Ideal Customer Profile? Say what?

Are you outreaching your leads and the efforts are just not paying off? Chances are you’re targeting the wrong crowd and your Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) isn’t right.

Andrea, our Head of sales, says that pitching to the wrong crowd only means wasted time and resources. Luckily, we are here to help you create the Ideal Customer Profile (ICP). This article will show you:

• A 4-step guide with actionable data to create your ICP
• The difference between an Ideal Customer Profile vs. Buyer Persona
• A template for Ideal Customer Profile
• How to use ICP for lead generation
• How to improve your ICP if you already created it

Our teams have worked hard to do the research, and now we present our findings, so pay close attention. 💡

What is an ICP?

The Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) is a firmographic description of companies that would benefit from your product/service the most. These companies should have the fastest sales cycle, highest LTV, and retention rate. ICP guides your targeted marketing and sales strategies to attract and keep valuable prospects efficiently.

Your ICP is a company that:

• Will become a long-term customer that you can easily upsell
• Loves your product/service because it solves issues seamlessly
• Becomes your brand ambassador

Pro tip: From our research, an Ideal Customer Profile can be positive and negative. We will focus on the positive ICP, but creating a negative ICP can help you outline all prospects that are a poor fit for your product/service. By keeping an eye on the negative ICP, you’ll surely avoid wasting your budget and time on the wrong companies.

The difference between an ideal customer profile and a buyer persona

ICP and Buyer Persona are crucial documents for sales, targeting, and prospecting on LinkedIn. Despite being similar, they serve different purposes.

Firstly, an Ideal customer profile combines firmographic and demographic data that best describes a company ideal for your business. This data can include: 

• Location,
• Average company size, 
• Revenue,
• Pain point, 
• Industry, etc.

Secondly, a Buyer Persona is a document that describes an individual profile of a person involved in the buying process. While ICP outlines the perfect company, Buyer Persona details the individuals within. The data from your ICP might mention the decision-makers and their positions, but the data we need to create a Buyer Persona is a bit more personal:

• Job title
• Social media and communication channels used
• Annual salary, etc.

Basically, the Buyer Persona focuses on more psychological and personal details, while the Ideal Customer Profile focuses more on the company itself and the metrics.A single ICP may contain several Buyer Personas, which means you can target multiple roles within a single company. Additionally, businesses can have various ICPs, which typically differ by industry, highlighting a layered approach to market segmentation. Here’s how it looks:

Now, back to the ICP and Buyer Persona. Here is a simplified example of their main differences.

Pro tip: If your company is new, it’s better to start by creating an Ideal Customer Profile and then move on to a Buyer Persona.

Key Benefits

Now, let’s look at how your outreach will change after clearly defining your ICP:

1. Personalize your outreach - The main and most obvious benefit of customer profiling is that it can help every sales team personalize communications for each prospect. This can only lead to more engagement, a better experience for your prospects, and improved sales.
2. Target a relevant audience - You will target more relevant prospects for your business that actually have a need for your product/service.
3. Improve response rates - When you’re speaking to the right crowd in the right way, you experience better results and boost lead nurturing. A tailored approach can boost response rates significantly.
4. Optimize customer acquisition - A good ICP can help you understand your best customers so you know what characteristics to look for in the future, helping boost customer acquisition.
5. An informed market expansion plan - With a good ICP, you can easily determine your current market share and plan to expand your reach and discover untapped revenue, only to grow your business even more.
6. Nurture brand loyalty and profitability - Knowing your audience and presenting a solution to their problem at the right time can help boost your brand image, thus attracting more loyal customers.

How to create an ideal customer profile?

An Ideal Customer Profile needs to be as detailed as possible to identify all aspects of your target companies, create a good base for your Buyer Persona, and help your LinkedIn lead generation activities. Here is how to create an ICP in case you:

1. Already have an Ideal Customer Profile as your customer
2. Don’t have an ICP as your customer or customers at all.

If you already have an ideal customer profile as your customer

1. Analyze your current customers' data

When creating an ICP, data is your best ally. You can easily spot patterns and anomalies from which your business can benefit. In this case, you should start with your existing customers’ data.

What we’ve learned from our experience is that the trick is to pinpoint your best customers. Here’s a list of questions you need to answer to find them:

1. What company became your customer the fastest?
2. Who are the customers that have the highest retention rate?
3. What customers have the highest LTV?
4. What company did refer your product and service elsewhere?

2. Identify the patterns

Once you have a list of companies that are your current customers according to previous criteria, it is time to analyze. The key here is to notice patterns and similarities between these companies.

Here is the list of patterns to keep in mind when analyzing:

Pro tip: Open Google Sheets for this step, note customers listed in rows, and put patterns in columns. Once you have them neatly written down, you can find similarities more easily.

3. Have a chat with your customer

By now, you should have rough data, which means it’s time to get personal and go deeper into the analysis. To gather more personal information, you can book online meetings and chat with your existing customers.

Here’s a list of questions you can ask:

Keep in mind that not all customers have time to talk to you, or your meeting may not be their priority. If you did the social selling part right, you would have instant positive feedback because of your well-established relationship with them.

From what we have learned so far, you need to find an alternative motive for the customers so they are willing to hop on this meeting. This is where discounts or gift cards come into play. You will get valuable information, and they will gain something in return—a win-win.

4. Assemble information about your ICP

You are almost done. The last step is to assemble all this information in one place. As we mentioned before, it would be easier to start with ICP industry segmentation and go on from there. 

Now that you have defined an Ideal Customer Profile, you can adjust your sales and marketing efforts to target the right companies for your business. If you create an ICP in this way, you’ll have actionable data to find your profile right away and pointers on how to personalize outreach, but more on that second part later.

Note that later in this blog, you’ll get a chance to download our ready-made template you can use, so keep reading. 👇

If you do not have an ideal customer profile using your product or a service

In this case, we don’t have much data to go on, so we will create the ICP from scratch. If you don’t have an ICP as your customer or any customers at all, follow the steps below to create the profile.

1. Identify your ideal customers 

One of the best ways to start creating an Ideal Customer Profile in case you don’t have any customers is to zero in on the companies you believe will most benefit from your product or service. You can do this by identifying a couple of things on your end:

• Product or a service benefits
• Problems and solutions your product or service offering

Now, choose a group of ideal companies to research. Follow their founders or other decision-makers and discover what they write about. Are there any pain points they often talk about? Visit their websites or check out their LinkedIn pages. This approach will help your sales and marketing team narrow down the target group and be more effective in their activities.

2. Identify the key aspects

Similarly to the previous approach, you should add firmographic and demographic data to the companies list. Here is the information you can gather about these companies and add to the list next to the companies’ names: 

• Industry 
• Location 
• Company headcount
• Revenue
• Challenges on the company level
• Decision-maker
• Technology used
• Goals and objectives
• What is their product or service
• What is their status on the market

Pro tip: When creating an ICP, our best advice is to make your ICP as detailed as possible since it will provide the best options for LinkedIn lead generation targeting. 

3. Finding personal information about the company

To make your ICP as detailed as possible, you need to find more personal information about the companies, which means you need to reach out to them. 👋

Do not underestimate the power of LinkedIn - most people will be glad to chat with you and share experiences. You can go one step further and use this opportunity to reach out to their decision-makers and start your social selling while you gather data.

Here’s a template example of a conversation starter invite to connect and a follow-up:

Hey {{firstName}},

Your profile struck a chord with me, particularly your role as {{occupation}}. How about we connect and share a few unscripted insights since we work in similar fields?

From there, you can continue the conversation like this:

Hey {{firstName}},

Thanks for welcoming me into your network! I noticed your impactful role at {{currentCompany}}, and I'm curious—what challenges do you face in your position? I'm in the midst of creating a solution tailored for professionals like you, and your insights could be incredibly useful.

Looking forward to hearing your perspective!

Here are a couple of questions you can ask if they are on board:

• What is the process of decision-making in their company?
• What are the pain points in the field of your product/service?
• If they were looking for a solution, what features would they love to see?
• What are their goals and objectives?

4. Build an ideal customer profile

The last step is to assemble the information you gathered, which we will show you in our template below. 👇

Note: If you choose companies that work in different industries, start with industry segmentation first, and import the rest of the data to create multiple ICPs. Otherwise, you will have only one.

Ideal customer profile template

Here’s what an assembled Ideal Customer Profile should look like for a fictional company that offers a time-tracking system to other companies.

If you want to download this template, be sure to click here and make a copy.

How to use ICP for lead generation

Now that we have an Ideal Customer Profile, it’s time to use it to identify your ideal leads. Note that, from what we have learned over the years, companies that don’t perfectly match your ICP are still worth a shot. The retention rate will possibly be lower or the buying experience longer, so optimize and adjust your efforts accordingly.

