The impact-of-social-media-usage-on-sales-performance

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A Research Report for B2B Companies
#LetsGetSelling
The Ultimate Sales Guide
to Crushing Your Quota
The Impact of Social Media
Usage on Sales Performance
and Corporate Revenue
(Updated!)

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https://twitter.com/sean_h_burke https://twitter.com/keenan
The Ultimate Sales Guide to Crushing Your Quota
Hello!
The “Social Media and Sales Quota Attainment” study conducted by Jim Keenan three years
ago showed that sales quota attainment was positively impacted by the use of social media as
early as 2010.
Fast forward ﬁve years, and the correlation between social media use, quota attainment and
corporate revenue has grown stronger. According to this follow-on survey of 524 sales pros
from KiteDesk and A Sales Guy Consulting:
Nearly three quarters of sales professionals who beat their 2014 quota by 10% or more
described themselves as “highly effective” or “better than most” at leveraging social
media to sell.
Sales professionals capable of taking advantage of the incredible amount of social data,
social insights and shared knowledge at their disposal were SIX TIMES more likely to beat
their quotas than salespeople with rudimentary or no social media skills.
The percentage of sales professionals who missed their sales quota and had little or no
social media skills increased an astounding 50% from 2012 to 2014.
To gauge whether sales reps are better off now that they have access to a wide assortment
of social media networks and digital tools and technologies, we asked sales reps to weigh in
regarding the effectiveness of using social for prospecting, lead nurturing, and closing deals.
We also asked them to identify areas where they want to see improvements in the digital
sales toolkit.
Finally, we invited a panel of sales thought leaders and stellar sales practitioners who crushed
their 2014 quota to weigh in with their personal stories and reaction to the survey results.
Together, we set out to discover how social media and digital tools make a difference where
it matters most – IN QUOTA.
Now, #LetsGetSelling!
Jim Keenan
CEO, A Sales Guy LLC
@keenan
Sean burke
CEO, KiteDesk
@sean_h_burke

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Contents
Executive Summary
About the Participants
Survey Questions
When selling to your customer base, how effective do you rank your personal use
of social media?
Have you closed any business as a direct result of social media in the past year?
A Deeper Dive into the Sales Results
Exceeded sales quota (2012 – 2014)
Attained sales quota (2012 – 2014)
Missed sales quota (2012 – 2014)
Closed 2014 Deals As A Direct Result of Using Social Media
Which Social Media Sites Do You Use?
Social Media Use Is Time Well Spent
How Does Social Media Stack Up As A Sales Tool?
There’s Room for Growth Within The Digital Sales Toolkit
Corporate Support for Social Sales Is Growing But Still Remains Low
Summing It Up
Thank You to Our Panel of Sales Pros
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• 4 •
Executive Summary
When working with sales organizations in the business-to-business (B2B) space, we are often asked whether the use
of social media actually generates a measurable return. Some argue that despite the social sales hype, it’s nearly
impossible to isolate the impact of social media use on sales quota attainment. What’s more, few agree on the
definition of what constitutes social selling in the first place. These days, virtually everyone in B2B sales uses the
Internet to some extent, and some would say that even the most cursory perusal of LinkedIn profiles qualifies as a
social sales tactic – albeit a basic one.
In this study, we aimed to find out whether a salesperson’s self-assessment of their ability to use social to prospect,
nurture leads, and close deals makes a measurable difference in their sales performance.
Here’s what we found:
The most socially savvy sales pros are far more likely to beat their sales quotas.
74% of the sales professionals who beat their quota by 10% or more described themselves as “highly effective” or
“better-than-most” social media users.
These sales achievers were SIX TIMES more likely to exceed their quota than were sales peers with rudimentary or
no social media skills. Meanwhile:
There is a strong — and growing — relationship between deals closed and social media use.
In 2014, a full 64% of sales professionals reported that social media use was directly responsible for at least one
closed deal. (This is a dramatic 15% increase from the 2012 report.)
Social selling is time well spent.
High achieving sales pros aren’t just goofing around on social media. Seventy percent of sales professionals who
exceeded their sales quota used social media during at least 10% of their sales activities. In contrast, almost half of
sales reps who reported low social media use missed their 2014 sales quota.
The top site used for social selling may surprise you.
For the first time ever, Twitter has dethroned LinkedIn as the most important social selling channel for B2B
sales professionals.
Social media is effective throughout the entire sales process.
The majority of survey respondents say social media works well to build the pipeline, nurture leads, and achieve quota.
Sales reps with little or no social media skills are substantially more likely to miss their sales quotas. In fact,
the percentage of underperformers that lack social media skills increased by 50% between 2012 and 2014.
The achievement gap between those with high and those with rudimentary social media skills has widened
since 2012. We take this as an indication that social media use will become more important to sales success
over time.

