By The sales world has drastically changed over the past few years. The average customer journey is very complex, with more options to choose from than ever before.
Back in the day, outbound sales were the only way to go. It was all about generating prospects and interest from scratch without the luxury of them coming to the business themselves.
In simple terms, outbound sales refer to the buyer-seller engagement initiated by the sales rep, while inbound sales occur when potential buyers spark the engagement by signing up for the newsletter, visiting the website, etc.
Sales Development Representatives (SDRs) usually work on outbound sales, and Account Executives (AEs) focus on inbound sales. SDRs turn rejections into opportunities, and once they spark interest in the prospects – they are sent down the pipeline and passed to the AEs, whose job is to close them.
Which of the two sales branches is more effective totally depends on the industry and the target market, but the practice has shown that some combination of both is the optimal way to go. It should be mentioned that outbound sales require less manpower and financing to get the ball rolling.
SDRs working on outbound sales focus on cold outreach, meaning outreach where the prospects are not expecting to be contacted by the business. Even though cold outreach, unfortunately, got a bad reputation due to the high numbers of scammers and unqualified sales reps, it still remains one of the most powerful tools in sales teams’ arsenal.
Modern-day outbound sales are about finding highly-targeted, relevant prospects that match your firm’s ideal customer profile. SDRs look for prospects who can benefit from their product, providing value or a solution to an existing pain point, rather than blindly mass outreaching.
The main objective of outbound sales is to spark a dialogue, show how the businesses can be of value, and potentially create long-term relationships. The first step is identifying and narrowing down the target market, after which SDRs pick their preferred outreach channel.
Cold emails and cold calls remain top of the list just like before, the only difference is that absolutely no prospect wants to be just another name on the list. Without some form of personalization, they will not even open the door, and why should they?
Thankfully there are some great Sales Engagement Platforms (SEPs) to assist in your mass outreach by maintaining that personalized warm tone and providing value at every touch point throughout the engagement journey.