The Ideal Customer Profile is easy to apply for lead generation. The idea is to search for and create a company leads list to match your ICP and then reach out to them. Here’s how to do it. ⬇️

Step #1 - Find your ICP via LinkedIn

LinkedIn is a powerful lead generation tool. So, what you need to do now is use your ICP by going to LinkedIn and doing a similar companies search. Here’s how:

Find leads using a basic LinkedIn search

Go to your LinkedIn account and research the industry or type of companies defined in your ICP document. Then use additional filters available to narrow down the search according to your ICP.

When the search is complete, make sure to jot down all the companies. Then, continue from there by clicking on every company page in the People section, as shown below, to find your qualified leads. 

Create a CSV file with every lead’s first name, last name, profile URL, and email. And then save this file for the next step.

Hacks to find leads using Sales Navigator

There are two ways you can filter your leads if you have a Sales Navigator subscription.

1. Find leads from the company profile

Go to your Sales Navigator search, apply Sales Navigator filters, and see the results. Find your ideal company from this list, and click on the three-dots button. Then, click on “View Similar”. 

"View Similar" is a useful Sales Navigator feature that will try to find companies most similar to the company you choose according to industry, company size, etc. It will show you up to 50 similar companies.
You can also usethe existing customer you selected as your ICP, type theirname in the Sales Navigator search bar, and click on the “View Similar” button for that company.

From there, click on the company you are most interested in, find your decision-maker, and save them to the lead’s list. Repeat the process for every company.

Step #2 - Create an outreach campaign

You can reach the leads you find manually, but to make this process even easier, you should use a sales engagement tool to do it for you. Let’s take Skylead, for example–a LinkedIn automation and email outreach software.

First, to create a campaign, choose your lead source. If you've written down all the decision-makers from your ICP in Google Sheets, you can upload it as a CSV file. However, if you used LinkedIn or Sales Navigator filters to find them, copy the search URL and paste it into Skylead. 👇

The next step is to adjust the campaign settings, such as start date or LinkedIn and email settings preferences, and click on the “Create sequence” button. 🧰

Note that what makes Skylead’s first-to-market Smart sequences special is that you can combine LinkedIn and email action with if/else conditions. This will help you get to your prospects one way or the other while maximizing touchpoints with leads. 

How? Through a carefully thought out and placed a set of actions. Here’s what you can drag and drop in the sequence builder to create an outreach flow 👇

A clear ICP will allow you to determine which steps or communication channels to use in your outreach campaign. Plus, you can use personalized visual elements that match your ICP thanks to our Image & GIF personalization feature to increase your response rate to 63%.

Lastly, once you’re done combining elements and personalizing, your sequence will look something like this:

Frequently Asked Questions - FAQ

How do you measure the success and accuracy of an ICP over time, and what metrics are most important?

To measure the success and accuracy of an Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) over time, companies should track conversion rates, sales cycle lengths, customer lifetime value, and retention rates. Adjustments to the ICP may be necessary as these metrics are analyzed to ensure alignment with market conditions and customer needs.

Are there industry-specific variations in creating an ICP, and how should companies in different sectors adapt the template provided?

Industry-specific variations in creating an ICP do exist. For instance, the factors that define an ideal customer in the technology sector may differ significantly from those in the manufacturing sector. Companies should consider their unique industry trends, challenges, and customer behaviors when adapting the ICP template.

How can small businesses or startups with limited data or customer interactions effectively create an ICP?

Small businesses or startups with limited data can still effectively create an ICP by leveraging industry reports, competitor analysis, and qualitative feedback from initial customers or stakeholders. These insights can form the basis for a preliminary ICP that evolves with more customer interactions and data accumulation.

Ready to find your ideal prospects?

In conclusion, an Ideal Customer Profile allows you to narrow down, analyze prospects, and optimize your approach. It shows precise challenges—valuable information to help you adjust unique selling points and offer tailor-made solutions to your prospects’ problems.

To jog your memory once again, here are the 4 easy steps you need to take to create an ICP:

Pro tip: After creating an ICP, the next step is to create a Buyer Persona. 

Did you make your ICP? Good, then use Skylead to get to your prospects faster and save up to 11 hours of manual work per week. Come, say hi via chat on our website, and test our all-in-one tool during a 7-day free trial. Let’s get to those perfect prospects together and enjoy the results of hard work. 🤝

Wondering about how much does LinkedIn Sales Navigator cost? You're not alone. 

The price of LinkedIn Sales Navigator depends on which plan you pick. There are different options for individuals, teams, and big companies (enterprise-level). 

And the good news is, you can try it out free before deciding whether it fits your company's goals.

LinkedIn Sales Navigator pricing plans

LinkedIn offers three distinct plans for its Sales Navigator solution: 

⚠️ Note on LinkedIn Sales Navigator Pricing: The prices listed above for the Sales Navigator Plan are exclusive of Value Added Tax (VAT), Goods and Services Tax (GST) or any other applicable taxes. 

Each plan caters to different needs and budgets, providing varying levels of features and benefits. 

The Core plan is ideal for professionals seeking new clients or partners. It offers features like LinkedIn Sales Navigator filters for advanced lead and search, lead recommendations, and custom lists.

Moving up, the Advanced plan targets sales professionals and teams. It includes full access to Core features and additional benefits. These benefits include CSV uploads, alerts when buyers show interest, unified team billing, and integration with other business tools. 

Finally, the Advanced Plus plan is for enterprise-level big sales teams looking for comprehensive access and CRM integration. 

Sales Navigator offers a range of pricing plans to meet diverse business needs. However, the associated costs may present challenges for smaller enterprises or individuals.

So, assessing your needs against potential returns is crucial before subscribing to any of the three plans above. 

Sales Navigator Core pricing - Best for individual professionals

LinkedIn Sales Navigator cost for the Core plan varies depending on the subscription duration.

Here's how much it costs:

The Sales Navigator Core pricing plan is designed for individual professionals, like freelancers, consultants, and healthcare providers. 

Moreover, the Core subscription plan is more cost-effective compared to the other two. This is because the features offered in Advanced and Advanced Plus plans are tailored mostly for large teams and enterprises. For individual professionals, the Core plan is both budget-friendly and efficient, providing only essential features without unnecessary additional overhead costs.

Sales Navigator Core features

In addition to Sales Navigator’s extensive feature set, the tool has gathered praise for:

• its advanced lead search filters,
• lead recommendations,
• and integration capabilities. 

However, we’ve noticed that some users have reported challenges with search accuracy and relevance, highlighting potential areas for improvement. Fortunately, we’ve developed a detailed LinkedIn prospecting guide, to help you precisely narrow down your search for outreaching relevant prospects.

Sales Navigator Advanced pricing - Best for sales professionals and teams

LinkedIn Sales Navigator cost for Advanced plan is justified if you are a salesperson and a part of the team that needs extra tools to find potential customers. 

Here's how much it costs so you can decide which plan fits your budget and how long you want to commit.

Sales Navigator Advanced features

In addition to the features available from Core plan, Sales Navigator Advanced offers the following additional advanced features and functionalities.

Sales Navigator Advanced Plus pricing - Best for enterprises

The next one, Sales Navigator Advanced Plus, is designed for big sales teams and comes with powerful features but at a higher cost.

Sales Navigator Enterprise doesn't have a fixed price. Instead, you'll need to book a demo through a webpage. However, we know the pricing starts at approximately $1,600 per seat per year, but the actual cost depends on your specific needs. 

You'll get a dedicated Account Manager to discuss and customize the pricing according to your requirements.

Even though the LinkedIn Sales Navigator cost for Advance plus plan may seem high, it provides significant value for large-scale sales operations. In other words, investing in it can help enterprises be more efficient in LinkedIn lead generation, prospect targeting, and conversion rates.

Sales Navigator Advanced Plus features

Sales Navigator Advanced Plus includes Core and Advanced plan features, along with additional functionalities listed below.

Does LinkedIn Sales Navigator provide email addresses?

Another thing that justifies LinkedIn Sales Navigator cost is that i provides access to a wealth of professional information, including contact details such as email addresses. However, it's important to note that these email addresses might not always be readily available. 

This is where other tools like Skylead can help you.

With Skylead’s Email Finder and Verifier feature, you can effortlessly uncover and validate publicly available email addresses. Skylead will streamline the process for you, ensuring that you have the correct contact information at your fingertips.

But that's not all! 

Skylead goes beyond just email acquisition since it's a complete LinkedIn automation and cold email software. In other words, you can use Skylead’s Smart Sequences to streamline and personalize your outreach based on your lead’s actions. 

To clarify, with Smart Sequences, you can combine if/else conditions with LinkedIn and email actions to create coherent outreach flows. That said, you can add as many steps as you want to create your best outreach sequences. Here is an example of one such sequence:

You can personalize messages using images, gifs, or text variables. Additionally, you can customize messages based on each lead's interactions.  For example, you can adjust messages depending on whether they've responded to your connection requests or opened your emails.

With Skylead, say goodbye to the hassle of searching for email addresses and reaching out to your leads manually. 

What others said about LinkedIn Sales Navigator cost - reviews

As of today, LinkedIn Sales Navigator Solution has 4.6 out of 5 stars on Capterra based on its 137 reviews.

