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Sep 07, 2023 Anna Troidl

Boost Social Selling Success With Sales Navigator Analytics

The statistics on the effect using LinkedIn Sales Navigator has on sales performance are impressive. When salespeople use the platform, on average they have:

  • +59% total revenue influenced by Sales Navigator
  • +42% larger deal sizes when using Sales Navigator to connect with decision-makers
  • +15% more sales pipeline created when using Sales Navigator to find customers

Source: LinkedIn Sales Solutions

And because of impressive stats like these, buying licences for your sales team seems a no-brainer. After all who doesn’t want larger and more frequent deals closing.

 

Take A Data-Based Approach To Social Selling

At Tribal, we often work with businesses that are either at the start of their social selling journey or who have dabbled with social selling in the past and want to try a different approach to engage their team and scale their program. We guide and coach sales teams to adopt new behaviours, and routines and to look at social media platforms like LinkedIn through a new lens. We help drive change with our clients. At the heart of this change is data. While many businesses take a data-based approach to decision-making, how many can say that they truly take a data-based approach to their social selling?

A sometimes forgotten and overlooked source of data to boost social selling success is your Sales Navigator usage report. It’s not uncommon for the Sales Navigator licences and the LinkedIn relationship to be ‘owned’ by a separate team from the one leading a social selling initiative. Without the data, program leads are ‘flying blind’ and are missing an opportunity to make the most of their program and to ensure their organisation achieves a strong ROI on the licence investment. Because let’s face it, Sales Navigator is a great tool when it is utilised and utilised well. If the sales team doesn’t understand why and how they should be using this tool, it’s money down the drain.

 

Case Study: How Commvault Achieved 61% More Pipeline Via Social Selling

 

What Data Is Included In A Sales Navigator Usage Report

If you’re unfamiliar with the wealth of data you can access, here are a few headlines. To start with, your report is accessible by anyone who has administrator access to your LinkedIn Sales Navigator account and if you’re leading a program, you want to have reporting access. If you don’t know, be sure to request it from the LinkedIn relationship owner in your organisation. You’ll get a view of several metrics demonstrating how your team is using Sales Navigator, such as:

  • Number of Days Active
  • Profiles Viewed
  • Searches Performed
  • Leads & Accounts Saved
  • InMails Sent
  • InMails Accept Rate
  • Connections
  • Smart Links Created
  • Smart Links Viewed
  • SSI score

Your usage report can be accessed at any time and has filters to show data for a specific user or group of users. You can also create a custom date range to analyse data and activity over your chosen period. So, say, for example, that you’ve tagged your company’s LinkedIn Sales Navigator users by geography, then you can pinpoint how one location’s performance compares to another or how a specific geography’s usage of the tool changes over time. This type of insight is invaluable when you’re looking at how to refine your social selling program and helps you make data-based decisions.

 

Boost Social Selling Success With Sales Navigator Analytics blog image 1

 

How To Use Your Sales Navigator Analytics To Drive Results

In addition to measuring specific user groups and measuring performance over time, here are 3 ways you can use your Sales Navigator usage report to enhance your social selling program.

  1. Create targeted training programs based on usage and effectiveness. Noticed your social sellers are struggling with their InMails acceptance rate? Maybe not many have created a Smart Link? Or perhaps they’ve saved hardly any leads? Look at how your sales team are using or not using the platform and develop masterclasses to deep dive into topics, share best practice, and build their confidence.

  2. Identify your super-users and make them your champions. You’ll likely have a few standouts who will dive in and embrace Sales Navigator without any prompt or push from you. They’ll test all the features and become expert users on their own because they’re interested and keen to get going. Reach out to these super-users and see if they can help you champion social selling within your organisation, sharing their knowledge and enthusiasm with their peers.

  3. Use it or lose it. Not everyone will embrace social selling and therefore not everyone will benefit from a Sales Navigator licence. Keep tabs on who’s using the platform and making the most of its features. If it’s not right for your seller, you can offer the licence to someone else within your organisation.

 

At Tribal we understand the positive impact of social selling. When sales teams are trained and coached to confidently embrace digital sales techniques. Sales Navigator is a fantastic tool that can help your salespeople connect with the right individuals at your target accounts in a time-efficient way. While there are no shortcuts to social selling success, there are ways to accelerate your results, one of which is squeezing bags of insight from your Sales Navigator data to guide your program along the way.

Editor's Note: This blog was originally published in 2021 and has been completely refreshed and updated to be relevant for 2023.

 

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About Tribal Impact

Tribal Impact is a B2B Social Selling and Employee Branding Agency.

We're a team of social media strategists, trainers, coaches, content creators and data analysts who are passionate about helping our B2B customers develop and scale their social selling and employee advocacy programs.

Learn more about us here.

Published by Anna Troidl September 7, 2023
Anna Troidl