Episode 362: LinkedIn Strategies for Sales Success

Intro

0:00:18 – (Bob Woods): Welcome to the Making Sales Social podcast featuring the top voices in sales, marketing, and business. Join Brynne Tillman, and me, Bob Woods, as we each bring you the best tips and strategies our guests teach their clients so you can leverage them for your own virtual and social selling. This episode of the Making Sales Social podcast is brought to you by Social Sales Link, the company that helps you start more trust-based conversations without being salesy through the power of LinkedIn and AI. Start your journey for free by joining our resource library. Welcome to the show.

0:00:55 – (Brynne Tillman): Welcome back to Making Sales Social. Today we have a special guest who knows a thing or two about crushing sales quotas and taking digital media growth to new heights. Andrew Barbuto is an accomplished digital media sales leader and ad tech expert, currently serving as the senior agency lead at Basis Technologies. Over the past eight years, Andrew has built an impressive track record, driving over 250 million in revenue and exceeding sales targets time and time again.

0:01:30 – (Brynne Tillman): He’s also the author of Top sales producer how to crush your sales quota, where he shares step by step strategies that have fueled his incredible success. Andrew’s approach is all about mastering the fundamentals, putting the customer first, and consistently driving improvement. Andrew, welcome to the program.

0:01:52 – (Andrew Barbuto): Hey, thank you for having me.

0:01:54 – (Brynne Tillman): Thanks for being had. We’re thrilled to have you here today. So before we jump into your genius, we ask all of our guests the same first question, which is, what does Making Sales social mean to you?

0:02:07 – (Andrew Barbuto): Yeah, it’s a great question. And I thought about this, I was thinking about this, and I think that how I look at what Making Sales Social is, I kind of look at it in three different categories. So, and this is kind of the way that I approach social selling, slash social branding. And so the three categories that I break down to it is the social branding element of it, is what I consider to be using social media, primarily LinkedIn, to build either my personal brand or my company’s brand.

0:02:44 – (Andrew Barbuto): And so putting out useful insights to anybody who’s following me and looking to position myself as a thought leader and expert in the industry. So that’s one bucket that I consider social branding. That’s, you know, like just the same way as if you were a brand and looking to build awareness. The second bucket is social selling. And So I use LinkedIn as probably the secondary, most Common communication tool for doing outreach and doing research.

0:03:15 – (Andrew Barbuto): And so I do sales. LinkedIn Sales Navigator, of course, we can get into the specifics, but it’s super duper useful for turning cold prospects into warm leads using all of the data that’s right there for you. But I do a lot of outreach using LinkedIn, cold outreach using LinkedIn Sales Navigator. So that’s social selling. The third one is research, which I put into its own category. LinkedIn is one of the most valuable tools for doing research.

0:03:45 – (Andrew Barbuto): And what I mean by research is I’m talking about prospecting research, which I separate from outreach. There is so much information you could find on all of the companies that you’re targeting by going to their page, all of the individuals that you’re targeting by looking at their LinkedIn page, giving you all the information about their responsibilities, and what they care about. Really. There’s no better tool that exists.

0:04:07 – (Andrew Barbuto): And what’s great about it is that they’re both, the social selling part and the research are in the same place. So that’s where LinkedIn Sales Navigator comes into play. Right. You know, uploading lists and not only finding new companies to target it using various attributes that you define as your ideal customer profile but also any sort of commonalities that you can identify. You know, they went to the same school as you, they have mutual connections with you, they have mutual connections with your colleagues, maybe in the same group.

0:04:35 – (Andrew Barbuto): All of that’s right there. You could just use that to make it a warm introduction, even if you’ve never met them before.

0:04:41 – (Brynne Tillman): Terrific. Thank you for that. I appreciate that. So whether we’re talking about LinkedIn or sales generally, I’d love to learn a little bit about your strategies that helped you generate that 250 million in revenue.

0:04:55 – (Andrew Barbuto): Yeah, yeah. And there’s so much to unpack. Right. Like sales is. There’s just so much to. This is a surprise, I think, for most people going to sales, how much you’re responsible for and how much there is to do. This is one of the difficult parts of sales, which is any given day, there’s a million different things you could do. Right. The proactive nature. No one’s going to tell you what to do.

0:05:14 – (Andrew Barbuto): So you’re basically responsible for coming up with your own routine. And so in my book, I go through a step-by-step, starting from your first day, and sells, what I’ve done to go from zero to building $250 million worth of revenue. And that’s two separate companies. I started the same way at both companies. And this is how I would recommend if I was going to a new company or you’re starting at a new company.