https://twitter.com/geoffstuhr
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• 5 •
Prospecting in any age requires using the tools we have at our disposal to our advantage, and in the
digital/social age, the craft of prospecting has changed quite a bit. Within my role in the Medical Sales industry,
it can be INCREDIBLY tough reaching key stakeholders through traditional means (by phone or email) or even
through a personal introduction from someone else that works at the same hospital. The healthcare industry is
undertaking a major change in the way that most facilities purchase products and in doing so, it has gotten even
more challenging to reach anyone outside of the supply chain department.
This, along with the onset of social media and social selling, has become the perfect storm for getting in touch
with key decision makers, on their time, outside of the four walls of a hospital.
Geoff Stuhr
@geoffstuhr, Specialty Care, Account Manager, GE Healthcare
There’s room for improvement within the social and digital sales toolkit.
The vast majority of respondents would like to have better tools and technologies for relationship intelligence,
actionable sales intelligence, and improved CRM automation.
Corporate support for social media tools is growing but remains low.
Only about a third of sales professionals received social media training in 2014 (compared to 25% in 2012) and only
a ﬁfth have access to and use internal social media sites.

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• 6 •
About the Participants
The survey was ﬁelded February 24 – March 14, 2015 to 524 US- and Canada-based sales professionals who target
the following markets:
When we asked the survey respondents to conﬁrm their role in the sales organization, we found:
Sales leadership and quota-carrying sales professionals were fairly evenly represented within the survey results.
We think this group provides a realistic picture of how salespeople view social media as a tool for increasing
revenue and achieving sales quota targets.
In terms of annual quota attainment, survey respondents reported that, for 2014:
Was within quota by 10%
(over or under)
55.7%
Missed quota by more than 10%
16.8%
27.5%
Exceeded quota
40%
Midmarket
Small Business
*rounding error
19%
Consumer
19%
Enterprise
2%
Channel
21%
23%
Quota-carrying sales professional
Quota-carrying inside
sales professional
20%
Officer
19%
Front Line Manager
(Sales Manager)
5%
Second Line Manager (Sales Director)
21%
12%
Sales Executive (VP, SVP, EVP)

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• 7 •
Survey Questions
When selling to your customer base, how effective do you rank your personal use of
social media?
In 2014, 74% of salespeople who exceeded their quota described themselves as “highly effective” social media users or
“better than most”. Socially savvy reps were 6.7 times more likely to exceed quota than were salespeople with
rudimentary or no social media skills.
Likewise, the majority of sales reps who met their quota consider themselves to be “highly effective social media
users,” or better than most.
The relationship works both ways. Those who do not use social media or consider their skills “remedial,” made up
36% of the population who missed quota by 10% or more.
Exceeded2014
Quotaby10%+
Achieved2014
QuotaWithin+/-10%
Missed2014
QuotaBy10%+
38%
17%
11%
31%
28%
28%
16%
36%
39%
36%
12%
14%
Highly Skilled
Better Than Most
Average
Basic/no skills
Highly Skilled
Better Than Most
Average
Basic/no skills
Highly Skilled
Better Than Most
Average
Basic/no skills
74%
of overachievers are skilled
social media users
56%
of salespeople who made
their quota are skilled social
media users
36%
of salespeople who made
their quota are skilled social
media users
Skilled social media users are substantially more likely to meet
or beat quota.
Click to Tweet

https://twitter.com/DigitalKeith
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• 8 •
Have you closed any business as a direct result of social media in the past year?
64% of respondents said "Yes"!
We’ve seen that the correlation between social media use and deals closed is getting stronger over time. Among the
entire population of sales professionals in 2012, 54% closed a deal because of their social media use. By 2014, that
number jumped to 64%.
We asked a group of outstanding sales professionals to give one example for using social to prospect in the
digital/social age. Here is what they said:
There have been many successes over the past 18 months. Essentially, I went from a struggling
salesperson who barely averaged 80% of quota, had a weak pipeline, and worked 12 hours a day some 6 days a
week to exceeding my quota sixteen out of the last eighteen months. My pipeline is fat and healthy, and I’m
working a normal 40 hour work week. All of this is thanks to social selling. My largest closed deal that I generated
using social selling was for $232,000. I engaged on LinkedIn, kept myself "top-of-mind", and positioned myself
as the "go to guy" for IT technology and business telecom services.
But it's more than just earning ‘more money’. I actually have been able to cultivate a deeper and more authentic
seller-to-buyer relationship using social selling. My customers are more qualiﬁed, more ready to buy, and
happier to be doing business with me. In turn, I now get more repeat business and more referrals.
Keith Gill
@DigitalKeith, Strategic Account Manager, Avisolve
9%
36%
32%
23%
13%
46%
30%
11%
20142012
64%
closed 1+ deals
54%
closed 1+ deals
No deals 2-5 deals 6+ deals1 deal
Click to Tweet