Here’s what people had to say about using the LinkedIn Sales Navigator.

For example, Abhishek appreciated Sales Navigator's lead generation and talent search features. However, he also mentioned frequent crashing issues and error messages.

Dusti, on the other hand praised Sales Navigator for saving time with integrations. She increased daily outreach from under 100 to 500. However, she noted inaccuracies in search results due to user input bias.

Lastly, Luisa praised Sales Navigator for alert settings, tracking leads, and InMail. She dislikes inaccurate recommended leads.

How do you get LinkedIn Sales Navigator for free?

If you are still not sure about LinkedIn Sales Navigator cost, you can test it out for free and see if it is the best fit for your business. Here's how to do it:

Go to LinkedIn's Premium products page and click the Learn more button below the Sales Navigator Core plan description.

Then, click "Start my free month" to begin and enter your payment details (you won't be charged until after the trial).

⚠️Keep in mind that you won't be able to test it for free if you had another free trial in the past 12 months. Check out our How to get LinkedIn premium free blog to discover another way to test Sales Navigator for free.

At the end of the Sales Navigator free trial, your membership will automatically renew, and, depending on your chosen billing option, you'll be charged a subscription fee on a monthly or annual basis. 

Remember, you have the flexibility to change or cancel your Sales Navigator plan at any time before the renewal date by visiting the settings page on LinkedIn.

However, if you cancel, you'll lose access to Premium features at the end of your billing cycle. That said, utilize all your InMail credits, as they remain valid only until the end of your current billing cycle.

As far as LinkedIn's refund policy for Sales Navigator is concerned, refunds are not typically offered except in certain specific situations and jurisdictions, as outlined in their LinkedIn refund policy documentation.  So, it's essential to review the policy carefully before making your purchase decision.

Is LinkedIn Sales Navigator cost worth it? - Pros and cons

Is LinkedIn Sales Navigator cost worth paying for? Let’s go through the pros and cons of using Sales Navigator for your business outreach to help you make an informed decision. 

Pros

Cons

How to make the best use out of LinkedIn Sales Navigator cost?

To make the best use out of Sales Navigator’s Cost, follow these recommendations:

1. Set Up Your Sales Navigator Account: If you haven't already, sign up for Sales Navigator and ensure your account is properly set up with your target audience and preferences.

2. Define Your Ideal Prospects: Use Sales Navigator's Account and Lead filtering options to define your ideal customer profile and buyer persona based on various criteria such as industry, company size, job title, location, etc.

3. Save Search Preferences: Once you've defined your ideal prospects, save your search preferences for easy access and future reference.

4. Utilize Lead Recommendations: Sales Navigator provides lead recommendations based on your saved preferences. Review these recommendations regularly to identify new prospects.

5. Engage with Insights: Use Sales Navigator's insights and updates to engage with prospects in meaningful ways. Comment on their posts, share relevant content, and interact with their activity to establish rapport.

6. Send Connection Requests: With third-party LinkedIn Automation tools like Skylead, automate the process of sending personalized connection requests to your identified prospects on Sales Navigator. Craft compelling messages that resonate with your target audience.

7. Utilize InMail Messages: Leverage Sales Navigator's InMail feature to send direct messages to prospects who are not in your network. For a more efficient outreach automation process, Skylead can help streamline this task.

8. Monitor Prospect Activity: Keep track of your prospects' activity on Sales Navigator, including profile updates and interactions.

9. Follow Up Consistently: Use Skylead's Smart sequences to automate follow-up messages and nurture relationships with prospects over time. Personalize your outreach efforts based on prospect engagement and feedback.

What Is The Difference Between LinkedIn Premium and Sales Navigator?

LinkedIn Premium and Sales Navigator are both subscription services offered by LinkedIn, but they serve different purposes.

LinkedIn Premium is for individuals who want to improve how they connect with others and find jobs. It gives you extra features like making your profile more visible, seeing more about other people's profiles, and sending more messages. You can also see who checked out your profile, learn about job postings, and take online courses.

Sales Navigator is for salespeople and teams who want to find leads and build relationships for their business. It helps you search for potential customers based on things like company size and industry. You can also message people directly, even if you're not connected.

That said, if you're focused on your own career and networking, LinkedIn Premium is better.  But if you're in sales and need to find clients, Sales Navigator is the way to go.  It just depends on what you're trying to achieve in your work.

FAQs

Can you add more licenses for Sales Navigator Advanced?

Getting more licenses for Sales Navigator Advanced is easy.  Once you've paid or used a free trial, you can simply add more licenses whenever you want. 

Are there any resources available to users as a Sales Navigator customer?

As a Sales Navigator customer, users have access to a variety of resources to maximize their experience with the platform. These resources include multiple platforms and tools designed to help users get started and make the most of Sales Navigator.  Whether it's learning materials, support forums, or tutorials, Sales Navigator provides ample support to ensure users can effectively leverage its features for their sales efforts.

Elevating Outreach: The Power of Sales Navigator & Skylead

Despite its limitations, investing in Sales Navigator can be beneficial. 

The platform offers advanced features for lead generation and relationship management. However, users may encounter challenges when it comes to outreaching manually. 

So, to address this issue, you can leverage LinkedIn automation tools like Skylead alongside Sales Navigator to enhance your outreach. With Skylead, you can streamline multichannel outreach campaigns and maximize touchpoints with leads for a better overall outcome.

While LinkedIn Sales Navigator cost may seem steep, the value it provides in improving our sales efficiency and targeting prospects effectively can outweigh the investment. Ultimately, the decision to invest depends on our specific needs and goals as a business.

In 2024, LinkedIn Sales Navigator filters revolutionize your quest for ideal customers with 34 Lead filters, 16 Account filters, a shared Keywords filter, and an expected AI-assisted search! 

Here at Skylead, we consider LinkedIn Sales Navigator a goldmine for LinkedIn prospecting. 

I mean, who doesn’t? 

LinkedIn Sales Navigator is packed with some great features to discover, categorize, and stay updated on relevant leads.

We use it to expand our business, and are thrilled to share this first-hand experience with you in this blog!

In this blog, we included the following:

• What AI-assisted search in Sales Navigator is, and how it works;
• Every Sales Navigator filter (Lead & Account) explained in detail;
• 9 Sales Navigator filter hacks that our sales team uses in their everyday work routine to find and stay on top of the most relevant leads for Skylead. 

LinkedIn Sales Navigator AI-assisted search

In 2023, rapid advancements in AI have been transforming the way we work, enhancing our skills and optimizing time. Using ChatGPT for sales has become a routine for SDRs around the world. 

So, it was just a matter of time before Sales Navigator also included some sort of an AI-assisted feature to help its users find the most relevant leads for their businesses faster. 

For now, the AI-assistance is available only for Lead filters search. 

To access it, go to your Sales Navigator Home page, click Lead filters, and check out the bottom of the Lead filter section. 

Click the Expand icon on the right. 

The scope of this feature is to allow the platform’s users to enter casual, conversational language-like search prompts, and let Sales Navigator ‘recognize’ these leads within its massive profile database. 

The prompt can sound something like ‘Find me sales decision-makers, based in the US (West Coast), in the software development industry’. 

Sales Navigator will then, in a way, ‘fill out’ the filters for you, and search within its massive database to find the most suitable platform members. 

LinkedIn Sales Navigator AI-assisted search will then continue to suggest filters to further narrow down your lead search. 

In the ‘Hacks” section of this blog, we will list several Sales Navigator filters that, from our experience, turned out to be more relevant for quality targeting. 

Currently, AI-assisted search could be better. It bugs now and then and can take into account only specific factors, such as work title, location, industry, etc. 

However, it can help you streamline your Sales Navigator lead search by running some of the criteria for you and suggesting other filters useful to handpick leads en masse. 

For everything else, you can always add or go back to the good, old Lead filters. 

Sales Navigator filters: LEAD filters explained

Lead filters search LinkedIn personal profiles and help you find professionals that match your Buyer Personas. 

To access Sales Navigator Lead filters, go to your Sales Navigator home page and click Lead filters. 

Keywords

Keywords is a shared filter for both Lead and Account filters, and it is still the Sales Navigator filter our sales team uses the most, and that, together with other filters, gives the best targeting results. 

The keywords filter lists all LinkedIn profiles containing the word you enter as an exact or partial match somewhere on the lead’s profile. 

Combine the Keywords filter with other Sales Navigator filters or apply a Boolean string to refine your search results. 

Section: COMPANY 

Current Company 

Search leads by the company they currently work at. 

Past company 

Search leads by the company they used to work at. 

Company headcount 

When using the Company Headcount filter, bear in mind that companies don’t update their company headcount regularly on LinkedIn. 

Also, the headcount range is wide, so this Sales Navigator filter might not be suitable if you need a super precise headcount search. 

