The Art Of Social Selling

The almighty sale.  It is what we are all in business for.  People to buy our shit!

It’s as simple as that…… but way more complex than that all in the same breath right?

When it comes to socials the big looming challenge on everyone’s to-do list is how you nurture someone from being a member of your audience to handing over their money to buy your stuff.

With so much focus on growing your audience and engaging your audience, there is sometimes a little step in the sales process that is often missed……

How to CONVERT your audience

Now, this can get tricky as a huge part of your social strategy needs to be about growing and engaging your audience.  It is an integral part of your social strategy and that is why a GOOD content marketing strategy is so important.

If you want any of my deep dive content on how to do this please read my back catalogue of blogs, head to my Facebook or Instagram feeds, join my FREE Facebook Group or check out my online programmes in my Online School.  I have a huge range of FREE and paid content to choose from to get you sorted.

BUT for now we are going to focus on The Art of Social Selling and I am breaking this up into three parts to make it easy for you guys.

1. Understanding The Client Journey
2. Invitation Selling
3. How To Convert Them Off Social Media

The thing is that you need to nurture your audience to the point of making a sale which can START directly from socials, but the actual sale happens OFF your social feed.  Which means as a business owner you need to know some conversion skills.

Selling can be a really confronting task, and for a lot of people, there is an image of a salesperson being a dirty, backhanded Charleton who is out to dupe their customers.

That is absolutely not the truth, it is about knowing when your offer meets their needs and being able to nurture someone to make a purchase that they WANT to make in an effortless way.

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1. Understanding The Client Journey

What the hell does ‘The Client Journey’ even mean?  Well in a very simple explanation it is the ‘journey’ that someone takes to go from not knowing you, to knowing you, to liking you, to trusting you and then deciding that you meet one of their needs and making a purchase.

This does not happen overnight.

Think about when you are looking for a new pair of jeans for example.  You don’t just wake up and go “I need new jeans today’ you probably look at your old pair for a bit and ask….’hmmm do I need new jeans?’  Then you start noticing jeans commercials or jeans other people wear, then you look at jeans in the junk mail that gets delivered each week, then you might stop and window shop some at the shops, next time you might try some on, more than likely you go to a favourite jeans shop and look at some new styles ‘just in case’, then after much deliberation you purchase new jeans.

The thing is most of this is UNCONSCIOUS.  You are not walking through the shops going ‘Oh the next step in my customer journey to buying new jeans is stopping to window shop these nice jeans’ you just do it without thinking.

Yes there are times when you go ‘Righto I am going to the shops today and not coming home without a new pair of jeans’ but this is NOT the norm, the previous example is what normally happens.  Or you wake up and say this AFTER doing all the previous unconscious things first.

It is the same of our audience, most people are not walking around going ‘I am going to purchase *insert your offer here* today’ it is a series of events that leads to that decision. Offer meets need on the right day at the right time and – Whammo.  New client.

Also when you are purchasing something you normally go to a tried and true business you know, UNLESS you are in the market for something a bit different to that.  So it is important to remember that your ideal client probably has a relationship with or an idea of someone they want a relationship with that IS NOT YOU!  Your job is to get in front of them and show them how awesome you are and how you are the obvious choice.

The most important take away from this component of Social Selling is that most people will NOT just find you and purchase on the spot the first time they are exposed to you. You need to nurture them over time.  You need to be there when they are thinking, contemplating, showing them you care, you understand them, that you are the best choice to meet their needs.  Then when they are ready, you are the one they go to.

This does not happen with 1 social media post here and there.  It is a consistently executed marketing strategy that does this.  AND it is NOT just socials that are a part of this journey.

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2. Invitation Selling

Now we are getting to how you nurture them, and for a lot of people, the concept of selling is an icky thought.  We all want people to just buy from us but the fact is it is an art form to get them there. But it is an art form that is easy when you have some sales skills that work.

For socials the art of selling is a really soft approach, socials are mostly the conduit for making the sale rather than the sales destination.   It is where you warm your audience up with that amazing content marketing and all that value you add, THEN get them to move into your funnel.

So what you need to get comfortable doing on socials is INVITING your audience to move into your funnel and/or make a purchase.

So how do you do that?

What I want you to do is grab a pen and paper, actually, I insist you grab a pen and paper and write down all the ways a client can be in contact with you OFF socials.

So we are thinking, email, website, landing pages, booking system, phone calls, messenger, webinars, online store, contact forms, referrals, word of mouth, physical shopfront.…. Any place someone can come into contact with you.  This gives you an idea of the landscape of your touchpoints with a client and the amount of these you have is varied from business to business.

With invitation selling on socials we are talking about A) Inviting them to take another step to become a customer and B) making a sale.

NEXT STEPS INVITATIONS

This is where you invite your audience to move into another form of connection with you.  Some examples of this would be

• ‘Head over to my site and read my blog’
• ‘DM me if you want to chat about xxx’
• ‘Comment below your thoughts on this’
• ‘Register for my FREE webinar’
• ‘Check out more about this HERE’ (with a link to a sales page)
• ‘I am giving away XYZ to my email list tonight so head here to make sure you are on it’
• ‘Book your consult HERE’ (with a link to a booking page)

What this does is gets your audience to move into another forum with you.  This is also commonly called a CTA or Call To Action.  As you are asking them to take action on your content BUT not necessarily hand over money for something…… YET.

