Necessary Preparations Before Prospecting for New Customers
Prospective customers can be identified through various methods, including outbound calls, emails, direct mail, social media, and events such as trade shows. For prospects with a certain level of interest, we nurture them through the sales funnel, educate them about our products or services, and guide them through the process of converting into a purchase.
While there are differences depending on the industry and sales approach, the following steps are generally followed.
1. Define the Ideal Customer Profile: Define customers who maximize the use of your products or services based on information such as industry, company size, location, department, and the job title of the person in charge.
- To solve problems related to business continuity
- To save operational resources
- To increase sales
By identifying common items among ideal customers with these objectives, you can develop a detailed image of their business responsibilities, daily tasks, and even the inconveniences they may feel.
Defining an ideal customer profile leads to creating a common understanding within the sales organization regarding the origin of a prospect's needs. Indicators that facilitate this common understanding include the following items:
- NPS (Net Promoter Score) or CSAT (Customer Satisfaction Score)
- Annual Contract Value or Total Contract Value
- Growth rate by industry
- Retention rate
2. Create an Approach List and Identify Qualified Leads: List companies that meet the criteria of your ideal customer profile. Specifically, lists are formed using the following methods:
- Conducting desk research to investigate company profiles and history
- Purchasing lists from data providers
- Attending industry events to obtain contact information
Once you have a list of prospects, conduct detailed research on items such as the business objectives and investment areas of the companies on the list using the following types of data:
- Corporate Attributes: Use data such as company organization, group affiliation, and number of employees to confirm if they are close to your ideal customer profile.
- Technographic Data: By clarifying the status of tool adoption, you can visualize relationships with competing services and the adoption status of services that can collaborate with your company, allowing you to consider the direction of your proposal.
- Financial Data: Financial data, such as recent investment areas and business performance, is important information for gauging the likelihood of them paying for your products or services.
3. Determine How to Contact Prospects: Methods for approaching qualified leads include requesting meetings via email or phone, and advertising using social media or paid media. It is important to start a conversation and build a relationship. Be careful, as business opportunities can vanish if the prospect feels they are being "sold to" or if the sales representative lacks an understanding of the prospect's challenges. You should prepare several contexts in which your products or services can solve the business problems faced by the prospect, and then select the appropriate approach method.
*Rating 2.0 was an optional feature of SideSonar (new provision ended in February 2025) and its new provision ended as of April 2025. Similar functionality has been inherited by the AI list feature included in PLANSonar.
