B2B Appointment setting services
To know about Sales Consulting Services
Prospecting has always been de-prioritised by enterprise sales reps
Enterprise Sales is chaotic.
Here’s what a typical day for an enterprise sales rep looks like:
Generating leads, Cold calls, Client meetings, Drafting proposals, Negotiations, Preparing contracts, Onboarding, Post sales service to clients, Sales reporting, CRM updates, client escalations the list is endless.
Further, most of these tasks have some internal dependencies on other departments which requires coordination. Add to that clients and superiors are always looking for quick replies. It is hard to plan one’s day in enterprise sales.
While juggling between these varied tasks for existing clients, immediate closures, reporting etc. sales people almost always de-prioritize prospecting.
Covid-19 pandemic has further increased the need for prospecting well
The pandemic has affected different B2B industries differently. However there are some broad learnings
- Clients are more open to online meetings than before; lesser travel has meant more time to do productive work.
- Online meetings have largely been more efficient ( lesser time), the jury is still out on the effectiveness of these vs face to face meetings.
- B2B buying except for a few categories has slowed down. Buyers are more cautious to commit to spends, sales cycles are being stretched as decision making slows down and prospects postpone spends.
- Meetings are rescheduled or canceled more frequently as people grapple with health issues and adjust to working from home.
Enterprise sales reps are having to build a bigger top of the funnel to meet their targets.
Field sales teams do 30% better when supported by inside sales
Phew! Moreover internal dependencies on other departments for these tasks and client expectations make it difficult to organize an overloaded workday.
Over time organizations have realized that sales people struggle to prioritize between these tasks. They now carve out specialized teams to handle specific tasks during the sales process.
Prime examples of this include customer service or customer success executives that get assigned to when you sign up for a service or when you raise an issue. Another common application of this principle has been in sales coordinators or sales support teams which help sales people with their documentation tasks.
“Phew! Moreover internal dependencies on other departments for these tasks and client expectations make it difficult to organize an overloaded workday.”
Specialization is the key to higher deal velocity in B2B sales
These efforts are meant to free up a sales person’s time so that most of it can be spent talking to new clients. Integral to this desired outcome is the concept of inside sales or pre sales teams. Their sole objective is to set up conversations with qualified prospects for the sales team.
Established B2B organizations have the luxury to develop these capabilities in house. They have a sophisticated setup spanning lead sourcing, content creation, reach outs, campaign monitoring etc.
For smaller B2B sales organizations, setting up an inside sales team might not always be feasible. They often have to rely on external appointment generation companies.
Industry Focus
We help you reach out to key decision-makers in organizations across the following industries
Outsourced B2B Appointment setting
There are several B2B lead generation and appointment setting services available in the market.
‘Lead generation’ companies usually provide services spanning across website SEO, digital marketing, cold calling on data bases, cold emails etc. Their deliverables usually include sourcing a name & contact number of a relevant person from the organization you are targeting. This is a good source of leads if you have a sales team which can process these and filter out the right ones for your business. However if you do not have a large internal team to cater to this.
Appointment setting companies rely on existing databases and some existing relationships to enhance your SAAS lead generation. They are expected to go a step further and give a brief about your product and set up a conversation with the decision makers. These campaigns work out if the agency has worked with similar products and buyer personas.
Effective B2B appointment setting requires two things to work out
Firstly, you should be able to target the right organizations and the appropriate decision makers within them. Most B2B appointment setting companies which rely on digital marketing fail on this count of SAAS lead generation. Digital ad platforms offer limited selection criteria for targeting; one rarely gets to select the organization or designations that one wants to target. Even a carefully designed campaign therefore doesn’t always reach the right decision makers.
Secondly, B2B buyers often need more than one contact point or interaction before considering a conversation. They usually want to go through some product decks, relevant case studies and assess the applicability of the solution before they agree to a meeting. Any appointment services company needs to be capable of handling these initial interactions in a professional way so that the lead is nurtured well.
At the Sales design institute, we specialize in the linkedin appointment setting. Our B2B appointment setting services rely on carefully charting out the target audience, both in terms of organizations( industries, size, location etc.) as well as specific buyer personas ( designations, functions, departments etc.). We co-draft the messaging with you keeping in mind the c-suite audience we are reaching out to. Click baity emails or fancy marketing taglines do not work with this set of buyers. These messages need to be razor sharp in articulating our value proposition without being ‘salesy’.
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Frequently Asked Questions
1. What is B2B appointment setting & how does it work?
B2B appointment setting is the process of setting up conversations with key decision makers in your target audience. B2B appointment setting companies typically create & execute an outreach plan keeping in mind your target audience. Positive responses from this outreach are nurtured by answering their questions and providing relatable and engaging content. Once the prospect shows interest for further more detailed conversations the lead is passed on to your sales team.
2. How does SDI get qualified prospects for us?
Sales Design Institute relies on professional networks like LinkedIn to generate qualified B2B leads. Our B2B lead generation and appointment setting services work on a pre approved list of organizations based on our understanding of your target market. Further we work on specific c-suite designations which could be decision makers in your buying process. Once a prospect responds we engage with them by answering their basic questions as well as explaining our offering & its benefits in brief. The initial screening of accounts and profiles and interactions using your sales collateral ensures that only qualified prospects are passed on to your team.
3. How do I track the progress of my lead generation campaign?
Our Linkedin appointment setting process is built to provide complete visibility and transparency to clients. Apart from weekly reports on outreach done, responses and conversations setups you also have live access to all responses from clients. This provides you with an early sense of how the campaign is progressing, what clients are liking and what they are not and other insights to the demand generation SAAS. Our account managers have in depth experience of over 100 such b2b appointment setting campaigns and are always around to provide you with actionable insights and suggestions on what can be done better.
4. How is this different from other forms of lead generation?
Traditional b2b lead generation and appointment setting services rely on two major channels; Cold emails and cold calls and online advertising. Cold emails, calls were effective until a few years ago. However over time, B2B buyers are refraining from engaging with sales people approaching through cold calls and emails. This is evident from the alarmingly low open rates and response rates to email and calling campaigns.
Advertising on social media platforms like Facebook/Instagram is not as relevant for B2B sales. These merely help you generate likes/ shares but do not impact your sales funnel. Search advertising (eg. Google) does provide high intent leads. However typically these connect you to junior resources within the organization tasked with finding possible vendors. For modern disruptive products, one needs to engage with senior stakeholders to present them the value proposition.
Our appointment setting approach relies on directly engaging with senior stakeholders across organizations and providing them with relevant information about your product. This lets you avoid ‘gatekeepers’ and provides an opportunity to present your offering directly to the decision maker.
