Lead pipeline management for Engineering

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if you're in technical sales and you're  struggling or looking to increase your   ability to build out your pipeline then on this  episode we're going to be covering four tips   that i feel can definitely help you get  there and start dominating the pipeline the first thing we're going to  look at is intent and stages   so the intent behind why do you need to build  out your pipeline and some people on this maybe   maybe like dude i know why and i've been doing  this forever and i know why it's important i'm   just looking for some tips but there's a lot of  people that don't understand the importance of why   so the importance of why building out your  pipeline or why you should build out your pipeline   and continuously build out is a lot of times  people will fill out their pipeline they got   opportunities and they just sit and wait and i've  had so many conversations with people individually   companies where the sales people are waiting  around for things to happen and they're waiting   around for deals to get done and that just  doesn't work anything can happen i've been   in situations back in 08 when the market crashed  and automotive took a dump and i was in sales at a   plastics company and it we lost 35 of our business  overnight um and i was tasked to go and replace it   and that that was difficult back in 0-8 and so you  never know what's going to happen so you always   have to keep feeding the top of this funnel  and feeding this beast and building out your   pipeline never assume that any deal is done until  it's inked now the different stages of a pipeline   i've got my own look on it so a lot of people  say well oh i've got leads i look at a lead   a lead is just a name at a company it's no more  than that um a lead is not anything that is   substantial until it's been qualified so i say  all right we've got a lead the lead is a person   at a company that inquired or that we feel like  we could help them and and you guys feel like you   guys can help them and and so until we qualify  them they're just you know they're just kind of   a name on a list the next step is going to be  the prospect so once you've qualified them you   move them into that prospect phase and you've  done that initial conversation do they have   the budget do you have the services do do you  have something that will solve their problems   for you so you're qualifying them after you get  the contact or after they reach out to you as a   lead you qualify them they're a prospect once the  prospect then happens then i just typically say   it's going into a quote whether it's an rfq rfp  whatever it is once a quote is done and it's sent   then they move into the closing phase  so my process is simple it's lead   prospect quote sent and then closing the next  step for building on your pipeline is going to   be looking at your existing contacts and so many  veterans out there are people with big territories   or people that have been doing this for a while  are like dude i already know this existing context   yeah um everybody knows it but yet most people  don't do it and that's the issue so what i mean   by existing contacts it's not just people that you  know it's people that also know of your company   so looking at current customers looking at the  unsold which is anybody that you've quoted and   not closed and going back multiple years if their  current customer they always trust your brand   so that's a quick conversation you can have and  that's something that needs to be frequently had   multiple times a year don't just say oh these guys  are busy or i asked them six months ago you need   to be like following continuously following up put  them on a 90-day rotation hey just want to check   in see if there's anything you need from me if not  have a great rest of your week if your company is   set up to where once you close a deal and they're  a customer then it goes into account management   that's fine and that's common in industrial um  but that doesn't mean that you you still can't   hunt for new business from them because you still  are their sales person um and so following up with   them every 90 to 120 days there's nothing wrong  with that clients coming and being like yeah you   know what actually i do need something that  order that was supposed to ship didn't ship   um if you want to keep that trust and keep that  repeat business then you need to take care of   that and be that lead person the unsold is another  area that people often forget about and often miss   it's anybody you've ever quoted over the last few  years those are all viable opportunities that you   can re-circulate through and just reach out and  say hey look it's been a while since we last   talked what is it that what did you end up doing  with that project that we were talking about or   hey i'm new to the company i just got hired and i  saw that there was something that you were talking   with one of our sales guys about before but  wanted to see what else do you guys have going on   then you can look into other people like existing  contacts who knows you and who do you know anybody   at a trade show and i don't mean just people that  raised their hand and said i want to talk to you   about this opportunity i have a project for  you guys i'm talking about the lists of people   hopefully your marketing team did a good job and  they set up the booth and they also purchased   a list of attendees they're cold calls and  cold opportunities but they're still names   and they're they're an existing contact um they  may not know about you but you know about them   and so that's a that's a way to quickly build a  list is go and don't just look at it from the last   trade show two months ago or six months ago i  mean you can go back multiple years it's a cold   opportunity but everything's cold until you make  initial contact right i mean you can get tens of   thousands of contacts depending on how big your  company is very quickly the third step is going to   be hunting for new contacts so how do you do that  my favorite way to hunt for new contacts is going   to be using linkedin for those of you that follow  the content you know i'm obsessed with linkedin   because it just works right now in the future if  it changes i'll be on to something else but it   works you can build out very significant lists and  campaigns and things like that by looking through   linkedin based on the filtering criteria now  years ago it used to all be in the basic linkedin   and then you had to pay premium you know the 59  bucks a month to get access to those filtered   uh searches and then recently in the last 12 to 16  months 18 months they change it to where now you   have to have sales navigator sales navigator but  sales navigator is an amazing tool it's worth the   79 because you can literally filter out everything  that you need to be able to find and build out a   list of accounts and people to go after so it's  like the holy grail of prospecting the industries   on linkedin are a little bit different they're  not the same as like the knicks codes and the   sic codes they've got their own industry list it's  about i think it's about 150 different industries   listed what you have to do is look at some of  your