourselves together and get back on the rollercoaster called life.

We know, we know… sometimes life seems to get bad on all fronts and that all hope is lost. Our career is somehow stagnant, our personal life seems like an armistice, and the list goes on. The truth is when one ‘department’ of our life takes a bullet, the whole system begins to shut down.

Much like in business.

That’s why it’s of the essence to keep balance. And ask for help. There’s no shame in saying that you need a hand. Especially when it comes to outreach. Reaching out to strangers is not a walk in the park. Chances are, we’ll face rejection at every step of the outreach process. Yes, the prospecting road is full of twists and turns. No wonder we call it cold outreach. It can be quite a lonely, cold road.

We are not saying that it’s going to be easy. But there are some things we can do to lower the chances of getting rejected. We have a couple of tricks up our sleeve to help you get more Yes’s and less No’s. So let’s see what we can do to make those cold leads warmer?

Start with a Smarter Approach

Do you still do your lead generation manually? Yes, the manual approach gives us the feeling of having greater control. Plus, if something goes wrong, we only have ourselves to blame. But also, only ourselves to rely on.

Being part of the fast-paced sales world, we are well aware of how precious time is. That’s why we need to make the most of it. Luckily, it’s safe to say that we don’t have to do everything manually anymore when outreach is concerned. Instead, we can do it the smart way. We can make time and technology work in our favor. Put our faith into outreach automation tools, so we can spend valuable hours analyzing data and closing clients.

There are many tools that can help us get the warm leads we all so want. And they can all fit perfectly like pieces of a puzzle throughout the prospecting process. First things first, we don’t think we exaggerate when we say this is every LinkedIn outreach practitioner’s favorite tool – the very famous LinkedIn Sales Navigator.

Using LinkedIn Sales Navigator is a very effective way of getting more No’s than Yes’s. Wondering how? By pre-qualifying your leads, of course. Using Sales Navigator’s many filters like location, size, industry, revenue, and so on can smooth out our targeting. This way, you’re already filtering all the No’s without having to do any work and will be starting with pretty warmer leads.

Once you make a solid database of prospects with LinkedIn Sales Navigator’s help, you will need to decide on an outreach platform. Most businesses prefer using LinkedIn and email. And we all know why. But do the majority implement some automation tool? We hardly think so.

That’s why it’s wise for you to bring into play some of the various specialized tools that can help you master your outreach game. Let’s start with LinkedIn. If you are a startup, an agency, or simply a part of a sales team, you can get one step ahead of the competition by using some safe and effective tool for LinkedIn Automation.

If you are having doubts, and think that it’s more trouble than it’s worth, then do think twice. You can do so much more and spend less time with the help of these tools. Creating and scheduling multiple outreach campaigns will be a breeze. What’s best, you won’t have to worry whether you’ll remember to send that follow-up. The tool can send them in your stead.

And if you are afraid that you’ll sound like a robot, so your prospect will recognize that you’re using an outreach tool, don’t you worry for a second. The great LinkedIn outreach tools have the option of hyper-personalization. So your prospects will have no clue that you’re not manually writing to them. What a relief!

You know what else is comforting? Having the reporting taken care of. Yes, if you use an outreach tool, you’ll no longer have to spend hours searching for data and inserting everything manually in a spreadsheet. Talking about playing smart and getting more Yes’s in the long run.

The same goes for email outreach. There are a plethora of tools that can make your cold email outreach a lot easier. And all the best ones come with similar benefits. Their main goal is to save yourself a huge amount of time and get complete reporting so you can work on making your outreach even more profitable.

Know how to complete a client consultation

Filtering the qualified leads on LinkedIn gets you one step ahead of the curve. With the helping hand of an outreach automation tool, you can even book some meetings right away. But that doesn’t mean that you can’t get one more No. The most important one. The crucial one. The one that makes all the difference is whether your cold prospect will turn into a paying client.

As you might imagine, things are getting more complex by the minute in our modern world. And so do prospects. Which only complicates buying decisions. It’s no wonder that we all have diverse wants and needs. No matter if we are talking personal or business. You’ve certainly noticed that prospects are hesitant to share information. And yet, they have unlimited access to solution details online.

It goes without saying that to provide value to our leads, we need to start asking good questions. Actively listening to the answers will ultimately get you more Yes’s and less No’s.

Wondering what are some of the questions you could ask? How about a nice list?

  • “Can you tell me a bit more about you and your company?”
  • “What does your role entail?”
  • “What are your short-term and long-term goals?”
  • “What is your priority right now?”
  • “What problem are you trying to solve?”
  • “Are you currently using some solution to solve this problem? If so, how does that work for you?”
  • “What do you think is the source of the problem?”
  • “What are your desired outcomes?”
  • “What do you think are your team’s greatest strengths and weaknesses?
  • “What type of tools do you use in your usual workday?”
  • “What is your priority right now?”
  • “What deadlines are you currently up against?”
  • “What do you look for in the companies you do business with?”
  • “How can I help make this easier?”

Fair warning, this list can serve you in directing the conversation. But don’t stick to it blindly. Listen to what your prospects have to say, and ask your follow-up questions accordingly.

Regardless of where you communicate with your leads – LinkedIn, email, or you have them on a call, making sure you ask the right questions is part of the sales puzzle. Researching your prospects, qualifying them, asking the right questions, and listening to their answers will surely get you the much wanted Yes’s.

