Episode 204: Maximizing Sales Conversations with Curated Content and LinkedIn Job Listings

Intro  00:01

Welcome to Making Sales Social Live, as we share LinkedIn and Social Selling Training Strategies and Tips that will have an immediate impact on your business. Join Brynne Tillman, and me, Bob Woods, every week, Making Sales Social Live! This is the recorded version of our weekly Making Sales Social Live Show.

Bob Woods  01:30

Thanks for joining us for this special episode of Making Sales Social Live, which isn’t live. But as we’re at the midpoint of 2023, we decided to bring you some highlights from the Making Sales Social Live Podcast. So far this year, Brynne and I have had a great time putting these episodes together, and especially addressing your comments and questions during each episode. We go live on LinkedIn, YouTube, Twitter, and Facebook every week, and you’re invited to comment or ask questions during each episode. 

So now let’s get to some highlights. Let’s begin right at the start of this year, from Episode 150 to 10 LinkedIn activities for 2023, one of the activities had to do with the LinkedIn profile. So the first thing that we’re going to talk about is probably the biggest one, because as we’ve said before, everything that you do on LinkedIn, drives, eyeballs and drives people to your profile. So a profile Refresh is probably the biggest number one thing that you can do.

Brynne Tillman  01:32

You know, it’s pretty funny, because so many people set it and forget it, like they put their profile out maybe three or four years ago, and they never really look at it again. Now, although I am constantly updating, and you have some great ideas for updating, there are still times where I’ll go back and read something, I’m like, “Oh, my gosh, this is so old,” there are so many things we want to look at. 

But before we go through the sections of the profile that you can focus on, I want to talk about the strategy and the concept. So ultimately, as Bob, you mentioned, all roads lead back to the profile, we want to make sure that the profile is doing its job. And if your goal is business development, the profile’s job is to convert your visitor to a conversation. And so as we go through the profile.

I want you to start to think of it in terms of rather than me telling everyone how great I am and how I can help them literally use this opportunity to be the resource. So instead of telling them how you can actually help them not independent, we still need to talk about our services. But we don’t want to start there. We want to make sure that we’re earning the right to talk about how they can buy from us. 

Bob Woods  03:03

A big thing, though, is your headline. So headlines have to tell who you are, how you help people. 

Brynne Tillman  03:13

Who you help.

Bob Woods  03:14

I’m sorry, Who you help. This is what happens when you come off for three weeks of vacation. Sometimes things slide in your mind a little bit. So how you and the services that you provide essentially.

Brynne Tillman  03:26

Start over, Let’s start over. 

Bob Woods  03:28

Start over, Who you help.

Brynne Tillman  03:29

Next,

Bob Woods  03:28

How you help them.

Brynne Tillman  03:30

Next, 

Bob Woods  03:32

The results you bring.

Brynne Tillman  03:34

Last? 

Bob Woods  03:35

The services you provide. 

Brynne Tillman  03:37

You’re amazing. That was awesome. Just for clarity. Just for clarity, absolute clarity. Okay, yeah, perfect.

Bob Woods  03:47

If your headline isn’t doing all that, then you definitely need to reshape it. And if you want any kind of clues on how to do that visit mine or Brynne profiles, both of ours are done in that way. Chat GPT and AI products like it are going to change our world, both generally speaking, and specifically in b2b sales, in ways that were only beginning to be imagined, in episode number 172, seven ways to use Chat GPT with LinkedIn.

Brynne and I discussed well what the title of the episode says. In this clip, we dig deeper into using Chat GPT to help in the creation of curated content. And this I imagine is probably where a lot of people are going to use it. Because I’ve been writing for decades and decades and decades now. And yet, sometimes when I sit down and I know what I want to say and I’m staring at that blank Word document, I don’t know where to start. And I think that this is where Chat GPT can really come in and help things and help people out.

Brynne Tillman  05:00

Oh, wait, is this one about comments?

Bob Woods  05:03

No.no. This is text for curated content. Okay, great.

Brynne Tillman  05:06

Same thing we’re like we did with the URL, go into chat, grab the link to the curated piece of content that you want to share. If you’re curating a podcast or video, it’s got to have show notes or something to pull from, it won’t pull directly from, it won’t pull directly from the video itself, it needs text. 

So you grab the link, you put it in Chat GPT and you say three-sentence recap, and it will recap everything, and then you need to go read it. And with everything before you use it, read it and put it in your words, Right? And the same with all the tips that we gave before. I mean, a lot of them, even the discovery questions, you need to use it as a guide and make it your so that you own it. And it feels right. When you say it sounds right.

Bob Woods  05:56

And that’s probably one of the biggest things out there right now because I think now people are going to start wondering, is this the actual person? Or is this Chat GPT. So you really have to make sure that when you get anything that we’re talking about, like Brynne said, from Chat GPT that you make sure that it’s in your voice.

And the easiest way to do that is to take the Chat GPT output and read it out loud. If it kind of does sound like it comes from you, then fine, great, use it most of the time. Now, it ain’t going to sound like you. So what you need to do is say it out loud, kind of hear why it doesn’t sound like you address that and then rewrite it and then read it out loud. Again, if it sounds like you at that point, then go ahead and use it because it’s ready.

