Sales Prospecting Methods

Most AEs fail on the phone for one simple reason: They’re cold calling people who’ve never heard of them. In 2025, that’s just lazy. Here’s how I would book executive meetings without sounding like a desperate sales rep: I used to teach cold calling techniques. Tonality. Pacing. Objection handling. And while that still matters... It’s not the reason I consistently get meetings with C-level buyers. The secret? I never cold call anymore. I warm call. Here’s how I do it: Step 1: Start with a personalized, relevant email. Do some quick research. Make it about them. For example, if I’m reaching out to a CRO, I’ll highlight a drop in quota attainment from RepVue and explain how I can help upskill their team in tough times. Step 2: That same day—a few hours later—I call their cell phone. (ZoomInfo or LinkedIn can get you that. No excuses.) DO NOT call the office. DO NOT waste time dialing assistants. If you can’t get a cell, send a LinkedIn connection request with a DM or video message. Step 3: When I call, I say: “Hi, this is Ian Koniak—did you happen to see the email I sent this morning?” If they say no: “No problem. I sent it because I saw your team’s quota attainment is down since 2022. I think I can help based on what I’ve done with other clients. Do you have a couple minutes now, or should we find time to connect on Zoom?” It’s not a pitch. It’s a reference to something you already sent that’s about them. That’s what makes it warm. Step 4: If they don’t respond, wait 2–3 days. Then reply to the original thread with more context: – Mention the training or workshops you offer – Share real results (e.g., 20% increase in quota attainment) – Ask: “Is this something you’d be open to learning more about?” Always lead with interest, not a hard ask for time. Step 5+: Stack 6–8 touchpoints total. Each one builds on the last—adding more insight, examples, testimonials. Mix in: – LinkedIn videos – Client stories – Relevant frameworks Each message = more value. That’s how you break through. It can take 8-12 touchpoints to get a meeting. Most reps quit after 1-3 touchpoints. Or worse—just send the same “following up” message. No value. No relevance. No shot. This process works. It’s not magic. It’s just real sales effort with a real strategy.

How I'd fill pipeline as an AE if I started fresh today. (Send this to your Slack group) Here is my plan: 1. Find Active Buyers The secret? Focus on prospects who posted in the last 30 days. Response rates are 2x higher from active profiles. Quick setup in Sales Nav: ↳ Create saved searches by seniority ↳  Build targeted prospect lists ↳ Update lists weekly for fresh leads Smart reps look for prospects who are active. 2. Strategic Outreach     Too many people say never do a cold dm, and tell you to sit back and wait. Please don't listen to this advice. Here's what I would do: ↳ Block 1 focused hour daily ↳ Send 20-30 targeted messages ↳ Be brief, brilliant, gone Example framework: "Reason I am reaching out [specific insight] → This matters to you because [direct benefit] → Imagine [concrete result/use ask] → CTA [simple, compelling next action]" The big fat pipeline is in the outreach. 3. Smart Engagement Don't just drop "Great post!" comments. Like real talk.. please don't do this. Start real conversations instead. The framework: ↳ Find a post ↳ Share specific insights from their content ↳ Ask one thought-provoking question Now if you did 20 messages a day check the math: 400 messages/month 10% conversion rate = 40 meetings/month There are no silver bullets. This is just an example, If you stay consistent what could happen. Stay prospecting my friends. ----- P.S. Mention someone who could benefit from this strategy. P.S.S. Which step are you going to use today?

“But, you said we will get 4x ROAS!” In our industry, there’s always someone making louder promises. It’s tempting to join the race, promise big numbers, get the deal, deal with the fallout later. But here’s what most people miss: It’s easy to talk up results in a pitch deck. It’s much harder to build real, repeatable success in the wild. That’s why I’m a firm believer in that classic advice (Tom Peters said it best): “Under promise and over deliver.” Not because I want to play it safe, or because we can’t achieve bold results. But because I’ve seen what happens when the entire ecosystem starts chasing unrealistic benchmarks. Margins shrink, trust erodes, and clients hop agencies the minute a new, shinier offer comes along. This isn’t just about protecting my agency. It’s about building a healthy market where fair pricing, sustainable growth, and honest expectations win out over one-upmanship. I’ve worked both sides: corporate and agency. I know how much pressure there is to show up with “guarantees.” But now, I’d rather have tough conversations up front than scramble for explanations later. In business and in life, overpromising looks flashy but rarely pays off. A spouse who hears “I’ll bring you the stars” is happy for a day. But it’s showing up, doing the work, and quietly delivering more than you promised, that’s what sticks. I’d rather be the one who delivers steady, compounding wins than someone chasing their own hype. If you’ve ever faced the pressure to “promise the moon,” you know how tempting it is. But the real win? Building trust that outlasts the campaign.