https://twitter.com/careersingov
https://twitter.com/keithweightman
https://twitter.com/CarlMuhlstein
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• 9 •
The CIO of Maricopa County began marketing job opportunities on Twitter, but he wasn’t using the
correct hashtags or tweeting relevant insights that could help ﬁll the positions. I reached out to him and showed
him the types of traffic we generate for the many cities we work with nationwide. I demonstrated how we not
only market jobs but also major events within the county in order to promote local living. He liked our approach,
and we developed a two-year partnership to market all their IT and cybersecurity jobs.
Michael Hurwitz
@careersingov, President/Co-Owner, Careers In Government, Inc.
I've been fortunate to have several successes using social selling, which is why I continue to practice and
am constantly on the lookout for new tricks/tools to stay ahead of the curve. Recently, I connected with a VP
who was part of my LinkedIn group. He reached out to thank me for inviting him to the group. This led to a
warm conversation and four months later a $51k contract. What’s even more rewarding is I led a social selling
session for our entire sales team in 2014, and following my example, a colleague told me she created her own
group. Within a week she was contacted by a potential buyer, which turned into an $11k contract. She couldn't
believe it actually worked and is now a diehard social seller.
Keith Weightman
@keithweightman, Account Executive, Bullhorn, Inc.
When news came out that StyleHaul had sourced another $6 million in equity funding, I tweeted my
congratulations to them and suggested they look into creative new office space to house their soon-to-be
growing workforce. A few days later, they reached out to me seeking office leasing advice. A few months after
that we had a signed lease in a building I represent. All because of one tweet.
Carl Muhlstein
@CarlMuhlstein, Managing Director, Jones Lang LaSalle, IP, Inc.

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• 10 •
A Deeper Dive Into The Sales Results
A deep dive into the numbers is where it gets really interesting. When we set out to determine if salespeople were
actually achieving quota using social media, we felt conﬁdent that social media plays a signiﬁcant role in quota
attainment. The survey results support that belief.
Over the past three years, the number of “highly effective” and “better than most” social media users who exceed
quota has risen. Sales reps with remedial social media skills have become less likely to exceed quota over the same
time period.
38%
36%
12%
14%
Highly Skilled
Better Than Most
Average
Basic/no skills
Highly Skilled
Better Than Most
Average
Basic/no skills
Highly Skilled
Better Than Most
Average
Basic/no skills
33%
33%
35%
35%
14%
11%
18%
20%
74%* in 2014
68%* in 2013 and 2012
201420132012
Exceeded Quota 2012 - 2014
Over the past 3 years, highly effective/better-than-most social media users were far more likely to beat their quota
than their less social peers.
*of skilled social media users exceeded quota

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• 11 •
201420132012
17%
39%
28%
16%
20%
38%
38%
28%
16%
25%
18%
18%
56%* in 2014
58%* in 2013
56%* in 2012
201420132012
11%
31%
22%
36%
15%
35%
24%
26%
18%
37%
21%
24%
Highly Skilled
Better Than Most
Average
Basic/no skills
Highly Skilled
Better Than Most
Average
Basic/no skills
Highly Skilled
Better Than Most
Average
Basic/no skills
Highly Skilled
Better Than Most
Average
Basic/no skills
Highly Skilled
Better Than Most
Average
Basic/no skills
Highly Skilled
Better Than Most
Average
Basic/no skills
Since 2012, the majority of people who met their quota have been skilled social media users. They are more likely to
make quota than their less social media-savvy peers.
Missed Sales Quota 2012 - 2014
Achieved Sales Quota 2012 - 2014
We believe that, as social media use becomes more prevalent, it will become more and more necessary for sales
professionals to be online where their customers and prospects increasingly are.
*of skilled social media users achieved quota
The percentage of social-savvy
sales reps who missed their
quota decreased steadily from
2012 – 2014.
The percent of sales reps with
basic/no social media skills who
missed their quota increased
steadily from 2012 – 2014.

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• 12 •
Closed 2014 Deals As A Direct Result Of Using Social Media
We saw that 69% of the highest achieving sales pros – the ones who exceed quota by 10% more – closed one or
more deals in 2014 as a direct result of social media usage, and 64% closed multiple deals.
5%
9%
31%
36%
42%
23%
41%
32%
23%
33%
14%
11%
No deals 2-5 deals 6+ deals
Exceeded 2014 quota by 10%+
All Survey Respondents
Missed 2014 quota by 10%+
1 deal
69% of salespeople who exceeded
their 2014 quota by 10% or more said
they closed at least one deal as a direct
result of using social media.
64% of all reps surveyed said they
closed at least one deal as a direct
result of using social media.
42% who missed their 2014 sales quota
by 10%+ did not close any deals as a
direct result of using social media.
*rounding error

