LinkedIn’s Sales Navigator Rocks. Here’s Why.

While we won’t be seeing any raucous concerts (like the one pictured above) any time soon, we at Social Sales Link do teach — and use ourselves every day — a product that we think has already achieved rock-star status. That product? LinkedIn‘s Sales Navigator.

So why does Sales Navigator rock? Here are just five of the many reasons:

The search filters and results are powerful. Imagine being able to create a list of prospects that meet your ideal criteria. With Sales Navigator, you can find buyers that are in your ideal size company and industry you serve, and then see if those folks are active in LinkedIn. More important, you can see who in your network can help you gain access both them, and to your target audience in general. There are some additional benefits as well, like finding prospects in new roles (who are often more open to conversations than people who have been in a job for years) or excluding prospects based on location or industry. These make your list as clean and accurate as possible.

Sales Navigator’s Saved Leads and Accounts features are magical. You won’t go on a mystery tour of companies you don’t want to see with Sales Navigator’s Saved Leads and Accounts features. You’re able to save both people you want to speak with at companies (Saved Leads), as well as entire companies you wish to get into (Saved Accounts). The “magic” comes in as Sales Navigator will then alert you when it detects several actions in those lists, including when they accept a connection, mentions in the news, any shares they’ve published, and any changed jobs or roles (a biggie!).

You can set preferences for the companies that you want to see. By using Sales Navigator’s Sales Preferences, you’re just one toggle away from having a pre-populated search for the companies you’re specifically targeting. This makes searching faster and easier with Sales Navigator. You’re able to set specific industries and locations, employee size, function within these companies, and even seniority level. You can also set preferences for receiving alerts to your email when your Saved Leads and Accounts trigger them.

Why InMails are better than emails. InMails help you to gain access to buyers, stakeholders, and influencers that you might not have an “in” with (get it?). Using them wisely is the best way to secure that call with them. For example, the best time to send an InMail is weekdays between 9 AM and 10 AM at the local time of the recipient. The “sweet spot” for email length is between 50 and 125 words. And when you use InMail instead of email, you give the recipient a much-better chance of learning more about you as they can click directly through to your LinkedIn profile. With email, they can only see your message, and not the real you.

First/discovery call prep with Sales Navigator is much easier. You can drill down to getting the information you need for that all-important first/discovery call with Sales Navigator than you can with Google searches or even the main LinkedIn site. You’re able to easily find information about them as a person, as well as about their company — their offerings, competitors, etc. You can identify all stakeholders that are involved in a purchasing decision, too. This becomes especially powerful when you combine it with Saved Leads and Accounts.

While we might be socially distanced from concerts for now, Sales Navigator can help bring you even closer to the prospects who you want to talk with… without having to actually, you know, see them in person. That’s why we recommend it, use it ourselves, and teach it as a true “sales conversation starter.” We think you should, too!

Do you use Sales Navigator? If so, how well do you utilize its features? We are running a poll on LinkedIn that ends Tuesday (morning), August 25th, and we’d like to hear your feedback. Let us know what you think!