Which Ways of Lead Generation B2B Sales Leaders in 2022

Pervading digitalization and the consequences of the global pandemic have brought about continual change across industries including B2B sales. Plenty of new trends, such as hybrid selling, virtual events, and video prospecting, start to emerge and gain traction. One of the main challenges for the sales teams today is coping with the revolutionary changes that have been taking place within a short period of time. 

So, what are the key priorities for B2B sales leaders in 2022? Which technologies can organizations leverage to beat the competition? This article focuses on the major areas where salespeople should direct their efforts in order to succeed in the current year and the tools that might help them on the way.

Adopt Hybrid Selling

All of us have to face the fact that buying habits have irreversibly altered. Today, companies must be able to meet their customers everywhere they choose to interact with sellers. With the customer-centric approach becoming one of the buzzwords, organizations should transform their strategies, processes, and resources allocation to retain a competitive edge.  

Let’s take a look at the most widespread buying activities customers typically undertake. Numbers witness that most buyers prefer to conduct independent online research and/or to meet with buying groups.

This situation leads us to the concept of hybrid buying that becomes an indispensable part of B2B sales today. Hybrid buying is defined as a fusion of digital, self-service, and personal communication during a customer journey throughout the sales funnel. 

What does this mean to the salespeople?

• Be close to your clients. Deliver the information they need, in the way they want, and at the time they are ready to consume it. Furthermore, this information should be consistent throughout various channels. 
• Abandon the obsolete sales models. A traditional approach of managing only the top and the bottom of the sales pipeline is no longer efficient. According to modern customer behavior patterns, the marketing and sales departments should closely collaborate throughout the entire buying journey.

Build relationships 

Trusted relations with customers are at the core of the client-centric approach and make the foundation of the hybrid selling strategy. Salespeople should target strengthening their relationships with clients and supporting them during every stage of their interaction with the brand. Moreover, they should engage customers, provide value, and nurture business leads, thereby enhancing conversions.  

Email marketing is one of the efficient methods of personalized interactions with prospects. Whether you buy the lists of business leads or obtain them the other way, email is a great channel to engage users, educate them about your product, and make them interested in further communication. Whatever marketing goals you pursue, you should make sure your emails safely reach their recipients. In this regard, Belkins lead generation company offers superior software for email deliverability. 

• Spam checker, for instance, propels the efficiency of your outreach campaigns as the tool helps you avoid getting into the reader’s spam folder.
• Verifalia is another enticing solution for excellent email campaigns. It aids small businesses in B2B lead generation by checking email address validity.

Have a clear business lead prioritization policy

While trying to embrace multiple touchpoints with customers, sales leaders should clearly prioritize channels for business lead generation. Experts predict that by 2025, about 80% of B2B sales communications between buyers and sellers will take place through digital channels. The altering buying habits trigger the corresponding changes in the role of sellers. Today, sellers should proactively accompany their clients through multiple touchpoints, engage, deliver value, and build trust.

However, apart from considering the environment, sales leaders should take into account the specifics of their businesses when ranging the sources of B2B leads.

Focus on Talent

Whatever kind of B2B sales you are into, they are done by people. Your salespeople need the appropriate set of knowledge and skills to continue pushing your business forward. 

Have the right people at the right places

The changing environment dictates the need for the everlasting upgrade of the existing experiences, skills, and attitudes. In order to reach excellence in their job, modern salespeople need to expand their competencies. Those who want to confidently look into the future should be digitally adept, familiar with hybrid selling, and effectively use advanced technology.

However, apart from this, a successful salesperson should be extremely flexible and agile, since the worldwide change is hardly going to stop. Therefore, effective professionals should be ready to adapt and keep learning every day.

Increase the efficiency of your salespeople

No longer the role of B2B salespeople is limited to merely promoting their product or service. They should stay close to the prospects and facilitate their purchasing decision process. 

Thus, competent sales experts should adequately guide their potential customers, provide them with relevant information, support, and consult across channels as well as during face-to-face meetings. Therefore, leaders must educate and train their salesforce to ensure their employees are capable of handling virtual communication, feel comfortable using the selected digital channels, and successfully conduct meetings in person.  

Lay the Foundation for the Future

Once we have outlined the importance of digital competence, let’s reach a bit further, towards the role of artificial intelligence (AI) in B2B sales lead generation. AI is increasingly penetrating various industries with revolutionizing effects. Likewise, the technology can bring the B2B sales process to a new level, if applied thoughtfully. After all, AI is already being employed in sales to enhance business-to-business lead generation and reveal patterns that assist in making smarter, better-informed decisions. 

Although some may feel cautious about AI in the sense that it is going to supersede human force and eliminate jobs, in sales, experts expect AI rather complement and support the sales process. The comprehensive nature of B2B sales still dictates the need for human interference, although the sector can benefit from progressive automation.

The technology is rushing forward at a breakneck pace, so we may not even imagine in which ways AI will assist B2B sales in the future. 2022 is going to witness a variety of AI applications in sales. Companies that step on the experimentation path are likely to reach a competitive edge and maximize their advantages of the breakthrough technologies as they mature.

B2B Sales Leaders Strategy Options

In the modern ever-changing business landscape, yesterday’s sales strategies turn out to be absolutely inappropriate. To succeed tomorrow, organizations should transform strategies, approaches, and techniques. A customer-centered approach is fundamental to staying on the surge. But how to implement this approach properly in an extremely volatile environment? A comprehensive customer engagement is based on the three pillars:

• Situational awareness. A personalized approach is another buzzword in modern commerce. This approach should be realized through a deep understanding of the customer’s unique situation. These situations may have patterns that repeat across organizations, and it’s the task of sales and marketing teams to reveal and use them for lead generation.
• Multithreaded engagement. The customer journey in B2B sales is considerably more complicated than in B2C. Moreover, business customers may have numerous options and many internal stakeholders. The strategy of multithreaded engagement is aimed to integrate seller and digital experiences within the entire buying team. By enabling the access to consolidated information of the right people at the right time, the strategy helps to accelerate commercial decision-making.
• Commercial convergence. The strategy denotes a comprehensive alignment among marketing, sales, and service teams aimed to reach excellent cooperation and value sharing. When all stakeholders have the same understanding of essential tactics, functions, and KPIs, an organization optimizes its operations and boosts business efficiency.

Modern sales leaders enjoy plenty of tools and approaches to drive their businesses. They only need to properly adapt and apply them in their organizations. Technical novelties and advanced software are also worthy investments in a fast-evolving world.

From comparatively simple yet efficient solutions, such as Verifalia, to complex AI-enabled tools, they are designed to expand your opportunities. Professional lead generation companies such as Belkins can effectively guide you through the overwhelming diversity of progressive software solutions that will spur the flow of your B2B sales leads.