https://twitter.com/lgomezperu
https://twitter.com/GregBarkerOnlin
https://twitter.com/saleshack
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• 13 •
Prospecting for new customers is about connecting with human beings, and this has to do with increasing
the number of people who know about you. This is called building a reputation, a good reputation. My strategy
is to get to know, listen, learn, and understand the type of potential customers with whom I want to work. Once
I have a good understanding of them, I construct a value proposition in terms of what my potential customer
needs. The central idea is that this process has to be dynamic and clear so that the customer is the center of the
system that we build.
Lorenzo Gomez
@lgomezperu, Business Development and Sales Manager, Latin America, Infinit Technology Solutions
I find you need to take a long game approach to using digital and social. What I mean by this is the term
I call ‘Social Interaction.’ I typically find others that are relevant to my niche or area of interest to learn more
about where they “tell their stories.” With this information, I can start the social interaction via comments,
shares, likes, retweets, forwarding articles that they may have missed on the topics they are interested in, and
etc. I also try to take the discussion to the next level by making sure we meet in person at events, conferences,
etc. It takes a two-phase approach to bring the relationship to the next level and truly convey what you can
bring to the relationship that is helpful and useful to them. If I can help them connect with the people, ideas, and
information they need, it will return back to me in time.
Greg Barker
@GregBarkerOnlin, Business Development, Industrial/Mission Critical Fire Protection, J. F. Ahern Co.
I have a research team who connects me and my sales team to prospects through LinkedIn and another
team of people who procure, create, and post content through LinkedIn for our salespeople. This approach that
I call "operation silver platter," leads to several leads per week delivered right to my sales team’s LinkedIn InMail
box!
Chad Burmeister
@saleshack, Vice President, Sales and Marketing, ConnectAndSell, Inc.
We asked the sales community to describe their process for using social for prospecting. Here’s what they said:
good

https://twitter.com/jill_rowley
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• 14 •
Shocked that Twitter has surpassed LinkedIn. That said, I can typically learn more personal things about
a buyer on Twitter than LinkedIn — who she follows (business professionals, my competitors & partners,
inﬂuencers, comedians, politicians, athletes, news outlets, charitable organizations) who follows her, what she
tweets about, who she retweets, what lists she's a member of and subscribes to. I use Twitter to not only
research, but ENGAGE. If I believe the content being shared by my buyer is relevant to my network, I will
comment, retweet, and potentially favorite. I might share (via Twitter, LinkedIn, or email) a relevant follow-on
article, blog post, podcast, eBook, video. I also use Twitter to "attend" events virtually via the event hashtag. It's
all about being where your buyers are: offline, online, #AllTheTime.
Jill Rowley
@jill_rowley, Chief Evangelist and Founder, Jill Rowley, Inc.
Which Social Media Sites Do You Use?
If salespeople are using social media to sell, what social media sites are they using?
We weren’t surprised to see LinkedIn, which was top ranked in 2012, or even Facebook high on the list. However,
neither site ranked number one among survey respondents.
The number one social site used within the sales process for 2014? Twitter!
Twitter
Linkedin
Facebook
Google+
I Blog
Other
Slideshare
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Overall
Rank
Social Media Score*
*Scores are weighted based on responses from sales reps who use social media as part of the sales process.
We asked some of the top social inﬂuencers in sales for their reactions. Here’s what they said:
Click to Tweet

https://twitter.com/JulioVisko
https://twitter.com/vdimauro
https://twitter.com/shanegibson
https://twitter.com/gabevillamizar
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• 15 •
Historically, LinkedIn has been the network where more formal business communication takes place,
but there is a shift towards buyers and sellers engaging around less formal communications via Twitter.
Twitter really allows for more of a 360 degree view of your buyer and allows for more personal
communication to take place.
Julio Viskovich
@JulioVisko, Vice President of Marketing, rFactr
The fact that Twitter surpassed LinkedIn as the #1 social media sales tool is not surprising to me. I like to
describe Twitter as the bar after work – where you keep your tie on but loosen it a bit, and LinkedIn is the
conference room in the corporate office. Due to the fast and collaborative nature of Twitter, a salesperson can
effectively share an idea or engage with a prospective client through a pithy missive. When the exchange goes
well, it can then be moved to LinkedIn – which represents a much larger personal commitment.
Vanessa DiMauro
@vdimauro, CEO and Chief Digital Officer, Leader Networks
Twitter is a true open network and is really only limited by the creativity you apply to using it. There’s not
a city in the world I traveled to where I couldn’t make new connections within hours of landing there using
Twitter. My big tip for Twitter and social selling in general is to “use the internet to get off of the internet and
deepen relationships. Twitter doesn’t sell, relationships and trust close the deal.
Shane Gibson
@shanegibson, Author, Speaker and Sales Trainer, BuildDirect
One way to use Twitter effectively is to research the buyer to understand what kind of content they like
to share, what days and times they tweet the most, and who they engage with the most on Twitter. By only
knowing these three social behaviors, you will be able to accelerate the sales process.
Gabe Villamizar
@gabevillamizar, Social Media Marketing Manager, HireVue, Inc.

