LinkedIn for Sales and Marketing

The LinkedInPersonalTrainer.com contributed to an article on the use of LinkedIn (and twitter) for sales and earned a plug from Meryl K. Evans over on the B2B Social Media Digest. I thought you’d enjoy what she’s written.

Her topic explores answers from a multitude of people about what a company might do to encourage sales and marketing folks to run with LinkedIn and Twitter.

And that’s just what I do here, so my advice made a nice addition…

A whole lot of advice!

Meryl’s article is quite long – seven or eight screenfulls, so there’s quite a lot there.

I should say that Meryl posed the question and has created the article by weaving together quotes from about thirty experts.  The question?

Should we expect the sales team to use social media (LinkedIn, Twitter)? [paraphrased]

The really nice thing about this article is that she’s woven together the advice from all these different people to tell a consistent story.  We each had just one thought to add, and because each of us has a different perspective on the subject, we covered a lot of ground.

Here – I better give you the link to Social Media for Sales People: Where do we Start?

LinkedIn for sales

I probably don’t spend enough time on it here, but one of LinkedIn’s sweet spots is sales.

And no, I’m not meaning from a “get your gizmo today” sort of sales, but the relationship sale.  You know, the kind where you have to know and understand the problems faced by your prospect and be able to deliver a solution…

In fact – training sales people is the #1 seminar I offer. (Who’d have thought that training sales people how to use a new tool – a tool that gets them information and introductions – would have value to a sales organization…-)

I do fine with the logistics of using LinkedIn for sales, but I bow to Meryl’s coverage of the larger topic of sales, marketing, and social media.

Really the same thing…

Ok – another prime us of LinkedIn is for job seekers.

But you realize how that’s exactly the same, right?  The product is just a bit more personal – and the best approach remains to identify the prospect, ask for an introduction, and build a relationship – that works for everybody.

To your continued success,

steve

Steven Tylock
http://www.linkedinpersonaltrainer.com
http://www.linkedin.com/in/stevetylock