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11 LinkedIn Sales Navigator Tips for Better Prospecting

Sep 13th, 2017

To be an effective sales enablement leader, you need to be able to think like a sales rep. Part of doing that well includes knowing how to effectively use all of the tools and technology that reps use in their day-to-day.

One of the most important tools that sales reps use is LinkedIn Sales Navigator. This tool, which is a membership option within LinkedIn, helps reps prospect key leads and accounts through the ability to monitor their activities and look for similar contacts to reach out to. The more you know about Sales Navigator, the more you can motivate your reps to take advantage of it for social selling purposes.

Here are 11 LinkedIn Sales Navigator tips that your sales reps should use for better prospecting.

1. Save leads and accounts that you want to monitor

sales navigator filters for prospecting

Sales Navigator allows reps to save individual contacts or organizations that may be in their pipeline. These leads will then be displayed in their Sales Navigator news feed – which has a few more bells and whistles than their regular LinkedIn feed. Reps can filter their feed updates by top leads or accounts, or most recent updates. Think of it as your reps’ New York Times for their pipeline. They can stay up to date on any major changes or news going on in their lead’s organization or role, such as when someone is promoted or when a company announcement is posted.

  2. Set alerts by type

While saving leads and accounts is a critical first step, reps can take this one step further by setting alerts that will trigger a follow up. For example, you can set an alert by job type, and Sales Navigator will alert you if one of your leads has a new job. This will let your rep know that they need to look for a new main point of contact at that organization.

  3. Use filters to find more targeted leads

This is a critical tip for reps that focus on certain territories or industries for their book of business. For example, if you focus on marketing directors in the technology industry on the west coast of the United States with a company size greater than 500 people, you can filter by those criteria. Type ‘marketing director’ in the keyword search, and select filters for geography, industry, company size, or department size.

Some other options would be to segment leads by job title, function, or even alma mater. Reps can use criteria such as an alma mater as a conversation starter. “I see you went to the University of Minnesota. Go Golden Gophers!”

  4. Save searches to save time

LinkedIn Sales Navigator  prospecting tips

Once your reps have created a targeted search to find their ideal prospects, it’s a pain to have to enter all the search terms again. Simply select the ‘save search’ icon the top left corner of your search panel to save your search so you can easily pick up where you left off.

  5. Use Sales Spotlights to narrow your search

Sales Spotlights appear at the top of your search results page after you run a search and highlight prospects who are more likely to engage with you.  For example, you might see 68 people that have changed jobs in the last 90 days, or that 100 people follow your company on LinkedIn. Simply click on one of the spotlight boxes, and a list of those leads will appear. These will be the lowest hanging fruit for your sales reps.

Sales Navigator Sales Spotlight

  6. Leave notes to remember important details

Prospects appreciate sales reps that add a personal touch to their outreach. Sales navigator allows you to save notes or add tags to leads to remember important details like whether they are a decision maker or personal details like “Joe loves wine from Southern California.” Those smaller details can come in handy when a lead is celebrating a job anniversary or a new role and your rep wants to send a personalized note.

  7. Perform a ‘bluebird search’

LinkeIn Sales Navigator Search Filters

A ‘bluebird search’ refers to leads that were happy customers of yours once upon a time, but they are now at a new organization and you want to get back in touch with them. Reps can use the “past not current” filter to find these leads. For example, if you know that LinkedIn was a client that raved about your product, your reps can select the company name “LinkedIn” and select “past not current” from the dropdown to find former employees of LinkedIn who may want to do business with you in their current roles.

  8. Find similar prospects

Sales Navigator makes it easy to find similar prospects with the ‘view similar’ button. Once you find an ideal prospect, simply select the dropdown and Sales Navigator will populate results with similar job titles and backgrounds at other companies.

  9. Apply TeamLink filter

Sales Navigator Teamlink

According to LinkedIn, you are five times more likely to get a meeting if you go in with a warm introduction rather than a cold one. Sales Navigator’s TeamLink connections filter allows you to see all warm leads – those that you have a second-degree connection with – once you turn on the setting at the top of your search filters.  

Rather than reaching out directly to that lead, reps should reach out to the connection they have in common. Then they should ask if the lead would be willing to make an introduction.

  10. Send InMail to leads

InMail is LinkedIn’s version of an email or direct message. This is an effective way for reps to communicate with leads, given that the average person likely gets much fewer InMail every day than they do emails.

To maximize the effectiveness of InMail, reps should do a full review of the lead’s profile and engage with any updates they’ve shared recently. For example, if a lead recently shared an article on account-based selling, your rep can share their comments on the article and highlight how they can help.

   11. Optimize LinkedIn profile

Last but definitely not least, sales reps need to optimize their LinkedIn profiles in order to maximize their effectiveness on Sales Navigator. Their profile is not only a representation of their personal brand, but also a representation of your organization. Sales enablement leaders can help reps accomplish an optimized profile by scheduling sessions for professional headshots, creating a profile checklist, and providing sample copy for reps to include on their profiles.

Images in this blog are credited to business.linkedin.com.

For tips on how to create a sales enablement program that leads to mastery, download our free eBook, The Path to Sales Mastery.