The company headcount ranges are: 

• Self-employed 
• 1-10
• 11-50
• 51-200
• 201-500
• 501-1000
• 1001-5000
• 5001-10 000
• 10 001+

Company type 

Use the Company Type filter if the type of company you’re targeting is important for your outreach. 

When using this Sales Navigator filter, remember that the LinkedIn company page creator decides what to put as a company type. Therefore, LinkedIn itself cannot know how accurate this information is. 

Company types:

• Public company: a company whose stocks are available for purchase;
• Privately held: startup held by a few people;
• Non-profit: a company whose capital is on a positive zero; 
• Educational institution: schools and universities; 
• Partnership: business shared by multiple owners; 
• Self-employed: company owner is the only employee of the company;
• Self-owned: individuals who run their own businesses;
• Government Agency: government entities.

Company headquarters 

You can filter company headquarters by continent, geographical divisions (EMEA), country, region, and city. 

Regional abbreviations 

• Oceania
• Asia 
• Nordics 
• MENA: the Middle East and Northern Africa 
• EMEA: Europe, Middle East, and Africa 
• Europe 
• DACH: acronym that stands for D - Deutschland, A - Austria, and CH - Confœderatio Helvetica (Switzerland's official name in Latin).
• Benelux: Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg. 
• North America
• APJ: the Asia Pacific and Japan
• South America
• APAC: Asia - Pacific 
• Africa

Section: ROLE 

Function

The Function filter refers to the company department in which the lead works. 

Current job title 

Filter your leads based on the title they currently hold at their current company. 

Past job title 

Filter your leads based on one or more titles they held at one or more of their past companies. 

Seniority Level 

Seniority Level is NOT the title but the lead’s position in the current company’s hierarchy structure. 

There are 10 seniority levels: 

• Owner / partner 
• CXO (any C-suite position, such as CEO, CFO, etc)
• Vice president 
• Director 
• Experienced manager 
• Entry level manager 
• Strategic 
• Senior 
• Entry level
• In training

You can add multiple seniority levels. 

Years in current company 

This Sales Navigator filter finds leads based on the number of years at their current company. 

Time range explanation 

• 1 to 2 years: from 1 to 2 years and 11 months.
• 3 to 5 years: from 3 to 5 years and 11 months.
• 6 to 10 years: from 6 to 10 years and 11 months. 
• More than 10 years: 11 years and on. 

Years in current position

This Sales Navigator filter narrows down your lead search based on the number of years they’ve been in their current position. 

Time range explanation 

• 1 to 2 years: from 1 to 2 years and 11 months.
• 3 to 5 years: from 3 to 5 years and 11 months.
• 6 to 10 years: from 6 to 10 years and 11 months. 
• More than 10 years: 11 years and on. 

Section: PERSONAL

First name 

Search leads by their first name. No multiple entries. 

Last name 

Search leads by their last name. No multiple entries. 

Profile language 

Filter leads based on the language of their LinkedIn account. 

Years of experience 

This Sales Navigator filter searches leads based on the total years of experience based on the employment history stated on their LinkedIn profile. 

You can add multiple entries. 

Time range explanation 

• 1 to 2 years: from 1 to 2 years and 11 months.
• 3 to 5 years: from 3 to 5 years and 11 months.
• 6 to 10 years: from 6 to 10 years and 11 months. 
• More than 10 years: 11 years and on. 

Geography 

Search leads by continent, geographical divisions (EMEA), country, region, city, and postal code. 

Region

You can add multiple regions or exclude one or several regions from your search. 

Regional abbreviations 

• Oceania
• Asia 
• Nordics 
• MENA: the Middle East and Northern Africa 
• EMEA: Europe, Middle East, and Africa 
• Europe 
• DACH: acronym that stands for D - Deutschland, A - Austria, and CH - Confœderatio Helvetica (Switzerland's official name in Latin).
• Benelux: Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg. 
• North America
• APJ: the Asia Pacific and Japan
• South America
• APAC: Asia - Pacific 
• Africa

Postal code

Postal codes for different cities in different states match. 

That’s why, once you enter the first number of a postal code, you will get a drop-down menu of postal codes with respective cities and regions/countries. 

Additionally, you can choose the area radius that you would like to be taken into consideration. 

This Sales Navigator filter allows multiple entries. 

Groups 

This Sales Navigator filter finds leads who are members of a certain LinkedIn group or groups. 

Using the Groups filter is an excellent way to connect with members from the same or similar industries. Check out the ‘Hacks’ section of this blog to read more about how we used it to make our lead generation more effective. 

Type in the name of the LinkedIn group or a keyword. You will have a dropdown list of all available LinkedIn groups containing that keyword. 

Once you choose a LinkedIn group, Sales Navigator will suggest other groups from a similar industry or with the same keyword. 

Industry 

Choose from a drop-down menu among 413 Sales Navigator industries. 

Here is the LinkedIn industry list for all subscription plans and with rankings (Sales Navigator included).

School 

Search leads by college, university, and even high school listed on your leads’ LinkedIn profiles.

To appear in this search filter, a school must have a LinkedIn account page. 

Section: BUYER INTENT 

The purpose of these Sales Navigator filters is to help you find leads most likely to respond to outreach or express an interest in your product or service. 

Check out the Hacks section to get details about how and why to use these filters for more quality lead generation. 

Following your company

This filter lets you search for leads who follow your company page on LinkedIn. 

To use it, just move the toggle button to the right. 

Viewed your profile recently 

There are 2 ways to see Who’s viewed your profile in the past 90 days on Sales Navigator, and one of them is to use this Lead filter. 

All you need to do is move the toggle button to the right. 

Check out why this can be useful, and what the other way is in the ‘Hacks’ section of this blog. 

Section: BEST PATH IN 

The purpose of these Sales Navigator filters is to help you leverage your network to find the best path into a company and collect information to tailor your outreach. 

Connection 

Search leads based on the level of LinkedIn connection they have with you. 

You can be somebody’s 1st, 2nd, and 3rd-degree connection or be in the same LinkedIn group with a certain lead. 

• 1st-degree connections: members part of your LinkedIn network. 
• 2nd-degree connections: LinkedIn members connected with your 1st-degree connections, but not with you. 
• Group connections: members part of the same LinkedIn group as you are. 
• 3rd-degree connections: members that are connected with your 2nd-degree connections but not with you. 

Connections of

This Sales Navigator filter targets connections of a specific user on LinkedIn. 

You can insert only one entry at a time; that person must be your 1st-degree connection. 

Past colleague 

This LinkedIn Sales Navigator filters searches leads that used to work with you based on their employment history on LinkedIn. 

The search result will list leads and give you insight into what company you worked together at. 

Shared experiences 

This filter finds leads who share the same LinkedIn group as you or who also recently posted on LinkedIn. 

However, remember that just because someone is not posting on LinkedIn doesn’t mean they are not actively prospecting or networking on LinkedIn.

To use the Shared Experiences filter, move the toggle button to the right. 

The search results will highlight the experience you share with a specific lead.

Section: RECENT UPDATES

These Sales Navigator filters help you identify leads who: 

• have changed jobs in the last 90 days;
• posted on LinkedIn in the last 30 days;
• or were in the news in the last 30 days. 

As mentioned above, these filters can give you an important insight into when and how to approach leads relevant to your business. 

In the ‘Hacks’ section of this blog, you will find a detailed explanation of why, and what to do with that valuable information. 

Changed jobs 

Narrow down your search to leads who changed jobs or were promoted to the position of your interest in the past 90 days by using the Changed jobs Sales Navigator filter. 

Just move the toggle button to the right to use this filter. 

You can see the details of your lead’s new employment straight from the search result. 

Or, if the lead was promoted to another position. 

Posted on LinkedIn

Check out all members who posted on LinkedIn in the past 30 days. 

You will get a preview of all posts published by a specific lead in the past 30 days directly from the search results. 

Mentioned in news 

This Sales Navigator filter narrows down your leads to those who were mentioned in the news in the past 90 days. 

You can see the preview of all articles directly from the search results. 

Section: WORKFLOW

Persona 

This is where you can filter Personas that you’ve previously set up on your Sales Navigator homepage. 

Combine the Persona filter with other filters to narrow leads who match your Buyer Persona within the companies that match your Ideal customer profile (ICP) the closest possible. 

Account lists 

Use this Sales Navigator filter to find people who match your Buyer Persona within the companies you previously saved in an Account list. 

You can combine it with any other filter to narrow down decision-makers in the companies that match your ICP. 

Lead lists

This filter works similarly to the Account Lists filter. 

Choose among a previously created Lead list, and use other filters to further segment your leads or narrow down your search to those leads more likely to convert. 

People in CRM

This filter is available to the Sales Navigator Advanced Plus subscribers only, because it is the only plan that can be synced with your CRM to move leads from CRM to Sales Navigator and vice versa. 

This Sales Navigator filter allows you to apply other Lead filters to people in your CRM. 

People you interacted with 

This filter searches leads you viewed in the last 90 days or messaged in the last 2 years on Sales Navigator whether through connection requests, regular messages, or InMail. 