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• 16 •
Social Media Use Is Time Well-Spent
Many sales leaders are concerned that their salespeople will spend more time on social media sites than they will
spend actually selling. What we’ve uncovered, though, is that high achieving sales pros aren’t just gooﬁng around on
social media. 70% of sales professionals who exceeded their sales quota used social media during at least 70% of
their sales activities. In contrast, almost half of sales reps who reported low use of social media missed their sales
quota last year.
So how much time do sales reps spend using social media?
Exceeded 2014 quota by 10%+
14%
22%
34%
16%
20%
14%
Missed 2014 quota by 10%+
28%
16%
26%
10%
70% of salespeople who exceeded
their 2014 quota used social media
over 10% of the time
48% of salespeople who missed their
2014 quota by a wide margin used social
media no more than 10% of the time
Less than 5% or none 2-5 deals Over 50%5%-10% 2-5 deals

https://twitter.com/EvanCarmichael
https://twitter.com/eBizUniverse
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• 17 •
How Does Social Media Stack Up As A Sales Tool?
The majority of survey respondents say that social media is effective throughout the entire sales process. They
reported signiﬁcant value in building the pipeline, nurturing leads/opportunities, and meeting quota. We also
observed that those who exceeded their quota in 2014 valued social media as a sales tool more highly in all areas.
Google News Alerts used to be my favorite. In a Twitter world though it’s much less relevant. Want to
know what’s happening with them? Just follow them on Twitter. Want to engage with them and stay top of
mind? Reply to their tweets. It’s never been easier.
Evan Carmichael
@EvanCarmichael, Founder, Evan Carmichael Communications Group
Want to know where your competitor is getting all that traffic to his blog, app or website? Is he promoting
on Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn? SimilarWeb.com tells you where a website's major traffic is coming from. Want
to target orthodontists in a certain area? You can search twitter proﬁles with a single click using
Followerwonk.com.
Tom Varghese
@eBizUniverse, CEO, eBizUniverse, Inc.
66% 67%
81%
71%
75%
54%
Building pipeline
Achieving Quota
Nurturing Leads/
Opportunities
Say it works well/really well
All Survey Respondents Exceeded Quota By 10%+
We asked the sales community what are their preferred tools or sources to research prospective buyers, build
pipeline, and nurture leads and opportunities. Here’s what they said:
Click to Tweet

https://twitter.com/ajrobinson2002
https://twitter.com/TheSalesHunter
https://twitter.com/davestei
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• 18 •
We use tools like KiteDesk to profile customers and find ‘look alike’ prospects on the social web. This
supplements our marketing efforts in terms of top of funnel leads, and we have increased the total
opportunities at the top of the funnel by 25% because of it. We use a variety of social technologies, like
LinkedIn and Twitter, as new channels to hold initial outreach and as engagement/content distribution
channels to build relationships. We find that these tools help to grow top-of-funnel leads and enable our
salespeople to be more top-of-mind with prospects and where they are learning.
We also use social profile aggregation tools like Refresh to do easy pre-call prep prior to conversations. I view
these tools as crucial to early stage rapport building, and they have proven to shorten the sales cycle on
opportunities by a third.
Jason Robinson
@ajrobinson2002, Senior Vice President - Sales and Marketing, MarketBridge
I use Hootsuite to allow me to efficiently monitor thought leaders by subject. Doing so allows me to
retweet content I like quickly and also target tweets to them on specific issues.
Mark Hunter
@TheSalesHunter, Author, Sales Consultant and Keynote Speaker, The Sales Hunter
I certainly monitor my competitors on social media by following them on Twitter, connecting with them
on LinkedIn (if they’ll have me), and using old-fashioned Google Alerts. It really works. I work with my clients to
best determine how to keep track of the three levels of competitive information… 1: About the competitors'
companies. 2: About the competitors’ products and services. 3: About the individuals against who I and my
clients compete.
Dave Stein
@davestei, Principal, Dave Stein, Inc.

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• 19 •
There’s Room For Growth Within The Digital Sales Toolkit
“With the incredible amount of tools and technologies we have at our disposal – are we really, truly, helping
salespeople sell more and get better at their craft?”
That’s the question KiteDesk CEO Sean Burke asked when he started planning personally and professionally for 2015.
“Thinking about it another way: Is the B2B sales industry getting better, worse or treading water?”
When we asked sales reps how they rank their sales toolkit for uncovering mutual connections and identifying and
scoring untapped connections, delivering actionable sales intelligence and automating their CRM, only 18-23%
thought their current toolset works well. The majority indicated there’s ample room for improvement.
17%
30%
33%
33%
21%
23%
38%
12%
34%
12%
30%
17%
Score untapped sales connections
Deliver actionable sales intelligence
Automate the CRM
83% aren’t impressed with
their current tools for scoring
untapped connections
79% aren’t impressed with
their current tools for delivering
actionable sales intelligence
77% aren’t impressed with their
current tools for CRM automation
They work well/really well There’s room for improvement They don’t work at allThey’re ok
Click to Tweet

