Prospect B2B: Why is it difficult?
B2B Prospecting: The Ultimate Prospecting Plan
Prospecting B2B is an activity that does not always have a good press. For salespeople, the approach often appears time -consuming, tedious and off -putting.
Indeed, in B2B, decision-makers are already in high demand. When they can, they try to avoid new commercial solicitations. When the salesperson manages to make contact despite all the obstacles, the attention span of their interlocutor is very limited.
To reach a decision-maker, you need to increase your contacts. In 2010, it took an average of 4.7 attempts to make contact. In 2016, it needed 8.2. In 2020, 10? 11?
In short, prospecting B2B requires a lot of time and energy to establish contact. And a large part of the established contacts ended with a refusal to continue the conversation.
To this can still be added that salespeople are generally paid on signed contracts, therefore on closing rather than B2B prospecting.
The second difficulty in B2B prospecting lies in the length of the sales cycles. As B2B sales cycles are often long, the salesperson must maintain conversation over time and have regular interactions with the prospect.
Meanwhile, he must assess the level of maturity of the prospect. Traditionally, the B2B method is used in prospecting Bant (budget, authority, needs, timing) for:
- check the existence of a budget,
- ensure the identity of the final decision maker,
- validate the existence of a real need
- estimate the time frame within which the project would be completed
Finally, prospecting B2B requires salespeople to be for new practices. Indeed, traditional B2B prospecting now coexists with new digital methods such as Inbound Marketing, Social Selling or even Based Marketing.
Need more leads?
Try Magileads!
How to build a B2B prospecting plan to meet new customers?
Prospecting B2B is not an easy activity. To achieve its objectives in terms of acquisition, it is essential to prepare well. In terms of B2B prospecting, especially in B to B, the planning phase is essential. The commercial prospecting plan is used to define all the actions that will make it possible to achieve the business objectives of the company.
In particular, it makes it possible to identify the right methods for:
- attract more prospects
- gain velocity on sales cycles
- help salespeople close sales faster
How to succeed in your B2B prospecting plan? Here are the 7 steps to follow to build an effective prospecting plan.
#1. Prospecting plan B2B: Defining prospecting objectives
Prospecting B2B responds to different issues:
- build a prospect file, attract new prospects
- quickly find leads qualified enough for a sales contact
- relaunch existing contacts to boost turnover
Most of the time, these marketing issues intertwine. In what proportions?
Before launching headlong into B2B prospecting actions, clear objectives must be defined. To be precise, we even speak of Smart objectives:
- Specific
- Measurable
- Achievable
- Realistic
- Temporally defined
The B2B prospecting objectives depend directly on the business objectives of the company. One of the ways of fixing them consists precisely from the turnover objective defined internally.
From this forecast turnover and data such as Customer Lifetime Value and the attrition rate, we will define an objective on the number of new customers to conquer over a given period.
Then, on the basis of the conversion rates of the previous B2B prospecting campaigns, we can continue to decline the objectives: number of sales interviews carried out, number of appointments obtained, number of prospects contacted, number of prospects to be treated, ...
For example, if we convert 10% of our qualified contacts into customers, and our goal is to make 30 sales, then we know that we need to have 300 qualified contacts.
To set SMART and motivating objectives for salespeople, you cannot proceed randomly. It is necessary to rely on an external and internal analysis of the situation.
Analyze your market, your competitors and your customers
Setting objectives in a random manner does not make it possible to build an effective B2B prospecting plan. Indeed, if the objectives are too high, the salespeople will be discouraged and lose in productivity. If they are too weak, the company will not prospect at full speed.
To find the right dosage, you need to have a clear vision of your market:
- What are the main market expectations?
- What are the recent market developments (legal, technological, etc.)?
- Who are the main market players? How do they prospect?
- How does the company position itself compared to its competitors?
- What is our customer typology?
This preparation phase is fundamental. In particular, the question of knowing which target customers we are addressing largely determines the way in which we will prospect.
Indeed, if we are dealing with prospects that are widely learned about the web and are very autonomous in their search for information, we will favor B2B digital prospecting such as email marketing , inbound marketing or social selling.
On the other hand, if we address a little connected target, accustomed to direct contact, we will turn more to prospecting B2B telephone or land.
Knowing your target audience well is also an advantage when building your B2B prospecting argument. We will have more likely to establish the climate of confidence conducive to a sale if you press your contact on a solid knowledge of the issues of your interlocutor.
Likewise, we will only be able to adopt a differentiating discourse if we know perfectly the offers, the strong points and the weaknesses of our competitors.