0:05:36 – (Andrew Barbuto): And that first becomes an expert on your company, your industry and your customers. Then use all of your resources to identify prospects that have big opportunities and that are most likely to respond to you. So, people who fit your ideal customer profile and then just relentless prospecting, follow-ups, and seven touch points across all channels. Set up as many meetings as you possibly can and always be filling the pipeline, always provide value.

0:06:07 – (Andrew Barbuto): And if you’re targeting the right prospects, you will start to see some wins come in. It’s going to take time. That’s why you need to be super resilient. But hard work creates luck. And that’s kind of been my story. You know, tons of hard work and you know, you get lucky and you just. That’s kind of the way I got to where I was and how I built my book of business. But it’s not like a one-hit wonder situation. I have dozens of clients, of course, hundreds of deals using the process that I outline in my book.

0:06:34 – (Brynne Tillman): Tell me a little bit about the mistakes that you see other sales folks making.

0:06:39 – (Andrew Barbuto): Totally. I think the biggest mistake is not making it about the customer, really focusing it more on yourself. Right. So being client-centric, customer-focused or other focused is not common enough, especially with newer salespeople. Right. So so often I will, I will actually meet with salespeople because I’m on the other side of the fence as well and they will come in with a deck. And I did this at the start of my career, so it’s not something that I don’t understand.

0:07:06 – (Andrew Barbuto): I just don’t think that everybody’s thought the fundamentals of it, that’s part of the reason why I wrote the book. But they’ll come in with a prepared deck. They don’t. They have a presentation. They talk all about their company and all the different offerings and services without understanding whether any of it is super relevant to the person they’re talking to. You know, like presentations, it’s not about what you want to present, it’s about what’s going to be most relevant to the person you’re talking to. And what that involves is more listening and smart questions than talking and presenting. That’s a big mistake. I see a lot of salespeople make at the start of their careers.

0:07:40 – (Brynne Tillman): So what is the one recommendation you get them to kind of change that mindset?

0:07:46 – (Andrew Barbuto): Do not present your solution until they tell you that it will be relevant to you. So what I mean by that is I’m not going to present something unless I think that, you know, unless there’s something that you’ve told me that would lead me to believe that it would be helpful. And if you use that rule and kind of look at as a permission system. Right. No solution is relevant until they’ve outlined the fact that it would be relevant to them. The only way you could do that is by starting out with asking questions.

0:08:11 – (Andrew Barbuto): So getting to know the unique situation of every person that you’re talking to before you present your solution. Because it’s not. There’s no cookie cutter approach here. Right. Hopefully you work at a company where there’s a. You can customize your solution and so you can then take the conversation in the direction that your prospect wants to take it. And that’s how you’ll make the most relevant conversation that will be productive and lead to next steps.

0:08:40 – (Brynne Tillman): That’s fantastic. Thank you for that. So talk to me about customer-obsessed approach or that customer first approach that you talk about. And I know we kind of touched this with bringing them insights, but how can salespeople really come at it when they have KPIs and quotas? So you talk about quota crushing. Right? So their managers are like, they have, you have to hit these numbers and so how do they balance or how do they bridge the gap between what I’m responsible to do and what’s the right thing to do by the client?

0:09:22 – (Andrew Barbuto): Yeah, that’s a great question. And I, although I do see how they could clash, if you’re doing it right, they shouldn’t clash. And what I mean by that is, you know, you have to be an independent thinker in sales in order to succeed. You know, you can do all, you can play all, do everything that people ask you, but if you don’t perform, you know, you’ll get a nice pat in the back on the way out of the door. Right.

0:09:47 – (Andrew Barbuto): You, in order to succeed, you are solely responsible for hitting your goal. And so therefore, you should take responsibility for your own, you know, your own actions and do what you know is going to be right. And so how the two could then intertwine when you are an independent thinker is you should be the one who, you should have a thorough understanding of who are the customers who are most likely to benefit by our solution, who are most likely going to have the means to buy our solution in the short term.

0:10:17 – (Andrew Barbuto): So that’s the two critical areas of how I define a qualified prospect. So spending A lot of time finding those prospects that are most likely to have the means and the need to buy from you. And then it’s all about providing value. Once you’ve identified them as a qualified prospect, then that’s how you do the helping. That’s when I talk about being customer-centric and being customer obsessed is once you find the right prospects, then your job as a salesperson is to find out all of the ways that you can help them and find as many people to help and as many ways to help. And then if you’re doing that enough, then the sales will come.