https://twitter.com/JackKosakowski1
https://twitter.com/jamietshanks
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• 20 •
CRM capabilities with goals would be amazing to see. For instance, I’d love to be able to provide a list of
contacts that I want to keep in touch with at least once a month, and if I haven’t tweeted them for a month, I
get a notiﬁcation. Maybe that functionality exists somewhere in some tool but I haven’t seen it… and it’s
deﬁnitely coming as sales become more and more social.
Evan Carmichael
@EvanCarmichael, Founder, Evan Carmichael Communications Group
There is a powerful stat released by Docurated stating: “only a third of sales reps’ time is actually spent
selling.” That means the other two thirds is wasted on noise. Noise is a productivity killer that MURDERS a
company’s bottom line. It’s the day-to-day stuff like researching contact details, updating the CRM, or missing
intelligence altogether because you’re using multiple technologies that don’t speak to one another. Of course,
I understand some of this noise is inevitable, but I also believe that with the right technologies and processes,
the amount of noise can easily be cut in half.
Jack Kosakowski
@JackKosakowski1, Regional Sales Manager, Act-On Software, Inc.
The biggest gap missing in the social sales toolkit is the mindset that a single piece of software will solve
any and all sales challenges.
Jamie Shanks
@jamietshanks, CEO, Sales for Life
When asked about what’s needed to improve the sales toolkit, the community suggested:

https://twitter.com/chris_scarfo
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• 21 •
Corporate Support For Social Selling Is Growing But Remains Low
Only about a third of sales professionals received social media training in 2014 (compared to 25% in 2012) and only
one in ﬁve have access to and use internal social media sites.
Despite the lack of training in social selling strategies, our research clearly shows that social media use tends to
dramatically increase sales potential. We feel the investment in social media training for sales teams could lead to
dramatic boosts in revenue growth.
Consider this: with little to no training, the majority of social media-savvy sales professionals are exceeding their
sales quotas. Imagine the potential if your entire team was trained to use social media effectively to build and
enhance relationships while increasing the number of closed sales.
What should be remembered ﬁrst and foremost is that our social media platforms should be treated as a
professional portfolio. Remember to always have a professional headshot, descriptive bio about what it is you
do, and a handle or tagline that is memorable and draws viewers in.
Lead nurturing through social media is much easier than most think. It’s important to provide value to your
target client by curating relevant articles and constantly engaging in meaningful conversation so that they look
to you when they need information.
Christopher Scarfo
@chris_scarfo, Director of Sales, Impet Group, Inc.
37% 40%
28%
73%
20%
67%
Provide social media
training for sales?
Give reps discretionary
budget to purchase
their own sales tools?
Provide collaboration
tools like Chatter,
Yammer, Social Cast?
All Survey Respondents Exceeded Quota by 10%+
It’s worth noting that social media training, enterprise collaboration tools, and discretionary budgets for individual
sales tools all correlate positively with sales performance.
We asked sales executives what needs to be included in any sales training. This is what they advised:
Click to Tweet

https://twitter.com/Mike_Kunkle
https://twitter.com/JohnMBarrows
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• 22 •
First you Research and Connect. Then you move into a “nurture loop” of Awareness | Interest |
Relationship, until you see a sales signal or trigger event and can make a sensible sales approach, to convert
Relationship to Revenue. You want to avoid the too-common “Pounce & Pitch” behavior that I see from so many
inexperienced or ineffective ‘social sellers.
Social research, content marketing, social marketing, social nurturing, and social selling are all wonderful
methods and can produce great results, when used masterfully. But these are additive methods… not a
replacement for the telephone, email, or other methods. Social selling should become part of your Sales Utility
Belt. A master craftsperson always uses the right tool for the job.
Mike Kunkle
@Mike_Kunkle, Sales Transformation Advisor, Writer & Speaker, :: transforming sales results ::
From a training perspective, the biggest mistake most companies make is teaching social selling in a
workshop-style environment. Although great for introducing a new idea or further entrenching an existing
initiative, workshops don't lead to broad-based social selling adoption. Companies will need a program that
ensures adoption.
Jamie Shanks
@jamietshanks, CEO, Sales for Life
And yet, 63% of companies fail to offer social media training and 80% don’t provide collaboration tools.
We asked sales influencers why they thought this is the case:
I think there are multiple reasons for this disconnect. The first is I still don’t think anyone really knows or
can define what social selling means. When you can’t really define it or there are multiple definitions depending
on who you talk to it’s tough to figure out how to invest in it. The other reason is in order to effectively train on
it you need a strategy first on how it’s going to fit into your plans. Without a strategy or clear plan on how to
leverage social media any training will be a waste of time, money and resources. Lastly, there is a generational
gap with the acceptance and understanding of what social selling is all about. The generation that fills the
decision maker roles right now grew up pre-internet and many of them see social media as a drastic waste of
time, mainly because how they see their own kids using it. The younger generations are the ones who have
grown up with social media and can’t imagine a life without it. Unfortunately, since some of the decision
makers still don’t really understand it or have a misperception of what it is and how it relates to business they
are hesitant to invest money in it.
John Barrows
@JohnMBarrows, Owner, j.barrows, LLC, Owner, Sales From The Streets