Carry out an internal analysis of your strengths and weaknesses
Once we have determined the opportunities and threats linked to the context and the competition, we must do our introspection.
The question now is to know what are the strong points of our brand and our offers and, conversely, what are the weaknesses that work against us.
Let's go. All together, marketers and salespeople, we brainstorm and fill in the two columns.
What is the point of this approach?
Obviously, the “plus” column will serve as the basis for our argument. Since it is on these specific points that we excel, we will focus our interactions with prospects on this area.
Conversely, the list of our weaknesses makes it possible to anticipate the objections of prospects. If we do not know them, we will be caught when they lift these points. They can sign the end of the relationship. On the other hand, by reading them very early in our B2B prospecting plan, we will be able to develop answers to counter these objections.
#2. A B2B prospecting plan to segment its market and constitute its prospect file
Once you have analyzed its market well, the second step is to segment it. Depending on its B2B prospecting objectives, we will not deal with all contacts in the same way.
Not all contacts, not all leads are equal. One of the objectives of B2B prospecting is precisely to assess those on which commercial efforts will focus.
What is the objective of segmentation?
Segmentation consists of dividing your market into several groups made up of prospects with similar profiles, characteristics or behaviors.
For example, we could segment a market based on company characteristics:
- Type of company (startups, SMEs, ETIs, large groups)
- Activity area
- Geographical location
- Number of employees
- Turnover
You can also segment your contact base according to behavioral criteria or a level of maturity if you use a solution with a lead scoring functionality.
In this way, we will be able to address groups who are really interested in our offer and have a better probability of purchasing.
The consequence of segmentation is that we will have different actions for prospects who do not have the same level of maturity.
For example, hot prospects, identified as “almost ready to buy” could be the subject of telephone prospecting actions with a specific argument. At the same time, prospects who are less advanced in their purchasing journey will be contacted by email to maintain contact.
#3. A B2B prospecting plan must define its conversion tunnel
Most contacts or prospects in a database are not ready to buy.
The art of prospecting B2B consists in clearly identifying the position of a prospect in the sales tunnel and defining actions adapted to this position.
To do this, it is necessary to define a sales funnel.
The sales tunnel (or conversion tunnel or conversion funnel) designates the process through which a company will support its potential customers from the discovery of their need until the purchase.
In other words, it corresponds to the representation of the successive stages of the progression of a sale, from the moment we obtain the contact details of the prospect until the conclusion of the sale.
For example, we can define a conversion funnel in 5 phases:
- Discovery: The prospect does not yet have a clear idea of how he can solve the problem he is facing. His attention level is still quite low since he doesn't know you yet
- Interest: The prospect begins to learn about his problem and shows interest. At this stage, we will try to capture his attention by demonstrating our ability to support and advise him.
- Evaluation: the prospect examines the different solutions available on the market to respond to his problem.
- Decision: the prospect chooses a solution and embarks on a commercial negotiation process.
- Purchase: the deal is signed but the commercial relationship can continue with a logic of cross-selling or additional sales, for example.
For B2B prospecting to be really effective, it is necessary to precisely define the stages of the funnel, always know the position of the prospects and, ideally, measure its conversion rates and its velocity at each stage.
#4. Successful B2B prospecting plan by preparing your approach and commercial prospecting supports
To prepare your sales pitches (in the plural), you must rely on the typologies of target customers that we mentioned above.
First of all, you have to know the challenges of your prospects. The first moments of interaction are therefore firstly moments of listening. The time to sell will come later. But, first, you have to be in a questioning attitude to identify your prospect's challenges.
Once we have identified a few issues to which our offer responds, we will be able to rely on these elements to construct an advice and support message.
The meeting at a trade show, the first qualifying telephone exchange or the initial phase of an inbound marketing strategy serve this objective: to gather information on the prospect's issues.
If you are targeting prospects who are already mature, you will need to already have a well-constructed argument to close the sale. If we know their issues, it's quite simple.
If contact is made with prospects less advanced in the sales funnel, support takes precedence. The salesperson's role will consist more of providing advice and positioning himself as a reference point of contact on the subject.
Ultimately, rigid arguments are no longer appropriate. It is the salesperson's ability to adapt his speech to the phase of the funnel in which the prospect finds himself that makes the difference.
Depending on the choice of the prospecting method, B2B the salesperson can use marketing media (web content, print documents, catalogs, etc.) to send your messages.
#5. The B2B prospecting plan should make it possible to choose your prospecting means
There is no shortage of methods and means of prospecting. We will also deal with them in detail in the following paragraphs.
