Sales Prospecting Manual
Ryan Schefke

Sales Prospecting Manual: The Secret to B2B Sales

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To download the Sales Prospecting Manual: The Secret to B2B Sales white paper .pdf, click here.

Overview

This manual is a step-by-step guide to sales prospecting. The manual was curated through real-life experience with the sales team at Lead Liaison. By following this manual your B2B sales team should expect to have a smooth-running, well-oiled B2B prospecting engine that you can use to fill the top of the funnel for $.78 per lead!

Get Prepared

Step 1: Identify your Target Market

Look at your past successes and determine which markets/industries you’re getting the most traction in. For example, is it the finance industry, health industry, high-tech, etc. Keep your focus on a specific marketing or vertical and base it off of past wins.

Step 2: Build your Team

Your team will consist of a Business Development Representative (also known as an Inside Sales Representative, or “BDR”) and a Sales Representative. Your BDR can be an internal resource or external resource, such as a contractor or part-time hire. With the B2B prospecting methodology covered in this manual, we’ve used an external resource. Here’s how we did it:

  1. Visit upwork.com. Upwork is a marketplace to hire contractors.
  2. Post a new job (it’s free).
  3. Here’s our post:
    • Title: Looking for an admin to help with data entry.
    • Description: Help with prospecting by following a guide to finding contacts using tools provided by our company. Enter the contacts into our sales automation system. Rinse and repeat.
  4. Hire your BDR for $3 per hour! Yep, we’re not joking. Here’s proof:

Hiring a BDR

5. Next, find your Sales Representatives. We suggest having Sales Representatives that work for your company. The Sales Reps will take leads from this process that engage (express interest or interact in some way) and follow up on them. They will also execute manual tasks that are combined with automated tasks as part of a sales plan that systematically, and intelligently, reaches out to your prospects.

Step 3: Build a Semi-Automated, Systematic Sales Plan

This step is a must if you want to build a prospecting machine. These systems are sometimes referred to as Sales Engagement, Sales Enablement, or Sales Automation. Regardless of the name, they all serve a similar purpose. That is, to make a salesperson’s job easier by making them more efficient with their day-to-day sales efforts. Enterprise systems will include a few key components:

  1. Sales plan
  2. Task manager
  3. Integration with CRMs and marketing automation platforms

The Sales plan is a combination of various actions such as emails (automatic and manual), offline communication (handwritten letters, postcards, etc.), tasks, and digital communication (text messaging) that can be added into your plan. With the right system, there are two ways to manage your plan:

  1. Create one plan that all of your Sales Reps can share.
  2. Create individual plans for each of your Sales Reps.

In the process below, we’re using method #1. Your VP of Sales or someone leading your sales team could create the plan and your entire sales team can benefit from it. This results in consistent communication for your brand and overall messaging. Our system of choice in this example is a Sales Enablement system from Lead Liaison. Other providers call their Sales Plan “Sequences” or “Cadences”, while Lead Liaison calls them “Rhythms”.

Here’s how to create your Sales Plan using Rhythms: http://youtu.be/6bKzl9LZcX8?hd=1

Start Prospecting

Step 4: Find the Right Person

In this part of the manual, these are the instructions you can provide to your BDR (the $3 resource).

  • Do not select more than two (2) people at the same company. It’s suggested you use only a single contact to avoid any issues with domain reputation.
  • Use these methods, in this order, to find the right person to target:
  • Look for these people (you fill in the X, Y, and … in the section below to give your BDR specific instructions). Remember, you should create a Saved Search in LinkedIn Navigator to simplify this process for your BDR.
    • First, anyone with “X” in their title.
    • Next, anyone with “Y” in their title.
    • Finally, if there’s no match on the above look for these titles:
      • …
      • …
    • Ideally, you’re looking for these key job titles:
      • …
      • …

Step 5: Find their Email Address

Have your ISR install these tools as their ISR Prospecting Stack. Using these three tools will guarantee your ISR can find a valid email address f86% of the time. See a more detailed analysis on this fact in this blog post.