Brynne Tillman  06:42

I love that. I think that’s awesome.

Bob Woods  06:46

In that same episode, we discussed using Chat GPT, for comments on other people’s LinkedIn posts. So I don’t remember what it was for. But I basically typed in, Write out or Create a comment, Reply to the Following. And then I actually just copied the entire text of the comment, put it into Chet GPT, and let it do its thing.

And it came out with a pretty good reply. But again, it did not sound like me. So I had to make sure that I rewrote it to sound like me. But the points that pulled out and everything were actually really, really good. So you know, it’s not necessarily ready for primetime. Once it immediately gets spit out a Chat GPT. But man, it’s a fantastic start for you to really trail and really get. Yeah, definitely.

Brynne Tillman  07:40

So I love that I can add to that, because I think that’s brilliant. So recapping, grabbing the text from the post itself, pasting it into GPT, you can say recap in two sentences, because what happened might be a huge recap. But if you do recap in one sentence, or top priority from this post, so they’re playing with it, they don’t all work perfectly. 

But what you’re doing is right there. So I absolutely love that. And sadly, it hasn’t provided results since 2021. That may be the problem, Chat GPT was only trained on data through 2020 21. That is a good point, Stan, I don’t want to completely assume but I would think at this point. They’re working on 22 and 23 and keeping it updated. But right now it is old data.

Bob Woods  08:37

Now that we’ve talked a little about content and social selling, Episode 196 focused on the different types of content sales pros should be sharing on LinkedIn. Many salespeople, I think equate creating content for LinkedIn with something physically painful happening to them personally. 

Most of the time, though, that feeling comes from a simple lack of knowledge or plan regarding what types of content to post; They just don’t know where to begin. So with LinkedIn proving rather to be a goldmine for lead generation and an invaluable tool for building meaningful connections with prospects, you gotta get over that feeling right, Brynne?

Brynne Tillman  09:23

Oh, absolutely. And you know, there is lots of content that attracts lots of different people. What is happening before they need us? Where are they? So for us, there are a few things that are happening before they need us. Maybe they had sales training, and then we might be next Right? Let’s say “You are a CRM sales person,” They may have hired their first salesperson or their second salesperson, and now they need a CRM. 

So what is happening? Going one step before they need you. The reason that this is important is knowing this and most of this is going to be Curation, some could be original. But the reason this is so important, really comes down to the fact that if we’re engaging everyone, when they need us, they’re already shopping, when we really start engaging them and connecting with them prior to their knowledge that they need us. 

Number one, “We can help build the story and be the influencer.” During that journey instead of late in the journey late in the buyer process. We can also, you know, we’re engaging them before they even know they may need our solution. So we can really be part of that journey and help them. Yeah, so before they need us, I think it is critical to engage them at the top of the funnel.

Bob Woods  11:02

Very, very, yeah, very tippy, tippy, tippy, tippy top of the funnel, especially when you consider that old statistic. I forget where it comes from, but it was something like 68% of the people will buy from the person who was there to provide insight first.

Brynne Tillman  11:18

74%. So it’s a corporation?

Bob Woods  11:23

That’s right. Yes, it’s a corporate

Brynne Tillman  11:24

Vision stat. And if I’m quoting, as close as I can remember, 74% of buyers choose the sales rep or company that was first to add value and insight. So that’s a perfect example of why early in their process even earlier than we think about, we should be on the radar.

Bob Woods  11:49

Exactly. So the second part of that tippy top of the funnel is once you get that the before the needs stuff, creating curiosity and getting prospects to think differently about their current situation, which, quite frankly, is what sales is all about in general, but I mean, but to create content around that, so that you’re not necessarily involved in that thought process. But then they will want to reach out to you because again, you are providing insights into it. 

Brynne Tillman  12:15

So, I love this, Write really good content that is designed to start sales conversations comes down to a lot of this concept of that it needs to create curiosity gets them thinking differently about their current situation. So those are three elements. Sometimes we’ll have five in that, like resonate with your buyer, create curiosity, teach them something new, that gets them thinking differently about their current situation, and creates a compelling moment. Right? 

So why is this so important? Well, number one, actually, let me just back up for a second. This is not the formula for all content, Right? This is the formula for content that creates sales conversations that creates social selling engagement, not just thought leadership engagement. But when we can hit those five points. And Bob, you mentioned curiosity that gets them thinking differently about their current situation, we can now attract and engage people that are thinking about whatever it is they’re doing. 

So when we can create curiosity, typically, They’re leaning in and going, “Hmm, I haven’t thought of that yet.” or “That rings a bell,” or “That is something we just talked about in our meeting on Monday,” or whatever that is, we’re resonating and creating curiosity that gets them to want to read it, when they’re reading it. 

The resource that we have is getting them to learn something new, maybe a way to do something or a way they shouldn’t be doing something that gets them to think differently about the way they’re doing business today. This although is really at its core position to be a resource. It also is planting seeds in the minds of our prospects, that there might be a better way.