Show Them it Works

So now, you have your prospect’s attention. You got them further down the sales funnel. You asked the right questions and figured out they are actually in need of your solution. Now, you need to show them your solution works and that they can’t go wrong by choosing you.

This is where the social proof comes in. Social proof (also called informational social influence) is essentially based on the idea that people copy the actions of others in an attempt to imitate behavior in certain situations. For instance, when people shop, they look for reviews, recommendations, testimonials that others have used a product before making their buying decision. You must have noticed LinkedIn’s recommendation section.

As a matter of fact, 91% of potential buyers read at least one review before purchasing a product, business, or service. By successfully using social proof, you convey to potential clients that buying your solution is the safe thing to do. Given that most of us don’t enjoy taking risks, we increase our chances of getting more Yes’s and less No’s by lowering the perceived risk associated with purchasing our solution.

So how can we do this? By kindly asking our current clients to leave their reviews and testimonials so we can share them as social proof in our lead generation efforts. By crafting insightful case studies where we’ll proudly present the results we’ve achieved for our clients. And, of course, if you’re selling a product, give a free demo whenever possible to show your potential clients how your product actually works.

Share Content

Lead generation is just one part of the equation. In order to get more Yes’s and less No’s, we need to spend time, resources, and energy nurturing our leads as well.

Throughout your career, you might have noticed that many companies perceive content solely as a marketing tool. But we do think this is wrong. Given that it can take around 10 touchpoints to deliver a qualified sales lead, it’s clear as day that content plays a vital role in lead nurturing during the wearisome sales process.

That’s right. We need more than just LinkedIn, a sales proposal, and a contract to get that Yes and close the deal. We need content that will support our lead generation and nurture. Content that will help us convert more cold prospects into warm leads.

Content can make things a bit more complicated. You need to pay attention and tailor it to the buyer’s journey. Yes, you need a different type of content to stimulate leads that are stuck in different parts of the sales funnel. So be careful when you share your case studies, e-books or even simple one-pagers.

And remember, attaching content your prospects can consume in their own time increases the chances they’ll think about you even after you finish talking to them. Linking them to online content is another way to go. Don’t forget to add your most attractive content or social media buttons to your email signature. They can do wonders.

Share Numbers

Storytelling and sharing content can touch your prospects’ hearts. But what about their brains? Do people make decisions based on emotions or logic? Well, the neurological research so far says that we make emotional decisions and rational justifications. Yes, we feel compelled to justify our emotional choices with rational reasons. And this is where numbers come in.

What can be more rational than numbers? No matter how much we loathed that math class, we can’t deny its importance. Sales, costs, revenues, performance, targets – they are all connected with numbers. And business executives love their numbers. They show them not just what your product can do but what type of results they can expect. It comes as no surprise that numbers can influence decisions related to buying, performance, investments, and effectiveness, among other things.

So don’t think twice. Whenever possible, always include numbers to emphasize the impact your solutions has had on your current and past clients. Arm your case studies with stats. And don’t shy away. You can show some stats on your website and LinkedIn profile as well. Like how many clients you’ve helped, how many years of experience you have, how much is the average ROI of your clients. You get the gist. Whilst a picture can paint a thousand words, numbers talk hard facts. And as the old saying goes, numbers never lie.

Review Your Strategy and Improve your Approach

Start with LinkedIn prospecting, set the outreach automation tool, nurture the leads, share content… This must be the time when you can kick back and relax. The clients will come knocking any time now. They probably will. But will they be enough? Don’t you want to grow your company? Don’t you want even more warm leads?

We’ll go on a hunch here and assume you answered yes. At the end of the day, you are reading a blog post for getting more Yes’s and less No’s. So the question is, how can you improve? The cold prospecting is a tiresome process, although pretty effective if done right. But because of its complexity, rarely anyone stops to think about how it can be done better.

Well, this is where the reviewing part comes in. If you have been doing cold prospecting for some time, reviewing your work will come in handy. You have probably set some goals and KPIs, so it’s time to figure out how to reach or even increase them. You can start by measuring and analyzing all the data you’ve gathered. Once you identify the problems or the areas you shine in, you can optimize your cold outreach efforts accordingly. Focus on fixing the outreach domains you underperform in, but also ascertain your outreach strengths.

Taking a step back and trying to perceive your lead generation processes as an outsider can give you a different perspective. Having an unusual viewpoint can help you identify your weaknesses and figure out potential solutions.

Conclusion

Getting rejected is hard. Hearing a prospect say No can be devastating. No matter how much we say to ourselves that the prospect was cold, we always feel like we could have done something more. Luckily, we can work on getting more Yes’s and less No’s.

Leads get stuck in various parts of the sales funnel. We need to figure out the best ways to push them down the funnel. We’re confident that the 6 tips we provided will help you master your outreach game. Turning a cold prospect into warm lead often requires a lot of hard work. But it is worth it!

So take our advice, play it smart. There’s no reason for you to do all the heavy lifting, considering all the technological advancements. LinkedIn and automation tools will always be here to save the day.

You will catch your prospects’ attention by asking the right questions and showing exactly how your solution works. By sharing relevant content and backing it up by numbers, you will certainly keep it.

But don’t stop here. Take a step back and review your progress. Measuring and analyzing data is the only way you will skyrocket your outreach sales.

Do you feel ready to turn that No into a Yes?