  • Install the top three (3) ranked tools below. Each tool has a video demonstrating how to install it and how to use it.
  • Since there is an average of 21 business days in a month, use two separate email addresses (personal email such as @gmail.com addresses are fine) and install Clearbit Connect with those email accounts. You can use the free version of Clearbit Connect to generate 10 new email addresses per day for each business day in the month. If you need more, open more Clearbit Connect accounts.
  • Use your company’s Norbert account.
  • Use your company’s Hunter account.
RankToolInstallationUsageFree CreditsMinimum Paid Plan (Annually)Price per Email (Based on Annual Paid Plan)Notes
1Clearbit ConnectHow to use Clearbit Connect100 emails per month$6,000$.50 (12K emails)Paid Plan can be divided into 5 seats. Only pay for verified matches.
2NorbertNorbert installationHow to use Norbert50 emails$468$.039 (12K emails)Credits rollover. Charges on successful verification.
3HunterHunter.io installationHow to use Hunter.io100 per month$408$.034 (12K emails)Share across users for paid plan. Also crawls web. Use web for single credit instead of browser plugin.

Step 6: Enter Data Into your Sales Automation System

In this step, your ISR will enter data into a Sales Automation system, in this case Lead Liaison’s Rhythms. After the BDR finds the contact, create the Prospect in Lead Liaison and add them into a Rhythm.

Start Selling

Step 7: Use a Task Manager

Now that your BDR engine is running full steam, and people are added to your Sales Plan, that’s where the hand-off from the BDR to the Sales Rep occurs. The Sales Rep simply has to execute all of the tasks created by your Sales Plan. Since we’re using Lead Liaison’s Rhythms for our Sales Plan, it also comes with a nice, built-in task manager. Every manual email or task used in your Rhythm will get populated in your task manager. Here’s how to manage your tasks with the task manager: http://youtu.be/0heTYixWjZ4?hd=1.

As you work through your tasks, make sure to do your research. If you’re selling to major accounts, in what’s referred to as Account-Based Sales or Account-Based Marketing, research is really important at this stage. In the section below, we cover our favorite tools for research and provide some videos on how to use each tool.

Task Manager

Step 8: Research

Identify Technographics (Datanyze)

If it’s important for you to know what technology (lead gen, marketing automation, content management system, email marketing program, etc.) your prospect is using use a system like Datanyze (now owned by ZoomInfo) or BuiltWith to search technographics.

  1. Install Datanyze Insider for free: https://www.datanyze.com/insider
  2. Here’s a video on how to use it to find Technographics: http://youtu.be/0fF23vXfVoo?hd=1

Check out Funding Events (Crunchbase)

Funding events, competitors, financials, and more can be found with Crunchbase.

  1. Access Crunchbase.
  2. Review key company information: http://youtu.be/EfeGIK6pBhw?hd=1

Read the News (Owler)

Owler does the best job in the marketplace for finding competitors. If this information is useful to you, access Owler.

  1. Head to owler.com and sign up for free.
  2. Search the company for News, Competitors, and Press Releases. Here’s an example: http://youtu.be/fJsno3l_zLg?hd=1

Summarizing the Prospecting Stack

Here’s a summary of what your company would need to invest in subscription services for the total prospecting stack. We broke up the stack into a BDR Stack and Sales Rep stack. We computed a Cost-Per-Lead, or CPL, for this prospecting effort based on 10,441 leads per year. Not bad for $.78 per lead!!!

BDR Prospecting Technology Stack

TOOLANNUAL COST
Clearbit ConnectFree
Voila Norbert$468
Hunter$408
LinkedIn Sales Navigator Professional$779.88
Lead Liaison Sales Enablement User License$900
TOTAL INVESTMENT$2,555.58

Sales Representative Sales Technology Stack

TOOLANNUAL COST
Datanyze InsiderFree
Owler Free
Crunchbase $348
TOTAL INVESTMENT$348

Total Investment and CPL

TOOLANNUAL COST
Clearbit ConnectFree
Voila Norbert$468
Hunter$408
Datanyze InsiderFree
Owler Free
Crunchbase $348
LinkedIn Sales Navigator Professional$779.88
Lead Liaison Sales Enablement User License$900
Research Labor ($3 per hour).

Based on 40 leads per day. 10 minutes per lead.

261 working days in a year.

$5,220
TOTAL TOOLS$2,903.88
TOTAL LABOR$5,220
TOTAL INVESTMENT$8,123.88
COST PER QUALIFIED LEAD (CPQL). 10,440 per year.$.78
Lead Liaison Press Release
Lead Liaison

Lead Liaison Announces Attendance at EXHIBITORLIVE 2019

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Dallas, Texas – Sales and marketing solutions provider Lead Liaison will be exhibiting at the 2019 EXHIBITORLIVE conference in Las Vegas, Nevada. The global leader in event lead management will be showcasing their solution, GoExhibit!, and how it manages event leads from capture to close. This three-day event will be held on February 25-27, 2019 at the Mandalay Bay Conference Center.

