Public Relations & Social Marketing Insight

If you haven't started incorporating social media into your sales process, you're not alone. According to a survey from PeopleLinx, only 31% of sellers currently use social to sell.
But a quick look at the data backing social selling indicates that the trend will only get stronger in the years to come. For instance, 79% of salespeople who actively engage on social media outperform their peers, and over half of buyers consult social channels as part of their research processes -- up from 19% in 2012.

While there's no shame in not being a social seller today, salespeople who refuse to join the party will get left behind in the near future. Need some convincing? Check out the data in the following infographic from Sales For Life. Better to join the ranks of social sellers late than never.

In recent years, psychologists and behavioral economists have shown that our emotional decisions are neither irrational nor irresponsible. In fact, we now understand that our unconscious decisions follow a logic of their own.

They are based on a deeply empirical mental processing system that is capable of effortlessly processing millions of bits of data without getting overwhelmed. Our conscious mind, on the other hand, has a strict bottleneck, because it can only process three or four new pieces of information at a time due to the limitations of our working memory.

Social media has been traditionally known for it's "soft selling" approach, meaning most users are not online for the sole purpose of shopping and, therefore, they must be persuaded in a different way. What does that mean for you? How do you "sell" through social media without causing your followers and friends to get tired of your overly aggressive tactics? The answer is in what you post and how you post it. Learn more below about effective social media sales strategies you can use to increase sales and keep your audience happy.