0:10:53 – (Andrew Barbuto): Right, because you’re going to be helping them with what your offering is. So the two do go hand in hand in that respect. My advice is to. Yes, sales is an art and a science. So you do need to have a significant amount of opportunity, a significant amount of activities. You need to do your follow-ups, you need to be resilient, you need to create opportunities, but they need to be with qualified prospects.

0:11:12 – (Andrew Barbuto): And you need to keep in mind that the human psychology that’s involved with sales has to do with the fact that in order for someone to buy from you, first they’re going to want to lightly first they’re going to need to like you and then they’re going to want to. So therefore they want to work with you. And then, you know, once you’ve made that connection, then they need to justify their decision with logic and by providing consistent value to help. If you’re truly helping them with your solution, then that obviously naturally aligns with the revenue.

0:11:43 – (Brynne Tillman): Thank you for that. Some really good insights in there. Let’s just talk about how you move a cold prospect to become a warm opportunity. You mentioned warming them up. What is that strategy that you.

0:12:01 – (Andrew Barbuto): Yeah, I love that question. And the reason why is that I think this is one of the things that has separated me in my career and can be a huge leg up for any salesperson. And so the way I look at prospecting research, I think that what’s unique about the way I look at it is I don’t look at it as something that’s just a part of prospecting. I look at it at its own activity. And so what, what that entails is to do two things.

0:12:29 – (Andrew Barbuto): Well, three things. One is finding the right companies that are most likely to be qualified, that are going to move the needle, that can buy from you, that you can help. So that’s number one, finding the right companies. You can then put them into tiers based on opportunity size and likelihood of the Close two is, well, let me find the people, the right people who are most likely to buy from me at those companies.

0:12:55 – (Andrew Barbuto): So who are the decision makers? The ideal Persona profile at the ideal client profiles. And once you’ve then identified them, then the third part is, now let me try to find something that I can connect with that individual. And how I turn a cold prospect into a warm lead is identifying something that has a commonality between us. I already mentioned a few examples, right? We went to the same college, maybe we were part of the same fraternity, sorority, maybe, you know, we went to, you know, we grew up in the same area.

0:13:27 – (Andrew Barbuto): Anything that connects you to it and it doesn’t just have to be you. So just a couple of quick tactics that I’ve used that can turn a cold prospect to a warm lead. Well, when you start out in your sales career or at any point in your sales career, chances are you’re not going to have a big, as big of a network as your boss, who’s been likely in the industry a lot longer, right? But one of the things that I’ve done was I will go through my manager’s LinkedIn connections and I will take note of anybody that I think would be worth an introduction to that would fall into my ideal customer profile.

0:13:59 – (Andrew Barbuto): And then I will then send that list to my manager and say, hey, is there anybody on this list that you think that you would feel comfortable with doing an introduction for? And if so, I’m happy to send over some, an email that you can tweak and make your own. And from that technique, I’ve been able to get several leads that previously would have most likely not responded to me. But because they have those connections and they’re your manager, you’re on the same team, they’re more than happy usually to say, to do it right.

0:14:29 – (Andrew Barbuto): So that’s a team effort. And that could be for anybody that works at your company that you see that you have a second connection with.

0:14:34 – (Brynne Tillman): So that’s one of the things I love about Sales Navigator. In a corporate license, if they leverage Team Link, which is literally you can invite people to open up their network even if you’re not connected to them, Right? So your manager you’re probably connected to, but there might be a manager across the country who knows people and you don’t know that manager, you can still see who those folks know that you might want to meet. And so I agree. I think using that, you know the, there is no business without sales.

0:15:09 – (Brynne Tillman): So everyone in the organization is connected to your success in one way or another. So that’s fantastic. Thank you. My last question to you is what question did I not ask you today that I should have?

0:15:25 – (Andrew Barbuto): Sure. So one of the things I would say there are two resources that I think would be very helpful that can be found on my [email protected] meeting hacks and one that’s Andrew Barbito.com outreach. The way reason why I bring those up is because one of them is the exact script that I use to secure next steps in every meeting within five minutes. Literally I do it right at the top of the call and without fail 90% of my meetings lead to next steps. That’s one of the things that I see be a huge challenge is those deals that meeting ends right and there are no clear next steps and then they’ll send me the follow ups and like they’re not looking at your follow ups. Right.

0:16:06 – (Andrew Barbuto): And then it goes dark and you’re surprised they don’t respond to your email because everyone’s busy. So you have to take advantage of their attention when you have it. And the only way to continue to press progress a deal is by continuing to get next steps when you have their attention. The other one is we didn’t get, we didn’t have too much time to go into the in depth outlet strategy that I have.