Lead Liaison will present exciting new capabilities such as NFC badge scanning, voice recording, branding capabilities, registration and badge printing, and more. They will demonstrate GoExhibit!’s ability to be a holistic solution, from form customization and lead capture, to distributing and following up with the lead while interest is still at its peak, to sending the lead on to CRMs and marketing automation platforms. They’ll also be announcing the industries first lead capture app that runs on Microsoft Windows, allowing companies to capture leads on any Windows device, such as Windows mobile devices or Surface tablets.

EXHIBITORLIVE is The Professional Development Conference for Trade Show and Corporate Event Marketing. This five-day educational event features 170+ sessions and workshops with the industry’s largest exhibit hall, including nearly 300 exhibitors. This is where you will find the latest products and resources shaping the future of exhibiting and corporate event programs.

“Our attendance at EXHIBITORLIVE underscores our dedication to businesses looking for a superior lead capture and management solution,” says Jen Worsham, Director of Marketing at Lead Liaison. “We look forward to sharing our solution and connecting with attendees in a meaningful way.”

Get your free pass to EXHIBITORLIVE 2019 by clicking here. If you would like to schedule time with the Lead Liaison team, click here or come by booth 1056 during the show. More information on all of the exhibitors, sessions, and speakers can be found here.

About Lead Liaison
Lead Liaison provides cloud-based sales and marketing automation solutions that helps businesses accelerate revenue by attracting, converting, closing and retaining more prospects. Filling a void in the small pool of marketing automation providers that focus on marketing-centric functionality, Lead Liaison gives equal focus to sales providing sophisticated visitor tracking and additional website engagement tools to boost sales effectiveness. Lead Liaison blends ease-of-use, a flexible business model, deep external integration, marketing across social, web, mobile, email and offline channels and powerful functionality, all specifically tailored for mid-sized businesses, into a single platform, called Revenue Generation Software®. Lead Liaison is headquartered in Dallas, Texas. For more information, visit http://www.leadliaison.com or call 1-800-89-LEADS (895-3237).

How to Find Email Addresses
Lead Liaison

How to Find Email Addresses

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Research Study on How to Find Email Addresses

If you’re in B2B sales then it’s important to know how to find email addresses. Lead Liaison did a study on 100 people to see if we could find their email address. We already had their correct email addresses (in other words, we knew the answer); but, wanted to tackle the project as if we were a sales person trying to find an email address.

We set out to figure out the best ways to do this. We scoured the web for the best tools, looked at using methods like Twitter, general web searches, guessing email patterns, etc. There’s really no easy and reliable way to find someone’s email by doing it on your own. Fortunately, there are some great software tools out there that took away all the hard work. Our study identified seven main software tools that can be used for free or for little to no charge ($.07 per lead). For our study, we took 100 people along with their domain names and manually entered them into each of the seven tools. It was a lot of work, but some really good results and learnings came from it.

The email addresses were sourced from prospects, address book contacts, and customers. Some of the tools allow bulk uploading, but we did it all by hand, one by one to save you the time! We ranked each of the seven tools based on price, quality, and user experience. The top three tools to find email addresses were Clearbit Connect, Norbert, and Hunter – in that order. In the analysis below, you’ll find a table that ranks each of the seven solutions. We created videos demonstrating how to install each tool and videos demonstrating how to find email addresses using each tool.

In the analysis of 100 email addresses, the top three tools were were Clearbit Connect, Norbert, and Hunter. The graph below shows a summary of the analysis. Here’s how to read it:

  1. Blue (Success Match Rate): Percentage of attempts the provider was able to successfully find the correct email address for the person we were looking for.
  2. Red (Wrong-Email Match Rate): Percentage of attempts the provider returned an incorrect email address for the person we were looking for.
  3. Yellow (Not Available Rate): Percentage of attempts the provider returned an incorrect email address for the person we were looking for.

See the section on the Top 3 Ways to Find Email Addresses below for a deeper analysis on the top 3 tools.

Email Finder Results

Find Email Addresses 86% of the Time

When we began this analysis we were skeptical that there were accurate ways to find email addresses. However, after this study we found that were were able to successfully find someone’s email address 86% of the time! You can do the same! That’s really an incredible result, and very accurate. The method we describe below is a full-proof plan for any sales and marketing organization who wants to develop a consistent prospecting process.

