Crafting a distinct approach to each scenario and facet of your sales process helps set an exceptional sales team apart from a great one. In today's competitive market, prospects have become increasingly knowledgeable and adept in navigating their options, necessitating a more personalized and detailed cadence. Outbound prospecting encompasses a sequence of touch points or interactions designed to forge connections, build trust, and ultimately convert prospects into customers.
The importance of an outbound prospecting cadence in sales is rooted in its ability to optimize and amplify the chances of success. By adhering to a structured cadence, sales teams can ensure that they are connecting with prospects at the right time, with the right message, through the right channel. It also helps to establish a consistent and repeatable process that can be refined over time based on data and results. In this post, we’ll outline relevant details and examples of outbound prospecting cadences to help your team see success.
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Outbound prospecting is defined as prospecting that targets brand new accounts that have no prior relationship with your company. A well-designed outbound prospecting cadence can empower sales teams to:
Enhance efficiency and productivity.
Elevate engagement and response rates.
Cultivate relationships and trust.
Gather valuable data and insights.
In contrast to outbound prospecting, inbound prospecting involves targeting companies that are already demonstrating an interest in you through marketing. Outbound prospecting and inbound prospecting share a lot of best practices in common. In this blog, we will focus on what you need for a successful outbound prospecting campaign. Inbound lead generation however, is still vital to a company’s success so your team should still have an omni-channel marketing strategy to attract prospects across multiple marketing channels.
To devise an outbound campaign that caters to your unique requirements and effectively generates leads, ultimately boosting sales, consider the following steps:
Define your target audience: Determine the characteristics of your ideal customers, including details like their industry, company size, job titles, and location.
Build a high-quality prospect list: Use various tools, such as LinkedIn, to build a list of potential leads that align with your target audience.
Craft a compelling message: Create an email and voicemail templates that communicate the value of your product or service to your prospects. The message should be personalized, relevant, and concise. The email and voicemails should also be dissimilar in that if you leave a message and send an email, they aren’t identical.
Employ multiple channels: Engage with your prospects through diverse channels such as email, phone, social media, and direct mail. This will increase your chances of getting a response.
Follow up consistently: Send follow-up emails or make phone calls to keep your product or service at the forefront of your prospects' minds. Persistence is key in outbound prospecting.
Assess your results: Track your campaign's performance by monitoring key metrics such as response rates, open rates, and conversion rates. Use this data to refine your strategy and optimize your campaign.
Continuously improve: Regularly analyze the results of your outbound prospecting campaign and make adjustments based on your findings. Experiment with varying messaging, channels, and timing to improve your results.
Whether you are building an outbound prospecting campaign for a new team or refining the processes for an existing outbound team, there are a few different types of sales activities to consider. It is also important to remember that the optimal number and type of activities for outbound prospecting campaigns will be unique for your team. You may want to consider this compilation of statistics from Hubspot when crafting your campaign to ensure your team is focusing their efforts on areas that get results.
The first step in outbound prospecting is to create a profile for your typical prospect and customer. Here are some questions to consider:
What time zone do your prospects sit and are they geographically different?
What size of company do you typically target – SMB, mid-market or Enterprise?
What industries are your target accounts in?
What job level does your typical prospect have – C-level, VP, director, manager, etc.?
What job responsibilities does your typical prospect hold – Sales, marketing, IT, operations, HR, etc.?
How many attempts do you have to make on each outbound channel to get a response from a prospect?
Answers to these questions will help you determine the cadence for your outbound prospecting campaigns. Outbound prospecting cadence is defined by the types of prospecting channels you use and the frequency with which you reach out to your prospects using those channels.
Prospects in some industries might be less likely to have a social media presence. Some might be less likely to answer the phone but are very responsive to email and vice versa. Use those questions above to figure out how your prospects like to be reached.
Once you have determined the preferred channels for your prospects, the next step is to construct a formal outbound prospecting cadence. Based on the factors mentioned earlier, your outbound prospecting cadence may include these prospecting channels:
Social media messages
Phone calls
Voicemails
Emails
Break down the outbound prospecting cadence into daily activities, which may include a combination of different sales actions in one day. You should also specify the exact number of times each method should be employed. For example, email prospects and leave a voicemail on the same day. It is important to diversify your outreach channels and not rely on one type of channel in your outbound prospecting cadence. Your initial outreach message should be concise, personalized, and focused on the prospect's pain points and needs. Refrain from using generic or overtly sales-driven language.