Saved leads and accounts

All saved leads is a list made by Sales Navigator that contains all LinkedIn profiles you manually saved and all LinkedIn profiles from all your lead lists in one place. 

All saved accounts contains all LinkedIn company pages you manually saved and all LinkedIn company pages from all account lists in one place. When you save a lead, Sales Navigator automatically adds the lead’s current company to My saved accounts. 

Here’s where you can search them. 

Sales Navigator filters: ACCOUNT filters explained

Account filters search LinkedIn company pages aka. accounts and help you find companies that match your ICP. 

To access Sales Navigator Account filters, go to your Sales Navigator home page, and click Account filters. 

Keywords

As mentioned in the Lead filters section, the Keywords filter is one of the most used filters by our sales team. Combined with other Account filters, it brings back the most precise targeting results. 

The keywords filter lists all LinkedIn accounts containing the word you enter as an exact or partial match somewhere on the company’s profile. 

Combine the Keywords filter with other Sales Navigator filters or apply a Boolean string to refine your search results. 

Section: COMPANY ATTRIBUTES

Annual revenue 

Annual Revenue filters companies, based on their annual growth counted in millions, in any of the top world currencies. 

Company headcount

This Sales Navigator filter is useful if your product or service is aimed at companies of a certain size. 

Company headcount growth 

Company headcount growth filters companies based on the growth percentage range. 

Department headcount 

This Sales Navigator filter works the same way as Company headcount (see above), but it refers to a specific department. 

Choose the department first and then the headcount range. 

Department headcount growth 

The Department headcount growth filter works like the Company headcount growth. The only difference is that the growth parameter refers to a specific department. 

Choose the department first, and then the growth range in percentages. 

Fortune 

The Fortune filter shows companies listed in the top 500 of Fortune’s wealthiest US corporations based on the total revenue for the respective fiscal years. 

Headquarters location

This Sales Navigator filter narrows companies by their headquarters location. 

You can search accounts by region or by postal code.  

If you search by region, you can choose among filtering leads by continent, geographical divisions (EMEA), country, region, city, and postal code. 

Regional abbreviations 

• Oceania
• Asia 
• Nordics 
• MENA: the Middle East and Northern Africa 
• EMEA: Europe, Middle East, and Africa 
• Europe 
• DACH: acronym for D – Deutschland, A – Austria, and CH – Confœderatio Helvetica (Switzerland’s official name in Latin).
• Benelux: Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg. 
• North America
• APJ: the Asia Pacific and Japan
• South America
• APAC: Asia – Pacific 
• Africa

If you go for postal codes, you can choose among cities and postal codes of the city's areas. 

There's a drop-down menu of zip codes, designated cities, and city areas based on the numbers you enter. 

You can add multiple postal codes. 

Industry 

The Industry filter allows you to choose among a total of 413 industries. 

The number of followers 

The Number of Followers narrows your search results based on how many followers a company’s LinkedIn page has. 

Technologies used 

The Technologies Used filter can be useful if your business provides services regarding certain platforms, tools, software, etc., or for those who need to check if their product is compatible with specific technologies. 

Section: SPOTLIGHTS

Job opportunities

Job opportunities finds companies that are currently hiring on LinkedIn. 

Recent activities 

Recent activities shows companies that had senior leadership changes in the last 3 months or funding events in the past 12 months. 

Connection 

This Sales Navigator filter shows companies where you have at least one employee that’s your 1st-degree connection on LinkedIn. 

Section: WORKFLOW 

Companies in CRM

This filter is available to the Sales Navigator Advanced Plus subscribers only since it’s the only plan that can be synced with your CRM and move accounts from CRM to Sales Navigator and vice versa. 

This Sales Navigator filter allows you to apply other Account filters to people in your CRM. 

Saved accounts 

All saved accounts contains all LinkedIn company pages you manually saved and all LinkedIn company pages from all account lists in one place. When you save a lead, Sales Navigator automatically adds the lead’s current company to My saved accounts. 

You can apply other account filters to the All saved accounts list. 

Account lists 

Further filter companies from any custom account list or all account lists at the same time and further apply filters to those companies. 

9 Sales Navigator targeting hacks

Here are 9 targeting hacks used by our sales team in their everyday routine to find the leads most likely to convert.

Use the Buyer Intent filters to push ‘leads’ in your direction. 

• Following your company - This is a perfect filter to discovered leads who follow your company on LinkedIn but are not your clients might be in the research phase of their buyer’s journey. Reaching out to them first might give them the push in the right (your) direction).
• Viewed your profile - There are many reasons why someone shows interest in your LinkedIn profile and the only way to find that out is to reach out. They might be in search of a business partnership, in the researching phase of their buyer’s journey, interested in your product or service, etc. Don’t neglect this important insight. 

Another way to check Who’s viewed your profile is to go to the Who’s viewed my profile section on LinkedIn. 

#1 Click on the profile picture and select Who’s Viewed Your Profile.  

#2 You will be redirected to your LinkedIn page. 

First, you will see the LinkedIn filters as an option to filter leads who viewed your profile additionally. 

If you scroll down, you will see the list of people who viewed your profile. 

Find leads more open to new technologies through the Recent Updates filters.

This set of filters is so important, that even Sales Navigator AI-assisted search keeps suggesting them as the best choice to narrow down your search to the most qualified leads. 

One of the reasons is also that you can use this information to personalize your outreach, and significantly increase your response rates, which is how our sales team also uses these filters to increase their response rates. 

However, bear in mind that, just because some leads are not actively posting or updating their information on LinkedIn, it doesn’t mean they are not using the platform to network and do business. 

• Changed jobs filter - New hires in decision-making positions are more likely to say yes to new and innovative solutions and services. The first several months are when they are eager to implement new technologies and make improvements across the department. It is usually the right moment for your product to come into play.
• Posted on LinkedIn filter - When you find leads via the Posted on LinkedIn filter, you can refer to their content to personalize your outreach. This is a step in the right direction to establish a positive business relationship. 
• Mentioned in news filter - Just like we mentioned for the Posted on LinkedIn filter, referring to the article you’re lead was mentioned in can create a good foundation for a further sales-oriented conversation. 

Identify growing companies through the Spotlights filters.

Our sales team uses the Spotlights filters to find customers for Skylead, and these 2 filters turned out to bring qualified leads for following reasons:

• Job opportunities - generally, if a company is hiring, it means they are expanding their business or a specific department, and it could be the right moment to offer your product or service. 
• Recent activities - if the company had Senior leadership changes in the last 3 months or Funding events in the past 12 months it means they are expanding their business, they have more money to invest into new solutions or services, and that it might be the right moment to reach out and offer what you’ve got. 

Save your search criteria or let Skylead discover new leads matching your criteria automatically. 

Saved search is a great way to save time while still getting regularly updated on leads that match your ICP and/or Buyer Persona criteria. 

However, our sales team and Skylead users don’t need to do this portion of manual work, because, once you search LinkedIn (any subscription), insert the link in Skylead, and start your campaign, Skylead will automatically recognize new leads appearing on LinkedIn that match your criteria, and automatically add them to an existing campaign according to your settings. 

For Skylead to do this, you only need to move the toggle button to the right in the Campaign settings > LinkedIn Settings. 

On Sales Navigator, the point of a saved search is the same - to suggest leads and accounts relevant based on the criteria you set. 

We’ll show you how it works with Account filters, but the process is the same for leads. 

First, set up Sales Navigator filters that match your ICP. 

Click Save search. 

Go to Saved search next to the Keywords filter. Click on the Pencil icon to give your saved search a name. 

Sales Navigator will start pushing accounts that match your criteria into one list. Click the View button next to the Pencil icon to check new leads.

The numbers in green show the number of new leads or accounts since the last time you checked a specific saved search list. 

Check new accounts or leads every week, filter them out further, and segment them into Account and Lead lists. 

Connect with industry peers within a LinkedIn group. 

Targeting members from a LinkedIn group is an excellent way to connect with members from the same or similar industries. 

This can be useful to network, create possibilities for future partnerships, and get introduced to other people relevant to your business in many ways. 

Also, being part of the same LinkedIn group is an excellent way to personalize your outreach and connect with leads from the first outreach message. Being part of the same group implies, in a way, that you have similar interests or are in the same or adjacent industries, all of which create some kind of a bond right away. 

Check out our step-by-step manual on how to target members from a LinkedIn group for a more successful lead generation.

Blacklist leads or accounts you wish to avoid. 

The point of blacklisting certain leads and accounts is to save time and resources and direct them toward those more likely to convert. 

Consider excluding your negative ICP and Buyer Persona, people you already talked to, competitors, and companies you already work with for more precise targeting. That’s exactly the purpose of a Blacklist - to make sure none of the people who do not match your Buyer Persona can end up in your search result.

Skylead’s Blacklist options

With Skylead, you have 2 types of Blacklists at your disposal:

• Your Blacklist that blacklists leads on your Skylead seat only. 
• Global Blacklist that blacklists leads across all seats within a team. 