But, for the time being, the question that interests us is: how to choose the B2B prospecting tools that will guarantee the best results.
Today, two main prospecting methods coexist.
The inbound methodology is based on digital tools. It is based on the principle that prospects have become autonomous in their search for information. Therefore, it would be pointless to initiate a sales contact too early. On the contrary, we will strive to bring the prospect to you using content marketing, SEO and social networks. Then, once the prospect has provided their contact information, we support them to move them forward in the funnel until they are mature enough for a commercial contact.
Conversely, outbound marketing more or less combines traditional prospecting techniques. With this in mind, it is the salesperson who goes to the prospect, for example with telephone prospecting campaigns or cold emailing campaigns.
In reality, the two approaches are not really opposed. Few companies operate 100% inbound. Most structures that use inbound marketing combine it with outreach actions aimed at prospects.
In addition, in certain sectors, which are still not very digitalized, it is still impossible to find clients with an exclusively inbound approach.
#6. Plan B2B prospecting actions thanks to a good prospecting plan
We have now defined:
- B2B prospecting objectives
- Targets to prospect
- The sales funnel
- The main elements of speech according to the stage of the funnel
- B2B prospecting methods to use
It only remains to plan B2B prospecting actions over time. This phase must end with the creation of a provisional B2B prospecting schedule.
Why is this important?
First, we must articulate our B2B prospecting mechanics with a number of calendar key dates: periods of high commercial activity (seasonality, special dates like Christmas or Black Friday if we are concerned), professional fairs, ...
Then, certain marketing actions take place over a long time. If you opt for an inbound strategy, the first results will only be visible 3 to 6 months after starting. It takes time to build an editorial plan, to create and distribute your first content, and to improve your SEO.
Therefore, while waiting for these results, it will be necessary to plan other actions to generate leads in the short term.
Finally, forecast planning is a tool for internal communication and team coordination, for example between marketing and sales.
#7. Launch and manage commercial prospecting effectively to achieve your objectives
Everything is in place. It’s time to launch B2B prospecting actions.
In the daily efforts of marketing and sales teams, it is important to stick to the established plan.
If the strategic and operational planning of the B2B prospecting has been carried out correctly, any dispersion could result in less efficiency.
In addition, the forecast schedule provides for dependencies between actions. If we deviate from what was planned, it could have consequences on the whole.
At this stage, the role of managers is obviously crucial. It is their responsibility to keep the teams focused, thanks to a precise plan, on their tasks and the assigned objectives.
But their mission also consists in piloting B2B prospecting activities. For this, they must base themselves on performance indicators (KPI) to measure the progress of actions with regard to the objectives. For example, they will be able to use the OKR method which consists in assigning high objectives and associating them with easily measurable intermediate key results (Key Results).
Based on the KPIS observed, they will be able to identify any flaws in the B2B prospecting process and put in place adjustment measures.
Need more leads?
Try Magileads!
How to optimize your B2B prospecting to reach more prospects?
Even with a well -constructed commercial prospecting plan, B2B prospecting is not a long quiet river, especially in B2B.
At each stage, you must therefore look for ways to improve your performance.
The first measure is to improve the knowledge that we have of his prospects. As the B2B prospecting is digitalized, the control of data appears as an obvious axis of progression.
Depending on the methods chosen, we will favor:
- Or the data acquired internally, which is collected for example with inbound forms.
- Either third-party data purchased from companies offering B2B data intelligence solutions
But above all, it is the use we make of the data which determines the success of our prospecting actions. The ability to aggregate and analyze data and put it to use for actions is a strong differentiator.
A second area of optimization consists of being innovative, testing new prospecting methods. No more “we’ve always done it this way”. Buyer behaviors and therefore methods are evolving. You have to know how to change your habits.
To do this, it is necessary to continually train in new prospecting methods and tools. But you also need to be able to evangelize internally about new ways of prospecting.
Finally, third axis, it is essential to strengthen your resistance to failure, especially when using techniques such as cold telephone prospecting.
B2B prospecting tools: field commercial prospecting
In B2B, prospecting can be done through different tools. Field, telephone and digital prospecting: what these different tools consist of and how to use them best.
Let's start with the technique of field prospecting. What practices does it cover and what are the means to implement it?
Traditionally, field prospecting consists, for a salesperson, of going directly to a company to speak with a decision-maker.
It is a practice that is falling into disuse for obvious reasons:
- Decision-makers are reluctant to interrupt their activity to receive a sales representative on the fly, without prior appointment.