Bob Woods  14:25

In Episode 194, Brynne, I flipped the script a little bit when we discussed how to use the LinkedIn Jobs tab for sales. In other words, using job listings to actually start sales conversations at the companies you’re targeting when they’re hiring. So would you like to know when companies are hiring, because that’s an indication that companies are growing, when they’re growing.

They just might need whatever services that you provide And it’s gonna be impossible to talk about specific industries and things like that. There may be a template to that where you’re like, “Oh, I don’t know if I could use this at all.” But if you’re in one of those types of sales positions, where you work really well, when companies are growing to sell your products or services into that, Right? There is gold.

Brynne Tillman  15:20

Yeah, so let’s think about this. Who are your buyers? For us, our buyers could be chief marketing officers or Chief Revenue officers or a sales enablement. So what we want to do is start to find out when there are new positions open for those roles. Why? Because when someone else comes in new into that company, they’re open to hearing new ideas they’re being brought in to make change. 

So we know we want to keep monitoring that right. So ABC company is hiring a new chief marketing officer, there are a few things I want to do. The first thing is where did their old one go? Because there’s an opportunity there too. Right? But let’s, we want to keep an eye on this, the new marketing officer that might come in, and ultimately start valuable conversations with them, once they’ve been hired. 

And we’ll know that based on the fact that for following this company, and there is someone that’s hired, we can continuously look for, hop in, we’ve saved this company somewhere, if you have Sales Navigator you saved in Sales Navigator, and they’ll alert you when there’s a new change. But ultimately, there’s gold in that knowledge in understanding that there is a new person in the role. That’s a buyer. Yeah, I love that.

Bob Woods  16:56

So you got all that as well as talking really quick about the Sales Navigator function. And you can actually see this in the LinkedIn premium in some form. I think when companies are increasing growth, LinkedIn actually recognizes this and lets you know that these companies are growing. 

Brynne Tillman  17:15

Yeah, so you can do searches based on department growth, or entire company growth inside of LinkedIn, you can search, I’m trying to think in premium. I don’t think you can do that anymore in premium, but you can search companies by company size. 

So it’s definitely a Sales Navigator, all the fun things went to Sales Navigator,  But ultimately, you can monitor companies that are growing, but I really truly believe this little trick in the jobs app where you are notified when a new job is posted based on the titles you sell to is golden, you can get in earlier than anyone else into those conversations.

Bob Woods  17:58

That’s huge. That’s absolutely huge. So you know, using LinkedIn and something that it’s already good at for your purposes, but yet aren’t designed for your purposes, but get in there, use it and hopefully you can get some sales conversation started and get things farther down the road with those new people as well as just like Brynne said “The the person left for a reason if they went to another company, you can get that conversation started as well.” 

Brynne Tillman  18:24

Absolutely. 

Bob Woods  18:25

Yeah. 

Bob Woods  18:28

One more for you. That’s definitely fun in nature. Episode 182 was a special one that went live on April Fool’s Day. So in that April fool Spirit, Brynne and our good friend Gunner Hood got together to prank us a little bit. I think the title of the episode tells it that all social selling is dead. Long live cold calling, buckle up.

Gunnar Hood  18:56

How many times have you picked up the phone and then either turned it off by a cold call? Or had somebody really good on the phone that kept your attention and made you want to listen to what they had to say? I mean, it’s not dead. There are people who can get very very good at it. And when they do it is partly a numbers game but it’s an effectiveness you know, opportunity as well.

Brynne Tillman  19:22

Yeah, I mean, Hey, you know the smile and dial the you know, if you do make 100 calls, maybe three or four people answer, and maybe one of them will talk to you but who knows, you can spend 810 12 hours making phone calls and maybe you’ll see something but because this is just a vintage approach to sales. We should embrace it just like everything vintage, vintage cars we embrace, right even, you know vintage furniture we embrace we should be embracing vintage, vintage prospecting just old is.

 Gunnar Hood  20:01

What’s new?

Brynne Tillman  20:02

Everything old is new again. I love it. All right. So this is really my favorite hands-down reason why I truly believe everyone needs to stop social selling and start cold calling. Cold calling builds resilience, and it helps you develop a thick skin. As you’ll inevitably face rejection time and time again. This resilience can be invaluable in all aspects of sales and business social selling, though less confrontational, may not offer the same opportunities for personal growth. So right there, we should be cold calling. Exactly.

 Gunnar Hood  20:44

I mean, what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. Right?

 Brynne Tillman  20:47

Yes, Thank you Kelly Clarkson. Yeah, Right. So you know, the more we get caught up in the field, the more personal growth will have and believe me, cold calling will get you beat up. So personal growth is much faster than social selling.

Bob Woods  21:10

Yeah, you know, that was a really good, really funny episode. I listened to it again to Prep for this episode. And yeah, there were more than a couple of sensible chuckles going on there. And with that, thanks for joining me on this look back at the first six months of Making Sales Social Live. 

We’ll be back live next week with all new episodes through the end of the year and beyond. Because that’s what we do here. Social Sales Link, So remember, when you’re out and about, be sure to make your sales social. 

Outro  18:22

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