You only need to enter an exact or partial match of a company name, lead's full name, job title, or profile URL you don't wish to target with your campaigns, and Skylead will take care of the rest. 

Sales Navigator Blacklist options

There are 3 ways to blacklist leads and accounts on Sales Navigator. 

The exclude option 

You may have noticed that some Sales Navigator filters have the Exclude option. 

For example, if your target industry is Manufacturing but not Medical equipment manufacturing, you can simply exclude this subindustry by clicking the Exclude button next to it. 

Excluded parameters will always appear in red. That’s how you’ll know that you excluded them. 

Blacklist via account lists

If you wish to blacklist specific companies, you can make a list of companies that represent your negative ICP, save them in an Account list, and then exclude this list through the Account list filter. 

Sales Navigator will exclude all employees from the companies in your Account list from the search result. 

You can do the same with personal LinkedIn profiles. 

Save leads that you would like to avoid in a Lead list, and then exclude it through the Lead lists profile. 

Blacklist via saved search  

Another way to blacklist specific leads or accounts is through the Sales Navigator Saved search. 

Set up criteria for leads or accounts that you would like to avoid. Save your search. 

Then, select the leads or accounts found by Sales Navigator, and save the ones you wish to blacklist in an account list. 

Repeat the same process as explained in the hack above - Blacklist via Account list. 

Apply the Boolean search to produce more relevant results. 

The Boolean search helps you produce more accurate and relevant results and allows you to navigate through appropriate leads while disregarding unrelated ones. It is both a time-saver and an excellent way to laser-pick leads for your business more likely to convert. 

It is a query technique that combines words and phrases with the Boolean operators AND, OR, NOT, parentheses (), and quotations “ ” to limit, broaden, or better define your search. 

Check out our complete guide on LinkedIn Boolean search with string examples to learn what Boolean search is, and how to use it, and feel free to copy/paste our Boolean string examples. 

Upload a CSV file to Sales Navigator to match the ICP on LinkedIn.  

This option is available only to Sales Navigator Advanced and Advanced Plus subscribers. 

If you already have a CSV file with a list of companies representing your ICP, you can upload the file, and Sales Navigator will match the data and find the LinkedIn accounts of these companies. 

Then, you will be able to apply any Sales Navigator Account and Lead filter to company pages from your CSV file to narrow your search.

Click Create Account List. Then, Upload Accounts from CSV. 

First, you will get a list of thorough requirements for this feature to work, after which you can upload your CSV. 

The only required column in your CSV file is Account Name. Other columns, such as LinkedIn Company ID, LinkedIn Company URL, Website URL, etc., are optional, but better if you have them because LinkedIn will more easily find the accounts in question. 

The more columns (optional) from the Optional section you have, the higher the chances are that Sales Navigator will match that data with the actual LinkedIn company pages. 

This Account list will be marked as CSV. It works just like a regular Account list. 

Use Skylead to put your outreach on auto-pilot.

Skylead is a LinkedIn automation tool and cold email software that combines LinkedIn automation, unlimited Email automation, Email verification & discovery, and Image & GIF personalization into Smart sequences to help you book 3x more meetings than before. 

It is compatible with ALL LinkedIn subscriptions, and in this blog, we will show you how it works for Sales Navigator users. 

Copy and paste the URL of your Sales Navigator search result or Lead list into Skylead’s campaign creator. 

Later, you can use the Add new leads button to add another URL search, a LinkedIn URL of an individual lead, a CSV file, or through API to any active campaign on condition that the campaign steps allow it.

Then, choose your lead source. 

Also, know that Skylead auto-refreshes your leads. Basically, if new leads appear within the same URL source, they will be pulled into active campaigns if you turn this option on within the tool. 

Click Create sequence to create your Smart sequence campaign. 

Here’s an example of a ‘classical value proposition’ type of a Smart sequence. 

Once you start your campaign, you don’t need to leave Skylead to answer your leads. Thanks to its Smart Inbox, you can manage messages from any LinkedIn subscription and any email connected to Skylead in one place. 

Also, Smart Inbox is a light CRM at the same time, too, as you can custom-make labels to segment leads, and never miss an opportunity to book a meeting with a warm lead. 

Frequently asked questions

How does utilizing these filters impact the overall sales cycle duration from lead generation to closing?

Utilizing these LinkedIn Sales Navigator filters can significantly streamline the sales cycle, enabling more precise targeting which can lead to quicker lead generation and more efficient closing processes by focusing efforts on the most relevant prospects.

Can these filters integrate with CRM systems for a more streamlined sales process, and if so, how?

These filters can indeed integrate with CRM systems, facilitating a more streamlined sales process. This integration allows for the direct transfer of lead information into a CRM, helping sales teams to track and manage leads more efficiently. In other words, if you subscribe to Sales Navigator Advance plus, you have a feature to integrate it with your CRM.

Are there recommendations for combining filters to target very niche markets or industries effectively?

For targeting niche markets or industries, combining filters such as technology, LinkedIn group members, company size, and industry can be highly effective for LinkedIn prospecting. This strategy allows for the creation of a highly specific target list, optimizing the relevance of outreach efforts.

To Sum Up

LinkedIn Sales Navigator is a powerful database that helps you find the most relevant leads for your business from all across the globe. Teamed up with Skylead, you transform into an unstoppable force in lead generation. 

Don’t take our word for it; test it out for 7 days for free! 

You chose your path and decided to walk towards Social Selling, a valley of flourishing prospecting fields, meaningful connections, and better conversion opportunities. Now we welcome you to the camp - The Ultimate Guide Part 2, where we will be discussing how to create a tailor-made Sales Strategy for your business.

If you haven’t checked out Part 1 yet, be sure to do so here, where we’ve covered:

• What is social selling
• How to measure social selling success
• 10 tips to boost your sales using social selling

Let’s jump to the sequel of our shared storyline and prepare you for the mountain climb. 

Benefits of Social Selling

Firstly, let's distinguish why we are all doing this. Social selling is the most effective sales strategy in recent years. Thus, there are many statistics to prove how vast its potential can be: 

76% of buyers are ready to have a social media conversation with potential providers.

Social sellers are 51% more likely to achieve sales quotas.

39% of B2B professionals said social selling reduced the amount of time they had to spend researching potential leads.

84% of C-Level executives use social media to make purchasing choices.

To name a few. So what does this mean, and how can your company benefit from it? Well…

1. Social Selling increases brand visibility.

When a sales team shares content and optimizes their social profiles, their networks grow and engage even more. Besides, these actions are free and organic, meaning you do not need to PPC the hell out of them. 

2. Attracts more high-quality leads.

As brand visibility improves, so shall the quality of leads. When you have a team of social sellers armed with good quality content, they are educating their network. So, let's take LinkedIn as an example. Firstly, people on this social network are far more interested in education from their field of expertise. Secondly, the more you post valuable and specific content, the more interest you will trigger, and your niche network will grow, aka you will have the opportunity to reach more qualified leads.  

3. Improves website traffic.

The more you share content from your company’s website, the more people will click on the link. On the other side, they will also search for more information on the web about your company.

4. Gaining respect as an individual and the company.

If you show you know what you are talking about and constantly offer value to your network, you will gain their respect. In addition, prospects aren’t easily swayed with any content. You need to provide them with what they do not know - constantly. The more you do, the more respect you will have “on the streets”. Consequently, more people will trust you.

5. Building relationships and gaining trust.

Would you rather talk to a real person or a logo? Of course, the real person. That is why social selling works as you get the chance to build relationships with people. We as a human race wish to feel the connection with the people first and foremost. That is why, apart from posting, you should focus on mingling and chatting with other people. The good-quality relationships you have, the more people will trust you, and that is the true benefit of it all. Do not forget to be honest, genuine, and authentic in the process, otherwise, it will not work. 

6. Skyrockets conversion.

Due to gaining respect and building relationships, social selling is also a fantastic way to increase the number of meetings per month - meaning more chances to close the deal and more income to the company.

How to create a sales strategy for Social Selling

A sales strategy is a documented plan with activities and metrics for the sales team to follow and enables them to generate income for the company more efficiently. In other words, if you wish to do social selling, you cannot be sloppy - you must be detailed and organized as your main goal is to convert prospects into customers. In short, here are the steps to tailor-make your social selling strategy.

1# Determine which social media platforms are right for you

Most companies use different social media platforms to raise awareness and their presence. When it comes to social selling, you need to do the same. It might be overwhelming, but know this - you do not have to do everything on every platform possible, as you might do with your company’s presence. Think about what platform your prospects use the most and start from there. Once you establish your presence, you can use other platforms to connect with the prospects. For instance, here is what social media networks proved to be the most effective, according to DataBox.

2# Determine your goals and metrics

Social selling doesn't work unless you set goals. Without clear goals and metrics (which we mentioned in Part 1 of the Ultimate Guide), your random acts of social selling will produce uneven results. Hence, to prevent this and prepare a field for the most accurate social selling describe goals using specific words and KPIs. 

