If you’re reaching out to companies to try and get new business for your product or service, it can be a bit of a minefield deciding who to contact. Sourcing the companies you want to target is easy. Or, at least it should be if you’ve done your homework and know what problem your product or service solves and who would benefit most from that. That’s not the tricky part. The tricky part is exactly who to reach out to. With a little bit of research on LinkedIn, it’s easily possible to find the names and the contact details of people who work for an organisation but after sifting through all the job titles, who should you be paying particular attention to?
The Owner
In most situations, this would make sense right? If someone wanted to contact your business trying to sell a product or service, they’d try to get hold of you. The problem is, in this world of multinationals, the owner is incredibly difficult to get hold of. There are a million things that the owner has to do and spending time talking to someone they’ve never met before isn’t one of them. There is of course also the very real possibility that the owner no longer works in the business. They may have left the running of the business in the hands of a trusted employee and are enjoying the profits without having to put in the long hours.
CEO
Again, this person is super busy and not open to unsolicited contact. It’s also worth bearing in mind that they are probably not an expert in your field and it may actually be counter-productive to pursue them. That’s because if you get an outright ‘no’ from the CEO it’s going to be very difficult to get anyone else to let you try again. With this in mind, it’s probably convenient that CEOs are so difficult to get hold of. More often than not, the CEO is protected by gatekeepers that are part PA and part dragon. It’s their job to ensure that you stay away from their boss and given that they’ve gone to these lengths, you probably should stay away.
Procurement Officer
Now we’re getting somewhere. It’s the procurement officers’ job to look out for things that the company needs and acquire them. So, if you can arrive as the solution, you make their job a lot easier and this could be a good way in. It won’t be a deal there and then of course and it will in fact probably take several rounds with different people to get to the stage of actually thrashing out the details. If you see this job title in your LinkedIn research, make a note of their name, you’re going to want to speak to this person.
Department Heads
Now, the department head is likely to know what the company actually needs more so than anyone we’ve already spoken about. That’s because they are effectively on the ‘factory floor’. All the people above them see is that work wasn’t done but the department head can tell you why work wasn’t done and if your solution solves that problem, you’re in a very good place. The department head will have people above them who will need convincing but they will be listened to and as an inside person, can reach levels of the hierarchy that it’s almost impossible to do from the outside. Be prepared for the fact that you may have to do a proof of concept at each upward stage of your negotiations but if this ends in a good sale then it will all have been worthwhile.
Your Network
Don’t forget that you probably already know people who could get you an introduction to any company you’re interested in. It could be an ex-colleague, a friend or a family member but always remember that an introduction is worth a hundred cold calls. And, if the introducer has a strong influence within the company it may open more doors for you and provide you with more opportunity than any other route.
The alternative to doing this yourself of course would be to use Aexus’ SDRaaS (Sales Development Representative as a Service). Whether you’re scaling to the Americas, within Europe or the APAC region, our SDRs are local to the territory, speak the language and know the market. What’s more, they understand how to get things done and come armed with a list of contacts that means they’ll be able to quickly identify genuine prospects for your business.
To find out more, get in touch. We’re always happy to jump on a call.