- Unless you work in a limited geographical area or have a very dense territorial network, this method allows you to contact relatively few prospects over a given period.
- The method is expensive (a lot of travel costs) for inconclusive results. Its ROI is rather low
On the other hand, there are other field actions which are much more effective: events or professional fairs.
This type of configuration has a major advantage, provided you target the right events: several potential customers (or prospects) are brought together in the same place at the same time. It is a rare opportunity to do field prospecting by optimizing your time and means. Salons are therefore a dream opportunity to carry out your B2B prospecting file and start launching contact or monitoring actions.
Another advantage of professional fairs: prospects are more receptive to B2B prospecting than they are usually. Indeed, if they participate, it is with the aim of meeting customers, prospects but also suppliers or providers.
The golden rules of prospecting B2B also prevail in the living room. Upstream, the prospects we will meet and identify some issues should be well targeted to launch the conversation.
B2B telephone prospecting: to win customers
Telephone prospecting refers to telephone marketing actions intended to find new customers for a business.
Traditionally, telephone prospecting involves trying to contact a potential buyer in order to obtain a sales meeting.
How to prospect by telephone?
Telephone prospecting is a delicate practice. It requires good resistance to failure and perseverance. But you also need to have an plan of attack (commonly called a prospecting plan) to hold the prospect's attention and argue and good prospecting software to follow up.
A good telephone prospecting approach consists of 6 steps:
- Presenting yourself: once you have your interlocutor online, it will quickly decide if your call deserves that it gives you time. First, he must be able to identify you. Consequently, a successful B2B prospecting call begins with a succinct presentation: first name, last name, post, business.
- Explain the purpose of the call: at this stage, the prospect does not yet know whether he will listen to you or not. He wonders how your call concerns him. It is therefore necessary to clearly present the purpose of the call to him. For example, we could base ourselves on a sectoral issue that decision-makers in the field encounter and to which your offer responds.
- Keep your prospect's attention: decision-makers have little time to devote to prospecting calls. The mistake would be to launch into a long monologue extolling the merits of your solution. Take an interest in your interlocutor, ask them questions and keep the conversation going while identifying their issues.
- Respond to objections: Acknowledge the prospect's objections and respond point by point. If you have constructed your prospecting plan well, you have prepared for this step.
- Engage your prospect: you have argued and responded to objections. This is the time to find out if the prospect wants to go further.
- Specify the next step: at the end of the call, review what you have agreed together and specify the terms of the next contact.
Should we still do telephone prospecting?
Telephone prospecting has a rather bad reputation. In B2B, it often annoys decision-makers who consider it a waste of time. Many no longer respond to requests by telephone or shorten the call by asking the caller to send them everything by email. Suffice it to say that without appropriate training for the target, commercial prospecting by telephone is difficult.
These reluctances are mainly linked to practices such as “cold calling” which consists of cold calling prospects who have not shown prior interest in the offer proposed.
However, in certain sectors, telephone prospecting remains the norm. This is the case in professions that are less digitalized, for example. Prospects will prefer the telephone to have direct contact with the salesperson.
For other sectors, the telephone remains a relevant tool. But it is certainly worth combining it with other approaches. For example, digital prospecting methods make it possible to qualify a prospect and only trigger a first telephone call when they have reached a certain level of maturity.
Need more leads?
Try Magileads!
Digital prospecting techniques
The web has profoundly changed how companies find their new customers. By making buyers more independent in their information search, the Internet forced companies to review their B2B prospecting plan.
Traditional COLD CALLING or MASSE Email techniques no longer correspond to buyers' expectations. Their results have been stretched and they give way to less intrusive and more personalized B2B prospecting methods.
Email marketing
Email is a very effective channel for B2B prospecting. But emailing practices evolve at the same time as buyer behavior.
Mass emailing appears to be an outdated digital technique. From now on, buyers are fond of personalized messages that reflect their profile, their issues and are adapted to their position in the sales funnel.
Inbound marketing and social selling
What is the inbound methodology?
Inbound marketing is a response to new buyer behaviors. Since they reject the commercial contact initiated by the company, it is no longer the company that must go to them.
Conversely, the company will seek to attract target customers to its website, in particular through content.
In practice, inbound marketing consists of creating and distributing content to attract target customers (thanks to SEO and social media) then converting visitors into leads. To do this, marketers use online lead generation tools (call-to-action, forms, lead magnets).
Once the prospect has transmitted his contact information, he enters the B2B prospecting pipeline. Marketing will feed it with content to raise it in maturity and collect information.
Then, when the prospect is sufficiently mature, it is transmitted to the sales teams for telephone prospecting action.