https://twitter.com/babettetenhaken
https://twitter.com/ReferralSales
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• 23 •
Social media training and enterprise collaboration tools still are thought to be sprinkles on the sales
methodology cupcake. Companies will buy yet another round of traditional sales training from yet another
vendor versus expanding the breadth and depth of the engagement tools available to their sales team. I’d say
we are long overdue for a paradigm shift in the ﬁeld of sales.
Babette Ten Haken
@babettetenhaken, Founder & President, Sales Aerobics for Engineers, LLC
Companies jump on the bandwagon without any social strategy. It's Ready, Fire, Aim. Many companies
believe that salespeople should just do their jobs and ﬁgure things out on their own. After all, isn't that why
we hired them?
Joanne Black
@ReferralSales, Founder, No More Cold Calling, LLC
Often times, the leaders with the budget don’t understand the impact social business approaches and
tools can make, and therefore the business needs can fall on deaf ears. An organization that is seeking to
integrate social sales strategies into their overall sales approaches should consider ensuring that leaders are
exposed to and skilled with digital collaboration. Once they understand the impact, they will be more likely
invest in training their sales professionals. Take the time to invest in social media training for all leaders and they
will shine the light for the organization to follow.
Vanessa DiMauro
@vdimauro, CEO and Chief Digital Officer, Leader Networks

https://twitter.com/ellis_connolly
https://twitter.com/jdavidmcneil
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• 24 •
In an ever connected world, transactional sales cycles will get shorter and shorter as future customers
want access to information to digest at their own pace and interest level, then engaging when they are closer
to making a decision. Forecasting will become a bit more challenging because of this, but with the influx of
accessible data, it will eventually become extremely accurate. Companies need to understand where their
buyers are going be in the future and create amazing content strategies in those channels. And... hire great
people. Sales is not easy. Extreme highs when the blue birds close and manic lows when you lose that RFP
that your team invested six months into. Make it count.
Ellis Connolly
@ellis_connolly, Executive Vice President, Americas, TrustYou, GmbH
As technology advancements continue to put more and more power in the hands of buyers vs. sellers, it
will be imperative for salespeople to be present on the channels where their potential customers are most
interested in speaking with them. It will also be to their advantage if they are able to pinpoint the exact
moments of need when their customers are most interested in a product and having a conversation about it.
With that knowledge, salespeople will then be able to provide customers with an unprecedented level of
customized value.
David McNeil
@jdavidmcneil, VP of Sales Strategy and Operations, HubSpot
Summing It Up
These days it appears that B2B buyers are firmly in the driver’s seat. Well-equipped with Google search, social forums,
and easy access to trusted peers and industry thought leaders, buyers prefer to discover answers themselves,
completing some 60 to 80 percent of their decision process before contacting a single vendor.
Sales leaders are being held back by the belief that they have to react to technological change in order to keep up
with the buyer. But it’s not about reacting– it’s about anticipating. To borrow a page from Wayne Gretzky’s playbook:
good salespeople meet their buyers where they are; great salespeople meet their buyers where they are going to be.
To anticipate the buyer’s next move, salespeople must have better data about their buyer than their buyer has about
them and engage them with value-added content that helps further their decision-making process.
As Heinz Marketing president, Matt Heinz explains, buyers will not respond to a sales solicitation, but they will
respond to advice: “Help. A link to a best practice article. Someone who helps them discover and self-educate. The
source of that information has a leg-up in a sales process that hasn’t begun, but where the prospect is already
becoming qualified and establishing solution preferences.”
We asked some of the most successful sales pros to weigh in on the future of selling. This is what they said:

http://ctt.ec/98s6e+
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• 25 •
Sales professionals who have learned how to use social to take advantage of social data, insights and shared knowledge
signiﬁcantly outperform their sales peers. They close more deals and are more likely to meet or exceed quota.
An investment in social media training and sales collaboration tools is worth further exploration by sales team
decision makers. Additional training and relationship intelligence can mean stronger performance levels by high
achievers as well as those who meet quota and even those who tend to fall short.
We believe in creating content for you (not for us). So what did you think? Submit a 1-10 rating in a matter of
seconds. Your feedback will go directly to our content team.
In many cases, people can buy without a salesperson. While salespeople will never become obsolete,
there may be less of a need for them in B2C sales and in some B2B sales. Statistics show us that people have
done their homework before they talk to a salesperson. This means salespeople need to change. They need
to be more collaborative in their work and much more knowledgeable about how their product can impact
the person or company buying it. They need to do more research and stay current on what’s changing about
sales, their industry, and their customers’ industries. Their approach must be to help the customer make a
good decision, and not to sell their product. Personal brands become more important. If I am buying
something I don’t want to talk to a stranger. I want to Google that person and ﬁnd out what I can about them.
Salespeople need to become savvy about how they are showing up online.
Alice Heiman
@aliceheiman, Founder & Chief Sales Officer, Alice Heiman, LLC
1 10
2 9
3 8
4 7
5
Poor Excellent
Good
6

