Hi,

Cold calling is dead! Cold emailing is dead! Social Selling is dead! Everything appears to be just, well, dead. But is it true?

We can’t deny that the conversion rates on all outbound sales methods are dropping to an all-time low. And it is straightforward to point at tech as the one that’s causing all the commotion. Of course, the easy-to-use mailing tools, auto-dialers, and LinkedIn automation tools made it possible to contact your target group in a whiff.

And for sure, the commotion is real. The restrictions for email have been tightened recently, with Google banning domains and sending more than 5000 emails to their Gmail users. It looks like it’s more complicated than ever to get someone on the phone, let alone have them listen to what you have to say.

So, what’s left when you have to do outbound to get to the revenue intake you signed up for? Indeed, it isn’t blasting harder.

Outbound sales, now more than ever, are about doing better. And here is where tech definitely will help you. But it would be best if you focused on something else first. The crucial aspect of doing better lies within your go-to-market strategy. Where you could get away with large target groups until now, you need to be very specific and break down your target group into small, homogeneous groups. Every distinct group requires a different message or script, making it hyper-relevant for them.

For example, if your target group is law firms with 50 to 500 employees, you would draft an email outreach for this group. Today, you need to break it down with more variables. So, the size will be in three categories: growth rate, specialty, and maybe even company structure. These parameters are based on differences related to the pain you are solving.

It is still possible to get reply rates going on 30%. I know a company that just did that.

It is still possible to get reply rates going on 30%. I know a company that just did that. They deliver charging stations for electric cars. They didn’t just email the HR director of every company in a specific geographical area. They used a tool called Whatson.ai to scrape the internet for companies with the word: “sustainability” on their website at least five times, are bigger than 50 employees, and where the nearest charging option is more than 100 meters away. This company understood the importance of only targeting companies highly likely to have pain.

In this case, employees with electric vehicles are far from charging. Data enrichment helps you to uncover the data points that help you segment your target group.

With the turmoil that inboxes are these days, email and social media alike, you must stand out. Your subject line, first two sentences, argumentation, and all the technical aspects of your outreach need to be spot on. Easier said than done. ChatGPT or Jasper.ai will not help you craft the most amazing converting email without any more profound instructions. They deliver the same as anybody is sending. You know, the “I hope this email finds you well”-ones. The LinkedIn DM box is even stricter. Pitchslapping someone upon accepting a connection request is an absolute No-Go.

To get spot-on and converting outreaches, here are a few steps to take:

1. Break down your message. Subject line, opening, pain, solution, social proof.
2. You can have an AI writing tool for every part to help you craft the perfect element.
3. Repeat this for all your segments.
4. Then, ask the same tool to give you a second version. So you can do A/B testing and see what converts.

If your Go-To-Market for all these segments is solid, your messages should be evident and simple. When they are still pretty generic, you need to go deeper.

Ready with your super specific Go-To-Markets? Awesome. Here’s a list of some of our favorite tools that will help you in the process of the outreach:

Data enrichment/Sales Intelligence

• JIGGR (has good coverage in Europe and pushes the data in your CRM)
• LUNA.ai (does the outreaches too)
• Clay (we are testing it right now, so no accurate life results, but the references in the market are perfect)

Crafting emails

• ChatGPT can help, but please put in some custom instructions
• Jasper.AI is a pretty solid tool
• The HubSpot AI generator (and other CRMs) is doing better daily.
• Copilot within Office365: why buy another tool if you have it already…

Email outreach

Regardless of what everybody says, you don’t need a very fancy tool if you’re not on blast mode (aka more than 2500 per day). In general, MailChimp or Active Campaign still works just fine. If you have HubSpot, you’re good… The emailing itself is not hard; you need good reports and dashboards. If you are on blast, diversify in domains and tools. Work out what suits your needs. Our advice is to start testing with at least three tools and pick the one that brings you the most.

LinkedIn outreaches

I know there are many out there doing what isn’t allowed. And I’m not going to pretend I’m a good girl, but the LinkedIn bans have surfaced hard in the last few months. In short, LinkedIn doesn’t allow automated connection requests or messaging. So they limit it, and they sniff for this kind of behavior. There are not many tools out there that are safe. Only Expandi and Meetalfred feel safe enough for me, but please be careful out there if you are using these tools. One way to stay under the radar is by limiting the daily outreaches to a little below the limits and alternating the drips per day (starting and end times). With more CRMs now integrating the LinkedIn API, it seems like somewhere this year, we will be able to message and connect with people from our CRMs. That’s a big step forward. It will also allow tools like Zapier and Make to help you do multi-channel outreaches from one dashboard.

From art to science is challenging.

So yeah, doing outbound using tech isn’t simple anymore. The alternative, going back to manual, is even worse. It means, you have no choice. Pick your channels and go all in to get the results you need. My advice is to hire experts. If you are using email to get in touch with your customers, hire an email marketing consultant (even for sales mails), if you are doing social selling → hire an expert.

Calling? Train your people or bring it to an agency. All the outreach channels we have today demand you to have a PhD for it.

The times of amateurism are long gone. If you really understand your target groups, you have nothing to worry about. Your experience combined with the knowledge you have will make you stand out.

These are the posts published on LinkedIn that are worth checking out:

The path to implementing the right sales tech is not paved with shortcuts but with informed decisions and strategic investments. During the dozens of discovery workshops I’ve been doing over the last year, one thing stood out for me:

In all of the B2B sales teams, so many intelligent people know what their customers need and where they fall short.

It’s a matter of uncovering their need. So, if you want to move forward, take a step back. Sounds counterintuitive, right? But if you’re going to leverage all of the excellent AI features in the tech nowadays, focussing on the needs and opportunities brings the clarity you need. Just organize an afternoon, feet on the table, and a giant whiteboard. Put your sales process on and confront it with the customer journey. I promise you, it will be an exciting afternoon…

If you need help with it, you know where to find me.