As you move closer to obtaining a calendar commitment, tailor your messaging to the prospect's specific needs and pain points. Highlight the benefits and outcomes of your solution, instead of solely focusing on the features. Whenever possible, incorporate customer testimonials and case studies to demonstrate the success of your solution and foster trust with the prospect. It’s essential to offer a clear next step or call-to-action for the prospect, such as a demo or trial, and facilitate the process of moving forward with your product or service.
Prior to securing the prospect's commitment, attempt to anticipate any objections or concerns they may have. Be prepared to address them in the same manner you have created cadence, with a personalized and trustworthy approach. Depending on the industry, you may develop urgency by highlighting the consequences of not taking action. Once the appointment is secured, follow up promptly with the prospect to ensure a smooth transition and ask additional qualifying questions.
Overall, an effective outbound prospecting strategy requires a systematic and consistent approach that's tailored to the specific needs and pain points of your target audience. By adhering to the best practices outlined above, you can optimize your outreach initiatives and increase your chances of success.
As you analyze your buyers and answer the initial questions in this process, it’s common for patterns to emerge. These patterns naturally begin to form segments, which are a crucial part of forming your sales cadence plan when outbound prospecting.
Segment-based cadences are structured sequences of touch points that are designed for specific segments of a target audience. Some common ways to divide these segments include:
Industry: Focusing on businesses in a particular industry, such as tech, healthcare, or finance.
Company Size: Targeting small, medium, or large enterprises.
Geography: Customizing outreach based on the location of the prospect.
Responsibilities/Title: Crafting messages for decision-makers like CEOs, managers, or specific departments.
Behavioral Triggers: Engaging prospects based on their actions, like visiting a website, downloading a resource, or attending an event.
When establishing segments, your goal should be to align the content, messaging, and frequency of touch points with their specific needs and preferences. This approach also serves as a foundational way to experiment for A/B testing and better understand what resonates with potential customers. By gathering information, you can further delineate from a one-size-fits-all approach and enhance the effectiveness of your prospecting cadence.
Once you have refined your segments, the next step is to plan the spacing and timing of your outreach. While it might seem easier to standardize these two factors throughout your prospecting funnel, investing time and effort in this approach will pay off in the long run.
Effective spacing and timing ensure that outreach efforts are persistent but not overwhelming. Consider that emails sent mid-week (Tuesday to Thursday) often have higher open rates, and mornings can be a good time for phone calls. Here are a few other aspects to focus on:
Highly engaged prospects (e.g., those who open emails frequently or interact with content) may require more frequent follow-ups. In contrast, less engaged prospects may need more spaced-out communications.
For industries with longer sales cycles, outreach cadences can be extended over weeks or even months. In contrast, shorter, more intensive cadences are better suited to faster sales cycles.
The ideal timing can vary by channel. For example, emails might be spaced a few days apart, while phone calls may be scheduled daily. Social media touch points can occur more frequently but are less direct.
The example below illustrates a well-crafted outbound prospecting cadence. Note that the frequency of calls and messages, as well as the utilization of tools like local presence during calls, will be contingent upon the industry and persona to which you sell to.
Week 1:
Day 1: Give your prospect a call, and if they don’t pick up, send an email
Day 3: Call, and if they don’t pick up, leave a voicemail
Week 2:
Day 1: Send a LinkedIn message and connection request
Day 4: Call and leave a voicemail
Week 3:
Day 2: Call and send messages on social media like X if they have a professional presence there
Day 4: Call
Week 4:
Day 1: Leave a voicemail
Day 3: Send another follow-up email with more in-depth content on your product or service
Day 5: Call
Day 1: Introduction Email
Subject line: Introduction and a Question
Body: Briefly introduce yourself and your company, and ask a question related to the prospect's pain point. Keep the email short and sweet.
Day 3: Follow-up Email
Subject line: Quick Follow-Up
Body: Mention the previous email and ask if the prospect had a chance to think about the question. Provide additional information or resources related to the pain point.
Day 7: Value-Added Email
Subject line: Value-Added Email
Body: Provide valuable information or a resource related to the prospect's pain point. This could be a blog post, a case study, or a whitepaper.
Day 10: Personalized Video Email
Subject line: Personalized Video Message
Body: Record a personalized video message addressing the prospect's pain point and offering a solution. Keep the video short and to the point.
Day 14: Closing Email
Subject line: Final Follow-Up
Body: Mention the previous emails and ask if the prospect is ready to take the next step. Provide a clear call-to-action and offer to schedule a call or meeting.
