By Rachel Williams

Sales is an art form—and just like any other craft, it takes knowledge and practice to truly master it. 

That said, knowledge can often be safeguarded by salespeople looking to protect their advantages, and many sellers know little about where they stand in comparison to their colleagues. 

We’ve gathered a few pieces of eye-opening insight to illustrate what works and what doesn’t work when it comes to meeting with prospects and closing deals.

1. 80% of sales require 5 follow-up calls after the meeting. 44% of sales reps give up after 1 follow-up.

Source: Marketing Donut

We get it: you’re busy. Your prospects are busy. (At least that’s how they respond to your scheduling requests.) But squeaking a single call onto the calendar almost never results in a closed-won sale.

Make follow-ups a standard of practice. Let your prospect know you’re as invested in their success as they are. To reduce the burden of back-and-forth emails when it comes to scheduling meetings, try an automated scheduling system like Calendly.

2. Nearly 13% of all the jobs in the U.S. (1 in 8) are full-time sales positions.

Source: Skilled Up

Your position isn’t going away any time soon and your skills make you an asset everywhere you go—but the popularity of sales is a double-edged sword.

If you believe you’re the only one sending cold emails or LinkedIn messages, guess again. Your prospect has already heard from a handful of other sellers just this morning. You must not only make your efforts targeted, personalized, and timely, but also make it simple and frictionless for prospects to respond. Give them a clear call to action they can accomplish by clicking a single link—such as watching a video, requesting a demo, or scheduling a call.

3. 78% of salespeople using social media outsell their peers.

Source: Forbes

There’s no disguising social media’s raw power as an effective marketing tool. Many successful sellers use the power of social selling to draw their ideal clients to them, as opposed to chasing prospects down with cold calls and emails.

By curating a social feed that appeals to your ideal customers and providing a way for them to connect with you, you may attract enough inbound leads to make cold contacting a thing of the past.

4. What do buyers want from sales pros? 69% say, “Listen to my needs.”

Source: Hubspot

As a seller, the KPIs and quotas you’re trying to hit are truly mind-scrambling, and it’s easy to get wrapped up in your own needs. I need to make this many sales. I need to clinch this many upgrades. I need to push adoption of this feature.

If you aren’t already, then you need to be on the lookout for what your prospect is struggling with. Personalizing your outreach specifically to a person’s needs can greatly increase their trust in your recommendations. 

5. By the end of 2020, customers will handle 85% of all business functions without ever interacting with a human.

Source: Gartner Customer 360

Those who struggle in the sales industry are those who don’t adapt to their target clients’ business environment and personal preferences—and the data shows that prospects vastly prefer to take control of their business themselves, online. You’ll succeed if you can provide them with the right avenues to self-serve or book time with you in a contact-free way, such as through a scheduling app.

6. The best time to contact a lead? 4-6pm on a Thursday, or 5 minutes after their inquiry.

Source: LeadResponseManagement

When you’re trying to book calls with leads, you should aim to contact them no more than five minutes after their inquiry. Their interest is piqued, your product is fresh in their minds, and they’re in a receptive state of mind.

7. 19% of buyers want to talk to a sales rep when first learning about a product.

Source: Hubspot

They’ve seen your homepage, read your content, and they want to learn more—right now! Give their interest an outlet by providing a seamless way to schedule time with your sales team right from your site, with conversational marketing tools like Drift or a teams-based scheduling system like Calendly.

Now that you know…

Share this information with your fellow salespeople! We hope you found some valuable takeaways to help inspire and ignite your career in sales.