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Wondering whether or not someone is likely to buy a product or service from you? A verbal buying signal can help you take the guess work out of the equation. While there are some that are easy to spot, others might be a little harder to gauge. In this blog post, we'll explore the role of a strong buying signal in the buying process, why they're important and how you can gauge purchase intent.
What is a buying signal in the sales process?
A buying signal, otherwise known as purchase intent, indicates how likely someone is going to buy a product or service from you. Gartner suggests that by 2025, 80% of B2B sales interactions between suppliers and buyers will occur in digital channels such as LinkedIn. Which means that sales teams won't be the primary source of information for buyers.
Are buying signals different across sales and marketing teams?
The short answer is yes. But only slightly as there is some overlap. Which means that sales teams will have to work with marketing teams as they navigate the change in the customer buying journey.
What is the difference?
In marketing, buying intent revolves around a potential customer downloading content, signing up for a webinar, or engaging with a paid-ad. In sales, buying signals can be taken from behavioural or verbal cues and data from past sales to help them understand when someone is likely to make a purchase.
Why are buying signals important?
Spending time with the right lead is important. Gartner research suggests that B2B buyers only spend 17% of their time with potential suppliers. Which suggests that by the time they hop on a demo call with you, they're likely to be considering other options, too. If you've got a lot of leads coming in, and not a lot of time, buying signals can be a handy way to prioritize the leads you should be spending time on.
8 Common buying signals examples to look out for
Below are eight types of buying signals that show signal someone's potential purchasing decision.
1. Booking a demo
If someone books a demo via a cold message you've sent them on LinkedIn, they're already aware of your product and are keen to check it out. Making this a strong buying signal. Your sales professionals will need to understand their pain points in order to show them how your product can solve their problem. During the call, listen out for any verbal cues so that you can adapt and keep the call engaging.
2. Signing up for a free trial
If someone signs up for a free trial, chances are they're comparing your product against a few others on the market. And yours made the short list. They'll be making use of the free trial to suss out your product against common criteria such as user experience, price and plans and scalability.
3. Downloading gated content
A lead generation strategy is a plan to get prospective customers to share emails with you and opt-into sales or marketing communications. Your content plan might mean that you've gated some content behind forms, which means that prospective customers can only access this content by filling out a form which often involves them sharing their contact information. This is called gated content. Usually, lead magnets such as white papers or guides are gated.
4. Interacting with a brand on social media
As part of your content marketing strategy, you might host regular webinars online. These webinars act as a lead magnet, bringing you warm leads.
5. Asking about prices
If someone inquires about the prices of your product or service, chances are they might be considering it and have done their research. This is classified as verbal buying signals and is a great opportunity to offer them to offer a discount as an incentive to potential customers.
6. Asking about payment methods
Asking about payment options is another buying signal to show that they're close to completing the buying process. Make sure that you have some marketing material that can explain any flexible payment plans your company offers. You might want to include options such as flexible payment plans.
7. Live chat engagement
When someone interacts with your live-chat bot and wants to engage in a real-time conversation, this can be viewed a verbal buying signal. If you are unable to respond immediately, make sure that you have some clear action points for them should they have to wait, such as capturing their email address so your team can get back to them and how long your estimated response time is.
8. Product comparison
Don't be intimidated by anyone actively comparing your product or service. This is a buying signal, and your chance to help shine. Make sure your website is ready by having comparison pages that you can send leads to, and use this chance to book a demo so that you can use that time with them to address any reservations they may have.
How to identify buying signals on LinkedIn
As you can see, there are quite a few common examples you can lean on if you're trying to gauge someone's buying intent. But what about identifying buying signals from your LinkedIn community? Here are a few you should keep an eye on:
- Engagement: Does someone often engage with your LinkedIn posts either by liking them, or commenting on them? This demonstrates brand affinity. You can turn them into warm leads, and add these to your CRM. There's a way to export LinkedIn post, comments and likes so that you can leverage tools such as a CRM to track and analyze their behaviour.
- Webinar sign-ups: Similar to the example of common buying signals above, signing up to your webinar on LinkedIn is a strong buying signal for your sales and marketing teams.
- Product or service enquiries: Pay attention to customers who may have any specific inquiries about your product so that you can address these again later during a demo call.
Conclusion
Now that you're familiar with buying signals, don't be intimidated the next time you know someone is comparing your product or service. You now know exactly what to expect and action points you should take based on the examples of common verbal buying signals we've shared. You also know how your team can make better contributions on LinkedIn, especially if their LinkedIn posts tend to get good engagement. You've got this!
More resources from our LinkedIn series
Looking for more resources? Check out these blog posts full of tips and tricks on how to optimize your outreach on LinkedIn.
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