If you execute an outbound prospecting cadence similar to either of these examples, but you are unsuccessful in scheduling a meeting with a prospect, the next step is to pass the contact back to marketing. Allow those prospects to be nurtured via marketing touches. When the time is right, a marketing email may resonate with the prospect, at which point it makes sense to pursue them with an outbound prospecting cadence again.
Prospects know that you aren’t just reaching out to them with your solution but a large pool of other potential clients. We’ve all read through what is clearly a standardized email that lacks personality and is deleted as fast as it is received. To avoid this within your own outbound prospecting campaign, personalization is key to increasing engagement and response rates.
In a crowded marketplace, personalized outreach helps differentiate your message and demonstrates a deeper understanding of the prospect's needs and challenges. Some simple ways to personalize your outbound prospecting include:Use personalized subject lines that include the prospect’s name, company, or specific detail relevant to them.
Reference recent news about the prospect’s company, such as a new product launch, a funding round, or a company milestone.
Highlight any mutual connections or common networks, such as shared LinkedIn contacts or industry groups.
Create short, personalized video messages that introduce yourself and briefly explain how you can help solve a specific challenge.
Not every sales team has the time or resources to maintain a human touch with their prospecting cadence. At some point, leveraging automation just makes sense to streamline your process. But how do you know when to keep that human touch and when to hand it off to automation or AI? It’s all about your audience segments.
High-value prospects typically warrant more attention. By tailoring cadences to these specific segments with a human touch, you increase the chances of engaging prospects because the messages are more relevant to their business context and challenges.
For less promising prospects, try starting out on the personalized and human route, then gradually incorporating automation. Reminder emails 2 or 3 days later don’t have to have the same level of information or detail and can be canned in nature.
Sales cadence requires refinement and shifting based on various data points. With Segment-based cadences, you can accurately measure the impact of personalization and help your sales teams refine their strategies based on what works best for each segment.
These campaigns take time to perfect and can certainly have some learning curves involved along the way. Learning from mistakes enables you to identify what works and what needs refinement. If you encounter any of the obstacles listed below, take the time to reevaluate your strategy.
Salespeople may make the mistake of jumping straight into outreach without sufficient preparation and research. This can result in a generic or irrelevant message that fails to resonate with the prospect. Allocate time to research and tailor your message to address each prospect’s specific needs and pain points.
Another common mistake is using a generic approach to outreach. This can come across as impersonal and un-engaging, leading to poor response rates. So, personalize your outreach as much as possible, using the prospect's name, company, and other relevant details.
Outreach messages that appear pushy or aggressive can deter prospects and damage potential relationships. Instead, focus on building a connection first, and provide value in your outreach messages with resources, insights, or other beneficial information.
Following up with prospects is a critical component of outbound prospecting, and failing to do so means missed opportunities and lost deals. So, use a consistent follow-up cadence that's persistent but not pushy. Provide additional value to keep the prospect engaged and interested.
Finally, neglecting to monitor and analyze data can hinder sales reps from optimizing their outreach strategy and improving their results over time. As a solution, use a tracking tool to monitor your outreach efforts and gather data on response rates, conversion rates, and other key metrics. Use this data to refine your strategy and improve your results.
When developing your outbound prospecting team, start with learning about your prospect and your prospect’s industry. This will help you develop the unique outbound prospecting cadence needed to be successful.
The optimal outbound prospecting cadence can always change based on the business environment and industry. To continuously improve outbound prospecting, test your assumptions often, track your metrics, and adjust accordingly based on the numbers.
Keeping an eye on the data from your outreach efforts, such as email open rates, click-through rates, response rates, and feedback from calls, means you can stay ahead of pitfalls and identify trends early. What’s working, what isn’t, and where can you bridge the gap?
If prospects frequently raise certain objections or ask specific questions, adjust your approach to address these concerns proactively.
If prospects consistently respond to specific benefits or features, emphasize those more prominently.
If one segment shows interest in a particular value proposition, customize the information for similar prospects.
Throughout this blog, we’ve highlighted the guidelines for creating an outbound sales cadence strategy and how you can ensure your team is successful. A well-structured process is key when considering how to implement this process, and so is dedicating time to get to know your prospects, and the ways your products or services fit into their needs. Finally, diligent follow-ups play a critical role in keeping your brand at the forefront of prospects' mind. Perseverance during this process cannot be overstated.
Interested in training your team on how and when to contact prospects? Explore our comprehensive guide to sales prospecting based on an analysis of over 100,000 sales calls. We also offer a dedicated Sales Prospecting course designed to modernize traditional techniques, enhance your outbound sales cadence skills, and drive positive results for your team.