Doing this puts that person further into their client journey with you AND one step closer to doing business with you.  Wherever you can add some of these soft Next Step CTA’s in your content, not everywhere but in there, is going to move your audience off socials and into your funnel.

Not to mention grow your email list, grow your web traffic and grow your conversations.

STRUCTURED SALES INVITATIONS

This is where you are actually asking for the sale on socials.  This will always include a link to where they make that sale but you are asking for it directly in your social content.

I have a very specific method for how to do this on socials that I teach to ALL my online course clients, coaching clients and Social Superstar clients.  AND it works!  It walks them through how in one post get the potential client to say YES and want to buy their stuff.

The thing with these sales invitations is this.

A) You need to do this because people are following you because they think they want to do business with you at some point so you need to ask them for it also.

B) You cannot do these all the time.  Having a feed full of these posts is just tacky and you will lose your audience.  Meaning that you need to focus MORE on your content marketing and next steps invites to be able to have an abundant business with a continual stream of clients.

The takeaway from this component of Social Selling is that you need to invite your audience to move through your funnel otherwise you are missing out on sales.  Simple as that.

Where a lot of people fall short here is they go for the hard sales post ALL the time and miss how effective the soft Next Step CTA’s can be.

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3. How To Convert Them Off Social Media

This is where MOST people need to do the most work.  It is very easy to hide behind Facebook Posts, Instagram Stories and online sales funnels.  The online world has become a hiding place for introverts that want to sell online without actually talking to anyone.

If this is you, sorry babe, but you need to be able to TALK to people.  Whether it be on messenger, email or phone.

I so often see people running Facebook Ads, directing traffic, getting emails, getting DM’s and getting enquiries…… BUT NO ONE BUYS ANYTHING.

This is not an indication that your socials aren’t working…… it is a reflection of the quality of your off socials sales skills.  Sorry if that is harsh dude, but it’s true.  If you want to change this then this is where you need to spend your time!

One place you can convert your audience is your website and/or landing pages.  While these are still an online platform they still require a much more intimate conversation than your socials.  Your audience needs to see MORE of you, see MORE of your products and services, see your vision, see testimonials and get a taste of what it is like to do business with you.

Once they get here you need to do more than say ‘Hey I have Afterpay and Free Shipping for this product’ you need to tell a story about that product, you need to have a place where they can see who you are and what your business stands for, you need to show them how other people LOVE what you do.

While you need to be sharing all these things on your socials they need to scroll your feed to find that content or snoop around more, where on your sales page or site it is all there in one place.  And that place is all about you, no notifications from other people AKA competitors popping up like there is on socials.  You have them all to yourself here.

The other place you convert your audience is PHYSICALLY talking to them via message, email, phone etc.

If you are stammering once you get into an actual conversation and just drop your links and leave this is not going to work, the art of converting off socials like this is knowing the art of SELLING.

My top tips for being able to sell in the current consumer landscape is this:

• Understand their pain points – FACT FINDING
• Know how you solve their problems – WHAT YOU WILL OFFER THEM
• Show them how you will make their life better with your offer – YOUR RECOMMENDATIONS
• Confirm this is what they are looking for – CLOSING THE DEAL

Now it IS that simple, but there is a PROCESS to these 4 steps.  And this process is something you need to craft for yourself, individually, in a way that is authentic and real.  This will ensure your potential clients know that you actually mean what you are saying, no-one wants to talk to a sales scripted robot!  That is just …… well eye rolling to be honest.

The other thing about getting into an intimate 1:1 discussion is you need to craft your personal rapport building skills, you need to give them some love and give them a real taste of YOU.  Which is what will get them to buy from you.

Once you can master this your sales conversations will be effortless and you will actually ENJOY them!  I know, sounds crazy right, but it’s true!

When you can master this you are going to exponentially UP LEVEL your sales conversions!

AKA you will be living the dream!

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What Do You Do Now?

Ok ok, I can hear you saying…… ‘This is great Stace but dude, I need to know how to actually DO THOSE STEPS and make BETTER Structures Sales Invites.  Don’t leave me hanging!!!’

So if you are someone that wants to know MORE about how to do this and get the EFFORTLESS sales skills required then you are in luck I am creating a new programme all around JUST THIS.

WAAAHOOOOOOO!  You will finally be able to get the sales cred to sell with ease on and off socials.

But before I release this I am doing an online Masterclass ‘The Selling With Socials Masterclass’ where I am going to be spilling all my industry secrets of selling on socials AND all my secrets from being a sales coach for 16 years when I was in finance.

Yep, I have been teaching peeps how to do this since before Arianna Grande put kitten ears on her head.

And I want to teach it to you!

The Masterclass is a super special offer with a LIMITED number of spots at a ridiculously good value price (like $19 good value) the programme that is created off the back of that will sell for $99 so if you are up for some cheap as chips coaching in a LIVE online environment then get it now while you can

The Masterclass is March 28th 2019 and there will be a recording for all that register along with workbooks and a deep dive tutorial into effortless selling.

Grab your spot now as after March 28th this offer will be the FULL programme at the full price.

GET YOUR SPOT HERE