Latest / Sell Well: Helping Agencies Close More Deals and Grow Revenue / The House Party Strategy: Inbound vs. Outbound Sales Explained

Transcript

The House Party Strategy: Inbound vs. Outbound Sales Explained · Sell Well: Helping Agencies Close More Deals and Grow Revenue

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: So many business owners tell me they don't want to pursue outbound sales because it doesn't feel on brand for them.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_00: And here's what they mean: they don't want to feel sleazy.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_00: They don't want to feel like they're having to chase down business.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: And they're told that they should feel this way because business coaches and online courses have told them if you run a successful business, leads will just come to you.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: It's amazing.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_00: They come ready with budget and they're ready to work with you and they totally see your value.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: But in my experience, outbound sales actually changed the game.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_00: And I preferred it way over inbound.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: And that's what we're going to talk about today.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_00: When I talk about inbound versus outbound, I like to use the analogy of a house party.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: So in this case, we are going to pretend like we're throwing a house party together.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_00: Our goal for this house party is that as many people as possible come.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_00: We want this to be full early 2000s, red solo cups on the ground, people everywhere.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_00: I want you to picture, you know, whatever house party you're picturing, whether you went to it or you're picturing a scene from one tree hill.
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_00: We want as many people to come to this party as possible.
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_00: In order to get people to come to our party, we're going to employ inbound and outbound tactics.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_00: First, we're going to start with inbound.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: Inbound looks like us posting on our neighborhood Facebook page.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_00: It looks like us sharing on social media.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: We might tack some flyers up around the town.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_00: And we're just going to quote unquote spread the word.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_00: That's what we're going to do.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_00: Now, here's the problem with this tactic.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_00: We have no idea how many people are going to show up.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_00: Could be two, could be a hundred.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_00: We have no idea how many kegs to buy.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: We don't know what to do here.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_00: And this is fine because there will be some people that show up from this and they're going to be really excited and we just don't know who they are, where they're coming from, or how they found out about us.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_00: We can ask them and we can try to do some tracking here.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_00: But at the end of the day, we are just hoping that warm bodies show up from our inbound marketing efforts for our party, right?
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_00: So whoever shows up on that Friday night, those are people that just saw our flyer, saw our post, heard about us from a friend, and they're showing up and walking in the door.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_00: Our other option is that we can employ some outbound efforts.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_00: And this looks like sending invitations directly to people that we want to be there.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_00: We might shoot them a text.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_00: We might put an invitation in their mailbox.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_00: We might directly call them and invite them to come.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_00: And doing this, we can also tell them, hey, I'd love for you to bring somebody too.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: Now we're starting to get ahead.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_00: We've started to build a guest list of people that we actually want there who we think are going to show up because they are ideal party goer people.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_00: You're starting to catch my drift here.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_00: It's a lot easier to build your business when you know exactly who you're reaching out to.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_00: You're able to track who's saying yes, you have a headcount, and you know that you can always go back and reach out to even more people when tactics start working.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: Let's say that you get more SVPs from people when you text them rather than call them.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_00: You now know how to get even more people to your party versus if you just keep posting on social media, if you just keep crossing your fingers, you could end up pretty lonely or with some really weird people on a Friday night.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: It's not to say that I'm against inbound marketing.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_00: Posting and putting the word out and most marketing efforts are really great for warming up your audience, building trust, and helping people move through that process.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_00: And they are going to be warmer when they engage with your content and they get to see what you're about.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: The problem is most people stop there and they think that if their content's good enough or they're positioned well enough, honestly, it all comes down to, and if I build it, they will come mentality.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_00: And most of the time, they don't come.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_00: It's really hard to keep that up and to hope that you just go viral and land these people just from an inbound marketing plan.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_00: Now at this point, you're probably listening and you're like, but Susie, referrals, that's how my whole business has been built and my content just supports that.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_00: I'm with you.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_00: But at some point, you might end up in a spot like I did where you're not getting the referrals that you want.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: I was getting a ton of referrals, but they weren't the kind of leads that I actually wanted.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_00: They actually were from an industry that I wasn't super passionate about.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_00: They weren't super nice people.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_00: And at the end of the day, I was looking to break into a new group that would send me even better referrals, but I didn't know how.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_00: That was when, and if you listen to my intro story, uh I talk a lot more about this, but that was when I came across a cold email agency that introduced me to outbound, and I was able to reach a whole new group of people that I would have never reached otherwise.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_00: Cold email was the outbound strategy that I chose, but there's so many ways to get out in front of the people that you want to reach.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_00: And with all of the amazing technology and all of the data that we've aggregated, you actually can go and say, I really would love to break into architects, or I would love to break in and work with interior designers, or I'd love to break in and work with IT professionals, whoever that might be, you can actually build a list and go and market directly to them.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_00: And you actually don't even need a list builder or any kind of crazy software.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: You can do that just by researching them on Google.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_00: Google has verified all of these businesses.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_00: You can go and track down contact information.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: Is it tedious?
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_00: Is it less fun than creating content?
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_00: It's not like I'm saying I love outbound marketing because it's the most fun I've ever had.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_00: Where it got fun for me was when the money started coming in.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_00: And what I was able to do with outbound sales, I was never able to replicate with inbound marketing.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_00: Inbound marketing was fun.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_00: It felt true to our brand.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_00: We were able to invite people in.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_00: And of course they were warm when we had people that came in from there.
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_00: They had already fallen in love with us and we were off to the races.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_00: But when it came to actually putting more dollars on the table, 3Xing our business year over year over year, what we wanted to do was go and find more people that we could reach who would refer us even more business.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_00: And that's what we were able to do with outbound marketing.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_00: If you are in a season where you're feeling like, uh, we have an incredible infrastructure in our team, we're ready to add more business to our roster, but I'm feeling hesitant.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_00: Don't want to feel sleazy.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: You want to make sure that it feels aligned with your brand.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_00: I would encourage you to explore a couple different options for outbound marketing.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_00: Whether it's an SDR, cold email, ads, there's so many different avenues for you to go and pursue outbound leads while you're still building your inbound.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_00: Inbound is going to make these people trust you even more and make the most of your outbound investment.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_00: It's so important.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_00: My main point today is this: you need to have both inbound and outbound marketing to grow your business.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_00: If one of them makes you uncomfortable, specifically outbound, I would encourage you to schedule a few calls with people who are in your industry and ask them what they're doing to populate leads other than just typical marketing tactics.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_00: You might find out about an awesome agency or a partner or something that might inspire you and get you excited about pursuing some of these leads in a way that still feels true to your brand.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_00: I'll leave you with this.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_00: One of my clients was like, no, I would never pursue outbound.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_00: And I encouraged her to go ahead and try a cold email agency or pursue some leads on her own.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_00: And her business essentially doubled within three months.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_00: They doubled cash flow.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_00: She's had to add to her team.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_00: And now she's a whole new thing she's working on and how to support all of these amazing new clients.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_00: Outbound gives you levers you can pull to make more money.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_00: That is what you're trying to do.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_00: Inbound is a waiting game, it's a brand building game, and you are playing the long game.
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_00: Play the short game, find an outbound strategy that works for you.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_00: And if you're feeling like I don't know where to get started and I don't want to do this on my own, I'd love to chat with you.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_00: That's exactly what I help business owners do all the time.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_00: You can go to my website, susyconsoli.com, and check out how I support business owners in getting their business set up the right way.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks so much for listening.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_00: In the next episode, we're going to talk about why I think you hate sales and how that might not be the case.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_00: See you next time, and thanks for listening to the Sell Well Podcast.