Modern Outbound Part 3: 5 Outbound Sales Plays
Becca Eddleman
Outbound sales strategies require a multifaceted approach that starts with solid outbound plays.
If you follow along in The Modern Outbound Playbook, we first cover targeting and tiering to make sure you’re targeting the right people, then we cover the best practices for strong messaging through various channels.
Messaging is critical to hit on pain points and deliver a strong call to action, but using a variety of email, calls, video, and LinkedIn can be even more important.
Multi-channel, outbound sales strategies will help you create successful campaigns and elevate your professional presence.
So what are some step-by-step outbound plays? It’s hard to find valuable, tactical information on what content your play should include, the schedule, what channels and when, etc.
This post will cover five plays that you can start running tomorrow (pulled from our playbook).
If you’re ready to generate more meetings with these outbound sales plays, then let’s jump right in!
Play #1: Customer Obsessed
A primary component of outbound sales strategies is understanding your customers on a deeper level and gathering insights that can help you target new but similar accounts. Use this play for your top 20-50 current clients.
The goal.
Once you understand the buyer’s day-to-day, you can determine what they actually do and use this to identify other similar companies to sell into.
The best way to increase knowledge regarding your buyer is to create a Customer Info Doc. Jeremy Leveille with LeadIQ suggests including the following information:
- Account Name
- What they do
- Who they target
- Where they are located
- How many people work there
- Who their competitors are
- What their tech stack includes
This play also encourages you to track company job postings to understand employees’ day-to-day job duties better. This information will help you align your value proposition to their potential pain points.
Action items.
Implementing this play involves connecting and engaging on LinkedIn (we suggest Sunday evening-Thursday evening) for an on-going basis.
If you’re wondering what engagement on LinkedIn might look like, check out these three scenarios:
- Referrals: Ask for and give referrals.
- Job Changes: Congratulate them on the new job and ask to reconnect when they’re settled at their next company.
- Competitor Intel: Ask why they prefer your company over the competition and ask what they feel your company is missing.
Play #2: Personalize with LinkedIn
This play focuses on utilizing LinkedIn to engage with your prospects in a meaningful way. You should use this play with your top-tier personas and accounts.
The goal.
This second play aims to use LinkedIn Sales Navigator to personalize outreach, resulting in the creation of dynamic lists of potential clients. By leveraging prospect activity, you can apply it to your messaging for hyper-personalized engagement.
Action items.
Start by creating Saved Lists in Sales Navigator. Include target accounts, people who have changed jobs in the past 60 days, people who have posted in the last 30 days, and those who follow your company.
While direct messaging is important, comments and likes are equally valuable, so stay active and engaged.
This play works best during business hours (Monday morning-Friday afternoons) for about two weeks of engagement. Remember, this play is 90% personalized, very LinkedIn heavy, and has a series of steps to follow. More details in The Modern Outbound Playbook.
Play #3: Previous Customer
This outbound sales strategy should be used with 100 of your past top-tier customers in new roles. You can use the LinkedIn Sales Navigator filter called “Previous Company” to determine who fits this play.
The goal.
This play aims to engage with past customers who may have new opportunities for you based on their new roles.
If you have provided a positive experience in the past, they will likely be receptive to continuing a relationship with you in their new capacity at their new company.
Action items.
Create a saved list in Sales Navigator filtering for people who have changed jobs and were a top-tier client. Filtering for people who have posted on LinkedIn in the past 30 days is also a best practice, so you know they’re active, and it can give you more ammo when engaging.
Similar to Play #2, this play is very LinkedIn heavy and is 90% personalized.
Play #4: The Video Play
Lights, camera, action! Or just an iPhone will do.
According to Vidyard, video content has the highest return on investment for 51% of Sales and Marketing professionals, so it’s no surprise that we had to include a video play for top-tier personas and accounts. This component of your outside sales strategy will help you depart from traditional text-based emails and direct messages.
The goal.
This play aims to distinguish you from the crowd and stand out amongst the overflow of text-based emails and messages. Using one personalized video and one industry-specific video, you can connect and engage with many potential clients at scale.
Action items.
With these persona-based, hyper-personalized videos, you’ll want to engage with potential clients for about three weeks, sending during business hours (Monday morning-Friday afternoon).
A pro tip is to create a standard video to use mid-sequence to help you scale.
So what are you waiting for? You were born to be a star…well, at least a successful sales professional who maximizes the use of videos. If you need some inspiration for video content, check out Vidyard’s video inspiration hub.
Play #5: Warm/Active Nurture
When they don’t come running…this play in your outside sales arsenal is great for prospects who have moved through your top-tier sequence without responding. Don’t let them drop out just yet. It may just be bad timing.
The goal.
This play focuses on interacting with prospects who have gone cold and should be sequenced in a sales engagement platform. This play relies on solid, lengthier content and automation.
Action items.
This is a three-month play to churn out marketing content, case studies, customer stories, e-books, and other deliverables. Since this play is so long, an SEP is non-negotiable. If you’re already using the platform Outreach, prospect sequence states will help you keep track of these lengthier plays from a bird’s eye view. Check out this quick video to see how it works.
If these plays have you fired up and thinking about ways to improve your outbound sales strategies, then download “The Modern Outbound Playbook” for a deeper dive. The playbook will go into more detail and provide step-by-step guidance for most of these plays.