https://twitter.com/GregBarkerOnlin
https://twitter.com/shanegibson
https://twitter.com/DigitalKeith
https://twitter.com/lgomezperu
https://twitter.com/aliceheiman
https://twitter.com/HeinzMarketing
https://twitter.com/TheSalesHunter
https://twitter.com/careersingov
https://twitter.com/JackKosakowski1
https://twitter.com/JohnMBarrows
https://twitter.com/ReferralSales
https://twitter.com/saleshack
https://twitter.com/ellis_connolly
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• 26 •
Thank You To Our Panel Of Sales Experts
Joanne Black
@ReferralSales
Evan Carmichael
@EvanCarmichael
John Barrows
@JohnMBarrows
Owner
J.barrows, LLC, Sales From The Streets
Greg Barker
@GregBarkerOnlin
Business Development Industrial/
Mission Critical Fire Protection
J. F. Ahern Co.
Chad Burmeister
@saleshack
Vice President, Sales & Marketing
ConnectAndSell, Inc.
Founder
No More Cold Calling, LLC
Founder
Evan Carmichael Communications Group
Shane Gibson
@shanegibson
Author, Speaker & Sales Trainer
BuildDirect
Mark Hunter
@TheSalesHunter
Author,
Sales Consultant & Keynote Speaker
Matt Heinz
@HeinzMarketing
President
Heinz Marketing
Jack Kosakowski
@JackKosakowski1
Regional Sales Manager
Act-On Software, Inc.
Keith Gill
@DigitalKeith
Strategic Account Manager
Avisolve, LLC
Lorenzo Gomez
@lgomezperu
Business Development & Sales Manager,
Latin America
Inﬁnit Technology Solutions
Alice Heiman
@aliceheiman
Founder & Chief Sales Officer
Alice Heiman, LLC
Michael Hurwitz
@careersingov
President
Careers In Government, Inc.
Ellis Connolly
@ellis_connolly
Executive Vice President, Americas
Trust You, GmbH
Vanessa DiMauro
@vdimauro
CEO and Chief Digital Officer
Leader Networks

https://twitter.com/Mike_Kunkle https://twitter.com/davestei
https://twitter.com/geoffstuhr
https://twitter.com/babettetenhaken
https://twitter.com/eBizUniverse
https://twitter.com/gabevillamizar
https://twitter.com/JulioVisko
https://twitter.com/keithweightman
https://twitter.com/jdavidmcneil
https://twitter.com/CarlMuhlstein
https://twitter.com/ajrobinson2002
https://twitter.com/jill_rowley
https://twitter.com/chris_scarfo
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• 27 •
Carl Muhlstein
CarlMuhlstein
Keith Weightman
@keithweightman
David McNeil
@jdavidmcneil
VP of Sales Strategy & Operations
Hubspot
Mike Kunkle
@mike_kunkle
Sales Transformation Advisor, Writer & Speaker
:: transforming sales results ::
Jason Robinson
ajrobinson2002
Senior Vice President - Sales & Marketing
MarketBridge
Geoff Stuhr
@geoffstuhr
Specialty Care, Account Manager
GE Healthcare
Babette Ten Haken
@babettetenhaken
Founder & President
Sales Aerobics for Engineers, LLC
Tom Varghese
@eBizUniverse
CEO
eBizUniverse, Inc.
Managing Director
Jones Lang LaSalle
Account Executive
Bullhorn, Inc.
Jill Rowley
@jill_rowley
Jamie Shanks
@jamietshanks
Dave Stein
@davestei
Gabe Villamizar
@gabevillamizar
Julio Viskovich
Chief Evangelist & Founder
Jill Rowley
CEO
Sales for Life
Principal
Dave Stein, Inc.
Social Media Marketing Manager
HireVue, Inc.
Vice President of Marketing
rFactr
@JulioVisko
Christopher Scarfo
@chris_scarfo
Director of Sales
Impet Group, Inc.

http://ctt.e
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d5v+
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http://www.kitedesk.com/
http://asalesguy.com/
http://ww2.kitedesk.com/lp/thoreson-free-50.html
http://ww2.kitedesk.com/lp/practitioner-ebook-download.html
http://www.kitedesk.com/wp-content/uploads/Ultimate-Soc-Sales-Playbook1.pdf
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#LetsGetSelling
This research was developed by
The ﬁrst Sales Tool that ACTUALLY helps you sell.
PROSPECT. CONNECT. SELL.
The KiteDesk sales productivity platform gives sales teams access to millions of high-quality leads, plus
prospecting and relationship management tools that reduce prospecting time by up to 70 percent while
increasing overall efficiency and results.
Learn more about putting KiteDesk to work for your business.
Get 50 free leads a month for 6 months — 300 in total — from any of KiteDesk's premium data providers
when you sign up for KiteDesk today!
Download our eBooks, free!
Sales Secrets from The Most Successful Sales Professionals
The Ultimate #SocSales Playbook: Tips from 50 of the World’s Most Inﬂuential Social Sales Experts
In collaboration with
Helps sales organizations evaluate: your products, the industry, your market, quota, customers, pricing,
and more. Next, we will help you build your plan, one that ensures you meet your goals. At A Sales Guy
Consulting, we want you to have a killer plan, and more importantly, never let you into your car without
knowing where you are going, that’s just silly. A Sales Guy Consulting helps set up sales organizations,
sales team and sales processes for success.
Produced by Inc.

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