Social Selling goal examples:

3# Determine the right ICP

We already mentioned in Part one the importance of the right ideal customer profile. So, be selective of who you interact with. In other words, you cannot expect that just everyone will buy your product or service. When prospecting on LinkedIn, find your niche ideal customer profile and build a relationship with them.

On this mission, you will find out that many tools can help you find who to reach out to.

4# Determine tools to support your sales strategy

Many tools can help out your social selling activities. Some might save you time when you do outreach, such as Skylead, some will help you filter your niche ICP like LinkedIn Sales Navigator, or you simply need to keep all your prospects organized, such as Pipedrive.  

5# Determine your unique content strategy and product key benefits

To keep things clean, organized, and as simple as possible, you can create a separate document to join your sales strategy - a Content Strategy. For example, this can be a document that contains: 

• Type of content you will be posting
• Posting frequency by days
• Content format
• Content distribution groups or channels

In addition, be careful about the type of content you post, as according to Social Spout, 46% of people may unfollow you if your content is too promotional.

6# Determine Social Selling activities 

There are only a handful of social selling main activities you need to perform. You can decide which ones you will use, but you must know that this sales strategy works best if you combine them.

Post

Post your original, educational content, and do it frequently. Consequently, prospects will love it and follow you more.

Share

Sharing other people’s content for a change will eliminate the potential prospect’s perception that you’re self-centered.

Reactions

This is a useful social selling activity for the moments when you are short on time or if you do not have anything to contribute. It shows that you are following the prospect even though you are not engaging more actively. 

Comment

Your comment must not be just a sales pitch. Instead, offer your educational 2-cents on the topic in discussion, and link your content or website page ONLY if it can be applied. In addition, comments are a nifty indicator of your genuine interest, as it shows that you are not solely the “distributor” of your own content, but rather a social being. Speaking of nifty - comments are also free publicity on other people’s posts.

Message

Engage with the prospect on a more personal level with DMs. Example:

Hey Bethany,

I’ve just noticed you reached your 2nd anniversary at SaleChart. Just wanted to congratulate you on that. How are things going at SaleChart?

Connection request or a Follow

Social experts say that it is best to wait to make a connection with someone until you’ve had an appropriate reason to. In order to create this “reason” you need to go personal. Therefore, reference their blog post, the content they shared, or mutual connection.

Example of the LinkedIn connection request that will stand out:

Hi Jessie,

Your comment about a couple of sales techniques on Michael's post was quite insightful.  So I wanted to add you as my connection. If you are interested, I would like to discuss it further. 

Once you determine the activities, you need to keep in mind that they should always be honest, relevant, and hyper-personalized.

7# Determine sales communication funnel

When you create a sales strategy, every activity has to belong to a certain part of the sales funnel. This applies to social selling, as well.

In other words, you need to establish a valid sales communication funnel to know how to engage and warm up the leads, apart from engaging with their content. As people are naturally different and there is no one-size-fits-all when it comes to social selling, we cannot give you the precise sales communication funnel. However, what we can do is to provide you with a basis to start with. 

8# Finishing up sales strategy: Activity checklist 

Phew! That was a lot, wasn’t it? we’re almost done. Now that you’ve determined this sales strategy, create an activity checklist you need to do daily. Social selling can take a lot of time during the day, especially since sales reps already have a lot on their plate. Trust us because this sheet will help any salesperson organize daily activities and save a lot of time. 

Social selling activities will depend on previous steps defined. Since this is the Ultimate Guide, here is an ultimate checklist, which you can use for any platform.

• Firstly, post a content
• Secondly, share relevant content
• Like or comment your prospect’s content
• Take a look at who viewed your profile (if available)
• Send a connection requests to those who did and personalize your approach if they are ICP
• Check out who interacted with your content. Additionally, interact with them
• If people who interacted with your content are not in your network, connect with them
• Review social media notifications for any birthdays, job change etc and act accordingly
• Add new leads to your CRM
• Check on your leads status in CRM and interact with them on social media
• Respond to any messages
• Initiate casual conversation with the leads
• Initiate the connections
• Engage in existing groups
• Find new groups and join
• Lastly, attend events

Once you start doing social selling, you must constantly provide valuable contributions (unless you are on vacation :). Uneven or infrequent social selling can backfire. Every action matters as long as you do not vanish and appear in a month or two.

Sales strategy examples for Social Selling

How does the theory above manifest into reality? Let’s take a look at short-form sales strategy examples.

1# Sales strategy: The one when you become a thought leader

Let’s start with the statistics. According to Hubspot, 92% of buyers are willing to engage with an industry thought leader. For instance, if you learn fast, write faster, and like to mingle, this is a perfect social selling strategy for you. 

Thought leaders often use social media to share their experiences. Firstly, their posts are always straight to the point and educational - never promotional. Secondly, they act as a kind of influencer in their niche field.

Scenario: For example, let's say you have B2B software Budgetfy that scans companies' spending and suggests budget optimization.

Goals for 3 months

• Increase revenue by 10% (Metric: Percentage of revenue, profit rate)
• Expand network by 400 connections (Metric: Number of invitations sent, Number of connections accepted)
• Reach 60.000 website visits (Metric: Number of webpages visits)
• Publish a minimum of 36 posts

Social media platform

LinkedIn, Slack groups

ICPs

Chief financial officers, Accountants

Tools to use

• Pipedrive for managing leads
• Sales Navigator for lead search
• Skylead LinkedIn Automation & Cold Email Software to speed up outreach process (outreach campaign, lead discovery, connection requests, view and follow, hyper-personalized cold LinkedIn messaging)

Content strategy and product benefits

• Content format: Text, video, documents, image, link to website, LinkedIn poll
• Content type: content about budget optimization strategy, metrics to follow, business process optimization, finance trends, liquidity management, financial challenges, budget allocation, financial risk management, finance department digitalization…
• Distribution channels: LinkedIn profile, Slack channels, Website communities
• Posting frequency: posting approximately 5 times a week 
• Key software benefits: easy control over company’s spending, all invoices in one place, budget optimization recommendations, all-in-one tool, data-driven decisions

Sales communication funnel

Social selling activities outside of direct messaging

• Post content
• Share relevant content
• Like or comment your prospect’s content
• Take a look at who viewed your LinkedIn profile
• Send a connection requests to those who did and personalize your approach if they are ICP
• Check out who interacted with your content and interact with them
• If people who interacted with your content are not in your network, connect with them
• Review social media notifications for any birthdays, job change etc and act accordingly
• Add new leads to Pipedrive
• Use LinkedIn Sales Navigator to find prospects
• Create Skylead outreach campaign to extend the network
• Check on your leads status in Pipedrive and send them a message
• Respond to any messages
• Initiate casual conversation with the leads that responded to cold outreach

2# Sales strategy: The one with the questions, groups and events

It is completely alright if you are not a content writer type. What you can do instead is to be active on other levels. Joining groups, asking thought-provoking questions, and starting conversations with the right people is also a nice way to go. What's more, well-thought-out questions in groups, you will attract ideal prospects and start a conversation with them.

Scenario

For example, let's say you have a marketing agency, specialized for generating leads.

Goals for 5 months

• Gain 5 new clients
• Expand network by 1000 connections (Metric: Number of invitations sent, Number of connections accepted)
• Build closer relationships with 100 leads (Metric: Number of warmed-up leads)

Social media platform

LinkedIn, Slack, Facebook, Quora

ICPs

Marketing managers, Chief Marketing Officers, CEOs

Tools to use

• Sales Navigator for lead search
• Skylead LinkedIn Automation & Cold Email Software to speed up outreach process (outreach campaign, lead discovery and generation, connection requests, view and follow, hyper-personalized cold LinkedIn messaging, Whitelabel for clients)

Content strategy and product benefits

• Content format: Text, documents, image
• Content type: questions, polls about latest LinkedIn lead generation strategies, asking how people generate leads in specific industries, what they find to be hardest, leads lists etc.
• Distribution channels: Slack channels, Facebook groups, Website communities
• Posting frequency: Approximately 2 times a week 
• Key agency benefits: Extension of the company’s team, easy communication, creativity, data transparency, offering tailor-made, unique lead generation strategies, good quality leads

Sales communication funnel

Social selling activities outside of direct messaging

• Post questions
• Share relevant content
• Like or comment your prospect’s content
• Send LinkedIn connections, follow or add prospects
• Review social media notifications for any birthdays, job change etc and act accordingly
• Organize and document warmed-up leads
• Use LinkedIn Sales Navigator to find prospects
• Create Skylead outreach campaign to outreach the prospects 

Summary

As seen from our examples, sales strategy can help you a great deal with your results, especially if we are talking about social selling. However, keep in mind that we’ve shortened our sales strategy examples, and you need to be as detailed as possible.