To find email addresses 86% of the time, install the top three ranked tools below. In the “Ranking Ways to Find Email Addresses” section below, each tool we analyzed comes with a video demonstrating how to install it and how to use it.

Since Clearbit Connect had the lowest amount of incorrect email addresses returned and didn’t use a credit unless it found an email, start your searching by using Clearbit Connect first. If you can’t find the email address in Clearbit Connect, then use Norbert next. Norbert had the highest accuracy (same as Hunter) but also the 2nd lowest error-rate. If you can’t find your email in Norbert, then use Hunter. After trying each of these solutions we’re confident that across all three one of them will show you the correct email address.

The methods above are a sure way to find an email address 86% of the time. We’re sharing the details of our study with you. Download the complete analysis below:

Find an email address for someone 86% of the time! Download our analysis of 100 people and domains to see the complete results for Clearbit Connect, Norbert, and Hunter.

Ranking Ways to Find Email Addresses

Below is our analysis and rank of seven tools to find an email address. Each column is explained below:

  1. Rank: Overall rank based on quality, price, and user experience.
  2. Tool: Name of the tool to find someone’s email.
  3. Installation: Video showing how to install the tool.
  4. Usage: Video showing how to use the tool to find an email address.
  5. Free Credits: Number of free credits the tool provides (noted one-time or per month).
  6. Minimum Paid Plan: Cost per year if you subscribed to the tool.
  7. Price per Email: Takes the total number of email addresses the tool provides in a 12 month period and divides that by the total paid plan amount in 12 months.
  8. Notes: Any tips or special notes for the tool.
RankToolInstallationUsageFree CreditsMinimum Paid Plan (Annually)Annual PriceNotes
1Clearbit ConnectHow to use Clearbit Connect100 emails per month$6,000$.50 (12K emails)Paid Plan can be divided into 5 seats. Only pay for verified matches.
2NorbertNorbert installationHow to use Norbert50 emails$468$.039 (12K emails)Credits rollover. Charges on successful verification.
3HunterHunter.io installationHow to use Hunter.io100 per month$408$.034 (12K emails)Share across users for paid plan. Also crawls web. Use web for single credit instead of browser plugin.
4SellhackSellhack installationHow to use Sellhack10 emails per month$36$.03 (1K emails)No credit rollover
5ToofrToofr / EmailFinder installationHow to use Toofr / EmailFinder15 emails$228$.038 (6K emails)Cancel anytime. $.0196 at $588 annual
6Find That EmailFind That Email installationHow to use Find That Email50 per month$348$.058 (6K emails)Cancel anytime
7Anymail FinderAnymail Finder installationHow to use Anymail Finder20 emails$588$.588 (1K emails)Credit system

Top 3 Ways to Find Email Addresses

In our analysis there were three clear winners, Clearbit Connect, Norbert, and Hunter. We discuss the reasons for the ranking and our experience below in more detail.

1st Place: Clearbit Connect

  • Price: A+ (Free), C (Paid)
  • Quality: A+
  • User Experience: B+

Out of 100 names and domains in our test, Clearbit Connect had the least amount of incorrect email addresses returned (4%). In general, it’s fair to say that Clearbit Connect was either accurate or could not find an email. We loved Clearbit Connect for a few reasons:

  • Clearbit Connect also doesn’t charge a credit unless it successfully finds an email address for you.
  • They had the least amount of incorrect emails.
  • It’s free with 100 credits (100 correct emails) per month. You can install it on any email account.

Use their Chrome Browser plugin for your research. It starts by clicking their icon, then entering in the domain name for the person you’re searching for. To find the domain name, head to the website where the person works. The domain name will be the value before the “.com”. For example, in “https://www.google.com” the domain name is “google.com”. If Clearbit Connect returns a company match, select it, if not hit enter.

Reasons we didn’t like Clearbit Connect:

  • Price: For a solid prospecting stack, you can stick with the free version of Clearbit Connect. However, if you’re looking to pay for it then heads up – it was the 3rd most expensive price per contact out of the seven tools we analyzed.
  • User Experience: The Chrome Browser plugin loaded inside our email inbox. As a heads up, it also starts to collect all of your email addresses from your account. This is a bit invasive, but could be a good trade depending on your goals.

Finding a Company Using Clearbit

In the next screen, enter the person’s name.

