4 B2B Prospecting Signals that Power Aggressive Pipeline Growth

I don’t think anyone ever claimed that prospecting for new B2B leads is an easy task. At any given time, it can be a difficult to know the best prospects to reach out to. I recently had the pleasure of helping to organize a fantastic webinar on B2B sales prospecting. Panelist Ben Sardella, co-founder of Datanyze, revealed some incredibly actionable tips for identifying when to reach out to prospects.

Watch the B2B Prospecting Code webinar on demand for free.

From our webinar (which is now available to watch on demand), here are four signals that will help you discover when prospects are most sales-ready. We’ve also included an actionable prospecting tip for each, in order to help you hit the ground running!

Changes in Leadership

During Ben’s presentation, he revealed that reps should target accounts directly following changes in executive leadership. The reason is because new executives are often expected to make sweeping changes. Best of all, they usually have the budget to do so.  So if you contact new executives shortly after they’re hired, they’ll be far more inclined to invest in new services and technology in order to make good on their mandate for change.

Actionable prospecting tip: Be sure to follow your contacts on LinkedIn to see when they’ve moved into new roles. If you use LinkedIn premium, you can even follow role changes for outside-of-network contacts.

Closing a Funding Round

If a company closes a nice funding round, chances are that they are going to have some additional budget to play with. Companies that may have once brushed you off may, all of a sudden, be ready to do business. Ben recommended prospecting into an account right after they close a round (not the same day, but shortly thereafter). As he pointed out, things might be crazy immediately after a company closes a round, but you should be persistent because a budget is likely to open up.

Actionable prospecting tip: You can find recently funded companies by perusing AngelList, Crunchbase and VentureBeat. 

Asking Questions on Quora

Every day, there are almost certainly decision makers on Q&A site Quora asking about either your product or a similar product. Asking about a solution on Quora is a sure-fire signal that a prospect is worth reaching out to. Ben revealed that After a few months of answering questions on Quora, Datanyze was able to source 41 leads in a month from Quora (5 of which turned into opportunities).

Actionable prospecting tip: In order to get started using Quora for lead generation, use Feedly to follow Quora topics that relate to your product and industry. 

Product Renewals

Imagine that a you lost a deal with a prospect to a competitor and then they sign a one-year contract with that competitor. As that year draws to a close, it’s quite possible they might be having some second thoughts. As contracts come to a close, it is one of the best time to reach out. They may be more open than ever to discussing ways that your solution can add greater value.

Actionable prospecting tip: Datanyze can help you identify when prospects’ technology contracts are set to expire. 

For more incredibly actionable prospecting signals, The B2B Prospecting Code The B2B Prospecting Code: Secrets for Aggressive Pipeline Growth on demand for free.