Repeating is the mother of learning, therefore here is what you need to determine for your social selling strategy: 

1. Which Social Media Platforms Are Right For You
2. Your Goals And Metrics
3. The Right ICP
4. Tools To Support Your Sales Strategy
5. Your Personal Content Strategy And Product Key Benefits
6. Social Selling Activities 
7. Sales Communication Funnel
8. Activity Checklist 

Remember, social selling takes a lot of time. Once you see the first results, you will fall in love with them. 

Wish to share love, help across the internet, and build relationships with prospects? Try out Skylead free for 7 days!

Whether you want to network, find your perfect client, do cold outreach, showcase your expertise, or educate other users about your product, LinkedIn is a place to be. 

The platform offers so many possibilities not only when it comes to reaching pretty much anyone on the planet (crazy, isn’t it?) but also in terms of different communication channels - from direct messages to InMails, posts, polls, emails, etc. 

Get on LinkedIn, and the (business) world is your oyster. 

But what about the time? Yes, there are only so many hours at our disposal and so many things that need to be done. Luckily, the development of automation and AI-powered solutions took some strain off us and helped us focus on more “important” things. 

Take AI lead generation tools, for example. Sales reps that use them to automate lead generation and prospecting on LinkedIn have more time to focus on building meaningful relationships and closing deals, instead of getting stuck in certain repetitive actions.

The same goes for LinkedIn itself. If you automate these 3 things, you’ll reach more customers in less time and increase your company’s value.

Sales Navigator 

Sales Navigator is LinkedIn’s paid sales solution. It is designed to help its users do their outreach more effectively and land better deals.

Not only.  

Sales Navigator gives you some advanced options that can improve the quality of both your targeting and outreach efforts. 

Access to out-of-network connections

One of the biggest benefits of LinkedIn Sales Navigator, especially nowadays with the newest LinkedIn restrictions and limits, is the opportunity to extend your sales reach outside your network. 

Namely, you can only view a limited number of profiles outside your network. Sales Navigator lets you “unlock” that information for up to 25 profiles a month. This way you can better understand your leads and make more meaningful connections. 

Furthermore, the LinkedIn Sales Navigator account gives you 20 InMails each month. This way you can reach out to your 3rd-degree connections and establish significant business relationships. Additionally, InMails are credit-based. That is, if the user replies to your LinkedIn InMail, the one you sent first will not be counted towards your monthly limit. 

More targeted search

Sales Navigator gives you the chance of ultimate targeting!

With 24 filters only for “Lead Search” at your disposal, you can narrow down your audience until you achieve the very best results. Imagine how well you can refine your search and pick quality leads that will almost for sure be interested in what you have to offer. 

However, before you go ahead and start searching for that perfect customer of yours, learn how to use Sales Navigator filters. 

It would be a shame not to take it to your full advantage just because you haven’t done your research. 

Lead recommendation 

The “Lead Recommendations” feature suggests relevant leads based on your sales preferences, search history, profile views, and past saved leads. AI-powered techniques make this happen due to the pre-collected and labeled data.

The more you use Sales Navigator, the more it will use the data to do the valuable targeting for you. 

Therefore, it saves you a step in the sales process. 

Powerful sales insights

As you search for prospects, save leads, and make connections, Sales Navigator will keep you posted on updates in your network such as: 

• Job changes;
• Company updates;
• Relevant connections and warm leads.

This way you will always stay up with the latest industry tendencies.

CRM integration 

CRM stands for Customer Relationship Management Software. 

A CRM gathers customer data and interactions across all channels in one place. Managing centralized data helps businesses improve customer experience, satisfaction, retention, and service. 

Briefly, a CRM will help you understand your leads’ needs, segment your audience, and therefore, know how to target them better. 

That being said, Sales Navigator integrates with the following major Customer Relationship Management Software: 

• Salesforce;
• Hubspot;
• SugarCRM;
• SAP; 
• Pega;
• Oracle;
• Microsoft Dynamics. 

Hootsuite 

Hootsuite is a social media management platform where you can do everything from creating quality content and scheduling posts to managing team members and measuring ROI.

It gives you the option of: 

• Creating and scheduling posts;
• Managing all of your social media channels;
• Planing upcoming campaigns;
• Staying on top of incoming messages on social media;
• Measuring your performance and analyze results;
• Extending your social reach;
• Staying on top of the trends;
• Optimizing your advertising budget;
• And much more. 

Social media presence is crucial for any type of business. Nowadays, when companies and their employees have multiple accounts on multiple social media platforms, it is getting harder to post quality content and to plan a good strategy without using an automation tool. 

At the end of the day, trying Hootsuite out doesn’t cost you anything. 

Literally.

It is the only social media management platform that allows you a 30-day free trial. 

Check it out! 

Skylead

Surprisingly, cold emailing and/or reaching out on LinkedIn turned out to be some of the most effective ways of generating leads on LinkedIn. 

However, this works only if you have targeted your audience well, if you came up with a highly elaborated strategy, and have strong copies of the messages you will be sending. 

This is where Skylead comes into the picture. It is an Automation Tool, Scraping Tool, and an Email Finder, all in one software. 

Check out Skylead’s solution for an all-embracing outreach. 

LinkedIn outreach 

To perform LinkedIn outreach, you connect with your leads and message them. 

Or you can use paid or free InMail options depending on whether you have a LinkedIn basic or paid account. 

As you may see, Skylead gives you the option of hyper-personalizing Invites to Connect, LinkedIn messages, and InMails, and fully automating this process. 

It supports both LinkedIn Basic and Premium Accounts, but it is better to upgrade it to the extent of your possibilities. 

LinkedIn Premium Account, in comparison to LinkedIn Basic Account, can perform more in terms of features, such as having the option of an Unlimited Profile Search and sending a certain number of LinkedIn InMails. You can also view and engage with a much greater number of profiles with a Premium account.

Sales Navigator is more advanced as far as filters are concerned in comparison to a LinkedIn profile. 

Email outreach 

Skylead personalizes Email Outreach and combines it with LinkedIn features.

Email Outreach implies personal emails, emails imported through a CSV file, and business emails discovered and verified through Skylead’s Email Discovery & Verification Feature.

Here is an example of a campaign that combines LinkedIn outreach with business emails. 

As you may see from the picture, Skylead uses multiple channels to reach out to your leads. 

Email discovery & verification feature 

Thanks to its Email Discovery & Verification feature (see above), Skylead manages to collect the data, “compose” all the possible business email options, and verify them even without you being connected with the lead on LinkedIn. 

This is how your leads list will look like on Skylead. 

Image & GIF hyper-personalization tool 

With Skylead’s Image & GIF Hyper-personalization tool, you can offer products and services in a less conventional way, make fun job opportunity announcements, wish your clients happy holidays, or schedule a casual meeting. 

This option is available for LinkedIn Messages, Emails, and InMails.

As you may see, there are options to:

Add me: import your LinkedIn profile picture;

Add lead: import your lead’s LinkedIn profile picture;

Choose custom logo: import a logo from your computer;

Add lead’s logo: import your lead’s current company’s LinkedIn profile picture;

Add text: text is perfectly personalized by using all Skylead’s available tags. Additionally, in case you import your leads through a CSV file, each column of your CSV file becomes a tag as well. 

Smart sequences 

Skylead is the only Sales Engagement Tool that offers multichannel outreach through Smart Sequences. That is, it combines LinkedIn messages, Emails, and InMails, with other LinkedIn features such as Invite to Connect, View, Follow, thanks to the “if/then (condition)” step. 

The “if/then (condition)” step allows multiple scenarios in your outreach. Briefly, it ensures that you will reach out to your leads one way or another - whether by connecting on LinkedIn, sending an email, or simply following them on LinkedIn as a subtle reminder of you trying to connect. 

For example, let’s say you make the flow in the following manner: Invite to Connect - LinkedIn Message -  (follow-up) LinkedIn Message. 

In case the prospect doesn’t accept your Connection Request, the rest of the sequence goes down the drain. 

With Smart Sequences, the same flow would be put in the following manner - “If Connection Request Accepted” then “Send Message”, “If Connection Request Not Accepted” then - a whole bunch of other options, such as “View Profile” - “Email Discovery & Verification” - “If has verified email” then “Send Email”, etc. 

As you may see, your Smart Sequence will not just stop but will proceed with other available/possible paths to your lead. 

Integrated inbox 

Whether your leads’ responses come from LinkedIn, Sales Navigator, or Emails, Skylead has an Integrated Inbox. Its role is to put all of these together in a neat and organized way. You know where your prospects answered from at any moment thanks to the chat’s well-defined icons. It’s your choice where you want to continue the communication – in the Integrated or directly in the channel’s Inbox.

Summary 

Automation is there to help you scale your business while ensuring consistency in customer experience and opportunity costs. 

That is to say that with the right automation tool you will be saving and making money while watching your company grow. 

To learn more about how Skylead can help you make the most of your LinkedIn experience, schedule a demo call with our team representative. 

We look forward to opening a world of outreach possibilities for you!