0:16:26 – (Andrew Barbuto): But I don’t just use LinkedIn Sales Navigator and I don’t just use email and I just, I don’t just use the phone. I use the three different tools in sequence. And the outward strategy that you can [email protected] Outreach is one that has consistently secured me meetings with Prefix. So once you’ve identified them, once you’ve identified the data points that would allow them to be a warm lead. Well then you need to get in front of them, you need to get their attention.

0:16:54 – (Andrew Barbuto): And that’s not going to happen with a single email. It’s not going to happen usually with a single platform. You need to sequence your platforms and I have a very specific method that I use which allows me to hit them and with enough messages to guarantee that I’m not going to be somebody that falls into their, you know, their, their spam folder ends is not required to make a cold call. But I don’t really make cold calls.

0:17:19 – (Andrew Barbuto): I use this method instead and from my experience it’s been more effective and it doesn’t involve disrupting someone’s day like a telemarketer.

0:17:28 – (Brynne Tillman): So my last question then is going to be what are those three steps just Briefly, sure, of course.

0:17:34 – (Andrew Barbuto): So the first step is LinkedIn. I already mentioned how I identify those data points and how I find them. So I would send them a message on LinkedIn to identify that data point. You know, could involve a mutual connection. Right. Then I will send a Follow up on LinkedIn a coupl ofe days later. You can mix in voicemails because that’s a good way to stand out. Most people don’t use them. From there, once they don’t respond, then I’ll move it over to email and on email, I’ll then follow up in the subject line. I’ll call out the fact that I did reach out on LinkedIn and it was a follow-up from my LinkedIn message.

0:18:12 – (Andrew Barbuto): I don’t get a response after that, I’ll send another follow-up and then from there, if there’s no response, then I will use the phone and I will say, hey, I’ve sent you a few messages, I’m trying to get in touch. I want to talk to you about this that I think that would be beneficial for you. Please feel free to give me a call back, leave my number, then follow up with another email which says, just left you a voicemail, just left your voicemail, trying to get in touch.

0:18:42 – (Andrew Barbuto): What I found is that most of the time a client or prospect’s not going to pick up the phone, right? You see a number coming in that you don’t recognize, you’re not going to pick up. But they will almost always listen to a voicemail. So that is a way to break through the noise. It doesn’t involve necessarily cold calling. And you’re giving, you have a legitimate reason for calling. You’re not just calling out of the blue. You sent them a few messages.

0:19:02 – (Andrew Barbuto): You have a right as a salesperson or you’ve been trying to get in touch with somebody to say, hey, can we help you? And they will almost always respond to that voicemail. Most of the time. If you have a good product and you’re targeting the right people, it’s not that they’re not interested, it’s that they’re too busy. You’re not the priority. Why would you be? They don’t know you. If you were the priority, they would reach out to you.

0:19:22 – (Andrew Barbuto): What’s unique about why it’s still worth downloading? My outreach strategy is I put exactly what I include in my email that resonates with my prospects, that is of value. So I would still recommend checking it out, but that’s the overarching strategy that I use. But what’s most important is that you’re targeting the right people.

0:19:46 – (Brynne Tillman): Well, thank you for sharing that. It’s funny, we may part of our philosophy is we have to earn the right to ask them to meet with us. So in that follow-up bringing value insights that they can use even if they don’t talk with you can make a huge impact on them wanting to take your call because you earn the right and they go hey, if I got this much value from the blog post, the checklist, the video, just from that, imagine how much value I’ll get if I do take this call.

0:20:19 – (Brynne Tillman): So earning the right to get that call through value and insights is really important.

0:20:26 – (Andrew Barbuto): Yeah, it’s a cardinal rule of mine value on every touch point. I don’t check in. I don’t just email to set up time. I always think about what I can provide with value first and then I ask the request. If I do ask request value on every single touch point is super important.

0:20:44 – (Brynne Tillman): Well, thank you. So how can our listeners get in touch with you?

0:20:48 – (Andrew Barbuto): Sure. So you can check out my website andrewbarbudo.com I already mentioned you could do backslash outreach or meeting hacks or check out my YouTube video. I mean my YouTube channel YouTube. Com Drew Barbuto I put out a couple of videos a week with best practices on B2B sales. My book Top Sales how to Crush a Sales Quota will be available on pre-order starting in November and available to own everywhere in early December.

0:21:16 – (Brynne Tillman): Perfect. Thank you so much for your time. I appreciate it. And to all our listeners, while you’re out and about, don’t forget to make your sales social.

Outro:

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