LinkedIn Sales Navigator Q1 Update Helps Users Refine Their Virtual Selling Routines

The virtual selling train is showing no signs of slowing down anytime soon, and new features introduced in the first-quarter-2021 update to LinkedIn Sales Navigator reflect those realities. LinkedIn Sales Navigator director of product management Mitali Pattnaik said in a blog post Wednesday, “We each have our daily routines. For some of us, it might include working out, making coffee, walking the dog or all of the above. But, what’s your daily virtual selling routine? In connecting with many of you, we know that you are often bouncing between various workflows during the day—juggling key accounts, new leads, customer relationship management activities and so much more. That’s why we’re introducing new features this quarter that help you streamline your virtual selling routine and kick-start each day with a simple plan-of-attack: Upload your book of business, check out the insights on your accounts, visualize your accounts to better identify gaps in relationships, specifically with key decision makers, and then search for or save recommended leads.” “The biggest challenge that sellers will face this year is transitioning away from traditional hard-sell tactics and adopting a ‘trusted advisor' role,” Surge Flow Digital founder and LinkedIn consultant Natasha Vilaseca told Adweek. “With buyers having more and more choice, sellers need to make sure they connect with customers on their preferred channels of communication and are authentically helpful with their approach.” Addressing the quarterly update specifically, GZ Consulting analyst Michael Levy said, “Often, we look at a single release and try to analyze the significance of the new functionality in a vacuum, but this transition is a multi-release product shift. In the fourth quarter of 2020, LinkedIn added account list uploads to better understand a representative’s book of business, combined with CRM opportunities in lists, account outreach activity and expanded Account Alerts. The first-quarter release supports a redesigned account profile that enables account mapping, calls out employment trends and displays account-level alerts.” Starting this quarter, Team Edition customers can now import a CSV list of accounts into Sales Navigator to help them quickly get oriented with their book of business and identify opportunities based on aggregated LinkedIn activity such as connection requests, InMail, messages and Smart Link activity. Enterprise Edition customers already had access to these capabilities. The account page in Sales Navigator was redesigned to provide a comprehensive overview via real-time alerts and actionable insights, including account growth, the hiring of key decision makers and mentions in the news. New feature Account Map then allows Sales Navigator users to visualize key stakeholders, identify gaps and start building relationships with the right people in the buying committee. Pattnaik said users have been asking for a feature like Account Map, adding, “Sure, you might know someone, or even several people, at an account, but do you know the right people? Without a full view of who is in the buying committee and what those buyers need, you can end up wasting valuable time and even miss out on potential revenue.” “LinkedIn’s new Account Map feature is not only going to make prospecting easier, but it's also going to enable users to embrace buyer-first selling,” Vilaseca said. “Being able to access real-time trends and insights from one centralized place not only saves time, but also means your account-based marketing efforts are going to be easier than ever.” Levy added, “With Account Mapping, users can track demand units at accounts and identify the key stakeholders with simple drag-and-drop functionality.” Finally, Enterprise Edition users can now save new leads to their CRM systems directly through Sales Navigator lead pages or lead lists, eliminating the need to “bounce from one workflow to another,” as Pattnaik put it. “Virtual selling is developing week by week and, with that, we are seeing technology play a continually more important role,” Vilaseca said. “Having access to a tool like Sales Navigator helps users implement a buyer-first approach where they can effectively communicate with their prospects to build rapport and trust, ultimately resulting in more business.”

Platforms

LinkedIn Sales Navigator Q1 Update Helps Users Refine Their Virtual Selling Routines

The new Account Map feature makes it easier to zero in on key stakeholders

David Cohen

About

Subscriptions

Events

Publications

WORK SMARTER - LEARN, GROW AND BE INSPIRED.

Subscribe today!

David Cohen