Not only do podcasts offer numerous benefits over text- and video-based content—they are easy to create, convenient to consume, and they can expose new audiences to your brand— but by using an interview-based show format, your podcasts can also be fantastic social selling, networking and sales prospecting tools.
Why Do Interview Podcasts Work?
Think about it. People just love talking about themselves! Everyone knows that the best conversationalists are the people who say the least and ask the most. In the format of an interview podcast, that’s exactly what you’re doing. You’re saying very little and asking a lot of questions, which makes your guest the focus of the conversation.
By interviewing guests on your podcast, you have a built in opportunity to invite sales prospects, vendors, partners, and satisfied customers onto the show to have discussions about whatever your podcast covers. This allows you to shine a light on great vendors, strategic partners, and satisfied customers, creating a greater sense of attachment between those parties and your company.
How Can Podcasts Help You Prospect For Leads?
Interview-based podcasts are also great for new client sales prospecting. Nobody wants to try to call a prospect and say, “Hi, I’m Tom Martin, and I’d like to sell you something today.” But who among us would shy away from making this call?
“Hi, it’s Tom Martin. I have this great little podcast that I think you would be perfect for. Would you mind being a part of my show?”
That’s not a tough call to make. If the person doesn’t accept, you at least open a door that you can walk through at a later date with a more direct sales prospecting call. If the person does accept, you have the opportunity to build a relationship in a completely non threatening way. That’s the key to successful social selling — it’s not about making a sale today, it’s about starting a relationship that leads to a sale tomorrow or many tomorrows from now.
Even better, you can use your podcast as a platform to invite people you’d like to meet. In addition to sales prospects, this can include people with whom you want to network but who might never be a prospect for what you sell. These folks might be in companies that you don’t work with or organizations for which your product or service isn’t relevant, but they know people you would like to know and are excellent Social Agent candidates. And as any regular reader knows, I think Social Agents are the secret sauce of a successful social selling effort. By inviting these people into your podcast, you create an opportunity to have a really great first experience with them and create the opportunity for them to become social agents for your organization.
The Difference Between a Podcast Interview & a Sales Prospecting Call
Now instead of having to cold-call people to meet them, you get to spend 20–30 minutes with someone having a discussion that makes that person the hero. The key here is to make the prospect the highlight of the show. You want to entertain and inform your audience, but if you structure your questions correctly, you’ll actually be educating yourself in a way that could help you more effectively sell to the prospect.
Once a person has participated in your show, you have a perfect opportunity to do a follow-up call to say thank you for participating. You get to gush about how great the person was and tell say that you received awesome audience feedback. And now you have the beginnings of a relationship. You have contact information. You have the prospect’s email address. Most important, you have permission to use all of that as you nurture the relationship through email, phone, or social media.
The Single Biggest Reason to Podcast for Sales Prospecting
The networking and sales prospecting opportunities that podcasting afford you are the single most important reason everyone should consider adding audio and podcasting to their marketing toolkit. But remember—you can’t approach this strictly in the selfish networking mindset, or your effort will fail. You won’t develop an audience, which will make it difficult to convince prospects to come on the show—and that makes it hard to use podcasting as a prospecting tool. So keep in mind that core commitment, and produce a show that you’re proud to claim. If you do that, the prospecting and networking will take care of themselves.
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For more information on using podcasting as a sales prospecting tool and other social selling tips just like these, register for our FREE WEBINAR: The 7 Keys To Social Selling Success. We’re only holding 100 seats, so register now to start learning the secrets of social selling success in today’s self-educating buyer world.
