Social selling, which refers to the practice of building relationships with customers and prospects through online channels, has become a significant online sales trend. It can help you build positive relationships with prospects, grow your business’s credibility, and reach buyers more quickly. However, social selling isn’t without its challenges. The right social selling strategy—along with the right solution providers—can help you overcome those challenges and achieve your business goals faster.
Businesses usually face the following problems when social selling:
To improve your sales, you need to understand the challenges of social selling. If you’re struggling with sales and business growth, you’re not alone. Industries are experiencing fierce competition, and multiple brands are trying to attract 71% of consumers on different social media channels.
To add to the complexities of social selling, new expectations and emerging social networks create additional challenges for brands. It is more difficult for brands to stand out in today’s crowded marketplace.
Although many challenges exist for businesses that engage in social selling, we have narrowed the scope here to some of the most important ones. Let’s examine them in detail.
· High advertising costs
Many social media platforms are available today. Prices for ads on these platforms vary according to factors such as platform popularity and sales engagement rate. Facebook is one of the leading platforms, with more than two billion monthly users and a high sales conversion rate compared with other social platforms.
Facebook has a significant advantage over other social media sites because it is the world’s largest platform, with over 2 billion users. However, this competitive advantage can also create challenges for advertisers and ultimately lead to higher costs. Facebook has monthly ad spend criteria, so this can make it difficult to tailor ads to specific audiences. Additionally, as more users join social media platforms every year, advertising costs will continue to increase.
· Difficulties with reaching a wider audience on social media
Sales representatives face a number of challenges in their daily operations, especially when it comes to reaching a larger audience on social media. This is true because people do not know if they are using the right tools. Social media platforms are like monsters that require constant attention and effort to reach a bigger audience.
· Reduced customer retention and conversion rates
Although it is preferable to sell to customers who already trust your brand, many salespeople find that they are unable to increase their customer retention and conversion rates because of increasing competition on social media platforms. These platforms are evolving constantly in order to meet consumers’ fast-paced lifestyles. Brands that fail to keep up with these trends usually experience lower engagement, conversion, and customer retention rates.
· Loss of access to digital assets due to account suspension
A major challenge in social selling is keeping up with the ever-changing rules of social media platforms. A salesperson often has difficulty keeping track of an account’s visibility while focusing on getting attention. A suspended account is devastating both mentally and financially, as you lose all your digital assets.
Social selling solutions by Social Epoch
Meeting social selling challenges can be difficult, but having the right tools can help you overcome them. SocialEpoch offers Salestech and Martech solutions that can help you meet these challenges in the best possible way.
Sales intelligence
· AI social prospecting
SocialEpoch Facebook Sales Prospecting Tool offers the first-ever AI-powered solution for social prospecting. The AI platform can be used with just a few clicks, and it does all the work for you. This way, salespeople can focus their time on messaging, instead of spending hours researching people.
· Scraping and list building
Accurate and timely scraping and list building with a Facebook marketing automation tool can result in a significant impact on your brand’s sales. This process can also help you in making more effective decisions, streamlining operations, and improving the quality of your marketing, financial, and organizational choices.
Proactive social engagement
Social engagement is a core component of effective social selling. With SocialEpoch, you have a capable Facebook marketing automation tool at your disposal to help you manage social engagement in an efficient manner. When you gain access to this Facebook marketing automation tool, you also gain access to proactive social engagement tools that include joining conversations around your business or brand name. You can utilize these efforts to direct your prospects to message you with questions they might have regarding your product or service offerings.
· Combine RPA, MA, and AI
Marketing Automation Tool and AI have been combined with RPA (Robotic process automation) Tool, which effectively helps you to get the most out of your social media strategy. You can use this tool to execute all actions with a single key, and it will also help you find better engagement opportunities. You could then consider different tactics to engage these opportunities effectively.
· Improved lead coverage and boosted team productivity
In addition, SocialEpoch Facebook Marketing Tool features efficient technology-led Facebook marketing and Sales features. With the power of artificial intelligence and marketing automation, you can get to know where your leads are coming from and how you can better target them to improve lead coverage.
Technology-led and Community-led sales
SocialEpoch WhatsApp SCRM is an integrated platform for the sales team to make better use of their time and resources for reaching out to more customers. Community-led growth is arguably one of the most powerful ways to grow your business, and improve its bottom line. The tool can benefit your business in the following ways:
· Leads Research and Segment
A successful social selling strategy relies on appropriate lead research and segmentation. These tactics help to convert your leads into customers more effectively. No matter what industry you operate in, your target customers are a mix of people with varying needs. Their needs change as they move along the buying process, so you can segment leads based on those needs and deliver appropriate messages to them in order to convert them.
· Manage customers and leads all on WhatsApp SCRM
SocialEpoch WhatsApp SCRM is a powerful Sales Management Software that allows you to manage and grow your business more efficiently. The tool can help you respond faster to customer inquiries and increase the productivity of your team.
· Close more deals and preserve digital customer assets securely.
SocialEpoch offers a smart chatbot solution that allows businesses to respond to 500 messages per day. In addition, it can also be used to respond to customer inquiries and close more deals. This customer relationship management tool also enables you to securely obtain your customers’ digital assets.
Customer retention
SocialEpoch WhatsApp SCRM also helps you improve your customer retention rate by allowing you to automate the delivery of your messages on a personal level. Most people read their WhatsApp messages on a daily basis so using this tool to help you sell is one of the best ways to convert your prospects into paying customers.
By sending messages to your customers on a regular basis, you can build a positive relationship with them. WhatsApp SCRM can help you build trust and loyalty with your customers, which will increase their purchase rate.
3 Moats to help shape your business
Social Selling is on the rise. Many businesses have started to focus on this business technique, in order to improve their sales. The popularity of Social Selling has also increased competition in the market significantly.
SocialEpoch SCRM
SCRM helps in storing data on customers, such as their contact information, in one central location. This practice helps you to manage and respond to your prospects from a single platform, thus you can connect with all your prospects from a central location.
Customer Data Platform
Customer data platforms (CDPs) collect and store all customer data from various sources. However, marketers who use different systems to manage data need a more efficient solution.
Marketing automation
For a growing business, it is vital to improve efficiency and productivity. Marketing automation tools allow you to manage routine tasks quickly and efficiently. Personalized marketing campaigns based on segmented databases can help you increase customer engagement, while staying focused on other business processes.
Final Thoughts
Within a few years, social selling has become one of the most popular online selling approaches. Social selling is now a mainstay of most businesses’ marketing strategies, as it allows businesses to grow through social media platforms. Although social selling seems an easier selling technique, it also brings with it some challenges that can limit the potential of growth.