current customers look at companies you know   that you want to do business with you know  that you can provide a solution to them   and you want to get in contact with them and see  if you can have a conversation and then look at   what industry are they listed as on their company  page and reverse engineer that so do it with 10 20   companies see if you see a trend whether it's  mechanical or industrial engineering whether   it's you know mining and metals things like that  everybody's categorized a little bit differently   but but build out a quick industry list and then  go into linkedin sales navigator do a search i   would just say go industries and location and  maybe company size and then be able to add those   those companies those accounts into a lead list  it's a super simple process but oftentimes sales   people are like i don't know who to go after next  or i've got a new territory how do i find people   this is a quick way to do it the next area from  a data standpoint is going to be looking at zoom   info so some of you may have heard of zoom info  before we've used them for about six years on   and off you're roughly looking at around fifteen  thousand dollars a year to be able to export out   around ten thousand fifteen thousand contacts and  be able to search their database but if you're   looking for the best data sourcing tool of getting  contact information building out lists based on   job function industry all the sic codes things  like that zoom info is the best that's the only   one that i trust whenever our clients come to mfg  tribe that's what i would honestly say is the best   place for your money when it comes to that now  there's a caveat there do not use the list and   then just send out bs emails where you're like  hey uh you know buy from me um this is what we   do and doing the direct selling thing because like  i say in all my other videos and all of our other   content that stuff doesn't work anymore so you  have to reveal provide some sort of value so if   you want to grab a list from zoom info and say  hey joe this look at these uh last two articles   that we wrote i thought you get some value out of  it because it's relevant that's not gonna violate   anything and that's not gonna really piss anybody  off now if you're constantly doing that it might   but if you just go in for the direct sale  then you're definitely gonna piss people off   so the last area the fourth step is going to be  in the follow-up whether you're good great or in   between most sales people most technical sales  people don't follow up enough it can become a   very cumbersome process consistently following up  week after week after week sometimes getting no   return to your email no return to your phone call  don't always assume that people are just ignoring   you intentionally sometimes they have things going  on at work sometimes the project went on the back   burner they've got 147 emails that they're getting  in and so you you don't want to go into it like oh   they're just trying to ignore me you want to say  like they're probably busy and i'm going to keep   on following up the key is is do not use the  exact same method time after time after again   if you're only following up via email you might be  missing the opportunity because maybe your emails   are going to spam because you never know with with  all the company structures these days and i always   used to do this is i would always make a phone  call and send an email at the same time or if i   sent an email i would then call them and because  in your email after you call them and leave them   voicemail you can say hey i just left you a  voicemail i wanted to follow up on this project   and you can hit two methods right away with one  attempt and it's only going to take 60 seconds to   do this make a phone call and if they don't answer  leave them a voicemail and then send them an email   that's like a minute now if those aren't working  and what i mean by not working is not after   like six months not working i mean like after  you've done it a few times then you need to try   a different way you need to find them on linkedin  you need to do a cold visit if you're in the area   you have to change your approach you can't just  keep doing the same thing over and over again   but follow-up is really what separates the ones  that make it you know to the top and the ones   that stay just mediocre or just below it because  you've got these opportunities but you're not   following up enough and if you're resting on  your laurels and you're like i'm i'm going to   rely on this opportunity to drive drive my  pipeline and drive my revenue up and hit my   sales quota you're just relying on that one then  you're going to fail um sometimes you strike a big   and you hit one out of the park and that kind of  keeps the bosses happy for a while but if you're   aggressive and you're really looking to build out  your own you know personal wealth and income and   revenue for the business and put your name behind  it then you don't just want one of those you want   20 of those it all comes down to the follow-up  the last point that i would make is that when   you are going after companies and you're building  out these lists don't just look for the whales and   sharks and the biggest companies that are going to  do the most for you you have to look at everybody   in between so big companies are going to have  a big opportunity for you and big dollars spent   is great and you should have those people in your  in your pipeline and on your list of people to go   after so you still want to be going after smaller  companies because sometimes the bigger companies   take a while for the process to go through and for  you to get approved as a vendor or to get approved   to whatever it is that you're selling purchase  your product it can take a while whether it's the   paperwork or the approval process or whatever it  is and sometimes those medium-sized companies are   going to be able to push it through faster so you  have to look at all three areas of big medium and   small go after all three of those different types  of companies all at the same time you're not just   going after one hyper-focused niche within a niche  of revenue and only going after the big players   you have to spread it out because if you work  for uh work as part of a larger sales team when   there's 20 30 50 people there um they are going to  eventually probably cut you if you're not closing   deals you're only only focusing on whales you  got to go after sharks and fish too and i've   got a whole video about it breaking it down on  youtube you've made the commitment to build out   this pipeline you're trying to go after these  companies but don't just whale hunt there are   opportunities that are in between the small guys  and the big guys that can really get you there   so if you feel like there is some value in this  then please just share it hit the like button give   me some thumbs up on linkedin share it out through  youtube tell your friends about it whatever it is   what i'm trying to do is just help as many  people as possible whether it's industrial   marketing industrial sales technical sales  things like that stay tuned um subscribe   to the youtube channel share with everybody  you know and we will see you on the next one