Social selling
Social selling consists of prospecting on professional social networks like LinkedIn. This method can complement inbound.
Indeed, the disadvantage of inbound marketing is that it takes time. In addition, salespeople are sometimes suspicious of the quality of inbound leads, since they are “contactless” leads. There is therefore a lot of commercial qualification work to be done again.
Social Selling allows Outreach on the web. Again, the golden rules of prospecting B2B remain in order: to identify the targeted profiles, to engage the conversation on their challenges, to share relevant content to engage them over time and conclude by making contact.
Prospecting B2B has multiple facets. It is advisable to master all your techniques but above all to know when to use them. To help salespeople earn more customers, tools also play an essential role. Automating part of your B2B prospecting allows you to focus on tasks with the highest added value.
Need more leads?
Try Magileads!
Prospecting B2B: Why is it difficult?
Expert references and credible studies
Studies and data
A Salesforce study reveals that 58% of B2B prospects consider commercial approaches as poorly targeted source Salesforce
According to Gartner, only 24% of prospecting emails are open in B2B link Gartner
Content Marketing Institute shows that 67% of the B2B purchase cycle is now in digital source CMI
B2B prospecting experts
Jill Konrath, author of “Selling to Big Companies,” explains: “The complexity of B2B decision-making processes significantly lengthens sales cycles.” Official website
Mark Roberge, former CRO of HubSpot: “Effective B2B prospecting requires a data-driven and hyper-personalized approach” LinkedIn article
Bryan Kreuzberger, founder of Breakthrough Email: “The average response rate in B2B prospecting has fallen to 1.7%” Interview
Direct testimonies on B2B prospecting
“We had to contact 217 prospects before getting our first qualified meeting” – Pierre D., sales representative in the pharmaceutical industry LinkedIn testimonial
“Our response rate was 0.5% until we adopted an account-based marketing approach” – Sarah K., Tech Marketing Manager, Post Medium
“On average, 6.8 people are involved in a B2B purchasing decision at our clients” – Marc L., Sales Director Forbes Article
“Half of our prospects never respond to our follow-ups” – Sophie T., business developer Video testimonial
“We reduced our B2B prospecting time by 40% thanks to targeted automation” – David P., SaaS Founder Case Study
B2B prospecting stories and anecdotes
A salesperson spent 18 months prospecting a business before realizing that his interlocutor had left the company after the first contact Harvard Business Review
A startup has lost a contract at € 250K because its B2B prospecting email arrived during the holidays of the Twitter testimony
A commercial director discovered that 80% of its qualified leads came from content marketing and not from direct HubSpot study
A sales team has multiplied by 3 its conversion rate by personalizing each video of prospecting Case Study Vidyard
A salesperson won a customer by sending a personalized package after 9 emails without response article Sales Hacker
B2B segmentation
| Segmentation type | Features | Specific difficulties |
|---|---|---|
| Industry | Sectoral specificities | Technical language required |
| Behavioral | Interactions analysis | Difficult to collect data |
| TPE | Unique decision -maker | Limited budgets |
| SME | Simple decision -making process | Lack of digital maturity |
| Eti | Multi-decidement | Long sales cycles |
Diagram : Typical B2B decision process
[User] → [Identified needs] → [Research Solutions] → [Comparison] → [Collegial decision] → [Purchase]
Questions/answers on B2B prospecting
1. Why are the sales cycles longer in B2B?
Decision processes involve an average of 6.8 people according to Gartner, which considerably extends the deadlines.
2. What is the average b2b prospecting response rate?
It is between 1% and 3% according to a study of dirty lab insights.
3. How to improve your response rate?
By massively customizing messages and using news triggers, as Jill Konrath recommends.
4. Why is the email the main channel?
Because 80% of professionals prefer to be contacted by email according to a study by request gen report.
5. What is the best time to prospect?
Studies show that Tuesday and Thursday between 10 a.m. and 11 a.m. give the best results.
6. Should B2B prospecting and content marketing be combined?
Absolutely, 67% of the purchasing course is now in digital according to CMI.
7. How to manage current objections?
By anticipating the 5 main objections according to the MedDic model.
8. What is the ideal duration of a B2B prospecting sequence?
Between 8 and 12 keys out of 3 to 4 weeks depending on Sales Hacker.
9. How to effectively qualify your prospects?
Using the Bant (Budget, Authority, Need, Timing) model.
10. Can AI improve prospecting B2B?
Yes, for the enrichment of data and large -scale customization according to Forrester.
Need more leads?
Try Magileads!