Finding a Person in Clearbit

2nd Place: Norbert

  • Price: C+ (Free), A (Paid)
  • Quality: A
  • User Experience: B-

Norbert was very accurate, and did not make a lot of mistakes. We found the Chrome Browser plugin was a nice (1st screenshot), but a little clunky at times. It seemed to have a few bugs in the User Interface. As a result, we switched over to their web application (2nd screenshot) which seemed a bit easier to use. The only tradeoff with Norber is that it took more time to find an email address. When compared with Clearbit Connect and Hunter, which were pretty much instant, it took up to several minutes at times to return a result. We didn’t mind this that much though, as we were playing the role of a B2B sales person. Queuing up searches in another top didn’t disrupt our workflow.

The other thing we didn’t like with Norbert is that it charged a credit for each request we made. Since Norbert either returned an incorrect result or no result at all 31% of the time, that means that 31% of the time you’ll get charged a credit and get no value in return. If you’re using the free version, it only gives you 50 email credits for one-time usage. Unlike Clearbit Connect and Hunter, the credits don’t reset every month. Once you’ve used your credits – you’re done, and you need to go for the paid plan. Fortunately, the paid plan is very affordable.

All things considered, the experience, the accuracy, low error rate, and cost per credit put Norbert in second place. Going for a paid plan here is worth considering as part of your prospecting stack.

Using the Norbert Chrome Plugin

Using the Norbert Web App

3rd Place: Hunter

  • Price: A+ (Free), A+ (Paid)
  • Quality: B+
  • User Experience: B+

Hunter was also a nice tool for finding an email address. We didn’t like using the Chrome Browser plugin as we found ourselves using double credits most of the time. It would search for the company details when we put in the domain, charging a credit, then when we put in the person’s name it charged a second credit. Instead, we switched over to the web version. In the screenshots below we show how you put in the domain name and name of the person you’re looking for. Here’s why we liked Hunter:

  1. It returned results almost instantly. Unlike Norbert, there was no waiting.
  2. Cost was very competitive. They were the 2nd least expensive solution out of all seven providers we analyzed.
  3. It returned the most number of accurate emails (tied at 69% with Norbert).
  4. It also scrapes the web, and shows exactly where the email address was found. That gave us added confidence in the results.
  5. It also showed a verification symbol, see the green icon below. This also gave us a confidence boost.

Based on quality, user experience, and price, Hunter was a close 2nd. The only reason why it came in third is because of the higher number of inaccurate emails that it returned.  It was 6% more inaccurate than Norbert, and 12% more inaccurate than Clearbit. You can’t beat the price per email though!

Using Hunter

My $876 B2B Email Finder Stack

Since our study was based on a B2B sales person researching email addresses, we wanted to make sure we have the right tools in our prospecting stack for finding an email address. We also have a budget to use as part of our sales enablement plan. Each of the top three tools offer free credits. However, if that’s not sustainable and you need a good set of tools to use for B2B marketing do the following:

  1. Use the free version of Clearbit Connect to generate 100 new email addresses in a month. The paid version will set you back $6K in a year. That’s a bit rich for our blood, so the free version did the trick.
  2. Buy a Norbert account. It’s gives you 50 free credits. However, a subscription is very affordable and worth the investment. At the time of this analysis, and annual subscription was $468.
  3. Buy a Hunter account. You could use the free version and get 100 emails per month; however, similar to Norbert, it’s very affordable and worth the investment. At the time of this analysis, and annual subscription was $408.

For $876 a year, I’d feel comfortable going to my boss and asking him/her for the money. Assuming you used each of the three tools above for your stack, you’ll be able to find about 12,000 email addresses in a year. That’s 1,000 correct emails in a month. That’s more than enough for a single person. Depending on your individual capacity and your approach to B2B sales; this solution could cover one to 20 B2B sales reps. The bottom line is that your cost per lead (CPL) is $.073. That’s less than a dime for a prospect! Compare that CPL to the CPL of other sources, such as paid search, trade shows, etc. Sure – you can argue that other channels are more qualified prospects, but you can’t beat the cost as long as you work your leads.

Pro tip: Use Lead Liaison’s Rhythms to feed your new prospects into a step by step sales plan so you can stay ultra-organized and be efficient with your prospecting.

In conclusion, whether you’re looking for a free stack or a B2B sales stack to find email addresses, you can’t go wrong with the aforementioned tools. We hope this study is helpful and gives you the answer to how to find email addresses.