Sales folks, take note! Spamming a target company's employees with your services and requests for meetings will result in your company making its way onto a buyer's blocklist. As a buyer in the localization industry, I receive dozens of emails and LinkedIn requests every single day from vendors looking to showcase translation, AI, QA services, and more. It's not humanly possible to give personal replies to every outreach. When vendors can't get through to me, they often reach out to everyone on my team... and sometimes to many others across my company. I'd love for this practice to stop. It wastes valuable company time and makes a vendor appear desperate and non-strategic. Here's what to do instead: 1. Appeal to ego! Invite a target company’s decision-maker to a panel, or start a vlog series and ask buyers to appear and discuss industry topics. It’s also a great opportunity to reposition your company as a thought leader. 2. Offer genuine insight, not just services. Share a case study, white paper, or benchmarking data that’s actually useful to the buyer’s role, and do it without a sales pitch. 3. Build a reputation before you build a pipeline. Comment thoughtfully on posts. Contribute to community conversations. If you consistently show up with value, you’re far more likely to get noticed. 4. Target smarter, not broader. Don’t shotgun your message to an entire company. Learn the org. Understand the buyer’s scope. Then send one well-researched, personalized note that shows you actually did your homework. 5. Focus on mutual value. Can you help solve a known pain point or offer perspective on something changing in the market? Frame your outreach around collaboration, not consumption. 6. Use timing to your advantage. Keep tabs on when companies are hiring for roles associated with your offerings, launching in new markets, or attending conferences. That’s when buyers are more receptive to new solutions. 7. Lead with generosity. Offer a no-strings-attached resource, intro, or suggestion that doesn’t benefit you directly. Reciprocity is a powerful trust builder. And please! Don't ever ever call me on the phone! ;)

10 Steps that made our clients quadruple their booked meetings via LinkedIn. Most sellers are looking for leads in all the wrong places.   And the ones who know where to look? They’re not telling you.  I've worked with over 1,000 companies and helped clients generate over €200M in B2B leads. And let me tell you—most sales teams are wasting LinkedIn’s potential because they’re too obvious in their prospecting.  The best LinkedIn sellers?   They find high-value leads without anyone ever knowing.  Here’s how:  1. Stop going after the obvious   Your competitors are all chasing the same decision-makers. Instead, look at who is engaging with them—their network is full of hidden leads.  2. Go beyond job titles   Most people search for “Head of X” or “VP of Y.” Smart sellers dig deeper—looking at previous roles, project involvement, and mutual connections.  3. Engagement = Buying Signals   Liking and commenting isn’t just noise—it’s a map. If someone is engaging with your ideal client’s content, they likely share the same pain points. That makes them a prime prospect.  4. Slide 9 – The Power Move Nobody Talks About   Instead of directly messaging prospects, engage with their top commenters. Why? These are people who are already involved in the conversation, who trust your prospect, and who might be easier to approach.  This approach is how top LinkedIn sellers build pipeline in stealth mode—without looking desperate, pushy, or spammy.  Are you hunting for leads—or are you making them come to you?  A simple road map?  1. Click in the "Search Bar" and hit "Enter" without typing anything  2. Select the "People" button for People Search  3. Click on "All Filters"  4. Scroll down to "Followers Of"  5. Write down the name of a Peer, Thought Leader, Client etc  6. Now Add preferred "Locations"  7. Scroll down to "Title" and insert a powerful Boolean that covers all your ICP's  8. Hit "Show Results"  9. Now add important Keywords in the "Search Bar" and hit "Enter" 10. Start working on the list Amazing, isn't it? What's your biggest prospecting challenge? PS: I hit the 30,000 connection limit so I can't accept new connections without kicking somebody else out. Therefore I will not accept default ones, only personalised ones that make me smile. 📥 save for later 💬 comment with a LinkedIn myth ♻️ repost for more visibility

Sales Navigator is the world's biggest B2B database... if you use it right. 👇 Most people open it, get overwhelmed by the filters, and default to keyword searches that return thousands of irrelevant results. Then they wonder why their outreach isn't converting. The problem isn't the tool. It's the targeting. Before you write a single message, you need to define your market with precision. That's where the TICL framework comes in. 𝗧𝗜𝗖𝗟: → 𝗧itle — Who are you actually trying to reach? Job title is your first filter. Be specific. → 𝗜ndustry — Not every industry is your industry. Narrow it down. → 𝗖ompany size — A 10-person startup and a 500-person firm have completely different problems. Pick your lane. → 𝗟ocation — Geography still matters, even in a remote-first world. These four filters do one thing: they eliminate the noise. When you dial these in properly, your search results stop looking like a crowd and start looking like a list of qualified buyers. Your messaging gets sharper because you're writing to someone specific. Your conversion rate goes up because you're not wasting outreach on the wrong people. Most people trying to generate leads on LinkedIn skip this step. They prospect wide and wonder why nothing sticks. Define your market first. Then prospect. That's the difference between using Sales Navigator and actually getting results from it. #SaleNav #Linkedin #ExpertPRoject

Last month, I spoke with a VP Sales who built one of the most effective enterprise motions I’ve seen. His team wins $500K F500 deals at Seed with no marketing. Full STEALTH. This level of trust so early is almost unheard of. Sequoia just led a $45M Series A. Here’s how Trevor Messick from Nuvo did it: 1. Compelling message > Deck Enterprise is a battle of attention. Busy SVPs chased by 100s of AEs/SDRs and internal priorities need one thing – get to the (big) point, fast. A door-opening message so sharply researched it feels like a punch, whether it’s an email or a first call POV. And to approve $500K, punchy words that say "this is board level." Trevor didn’t spend his time polishing decks/proposals templates. He spent it on messaging – teaching his team how to build 6-fig stories. Priceless. 2. Turn customers into your marketing department In stealth, no brand means you start every deal in a credibility hole. Trevor's bet: over-invest in Customer Success until every customer becomes a trust-building marketer. White-glove onboarding, deep value-add, and post-sale check-ins. It all worked – referrals became their #1 pipeline source, while customer stories and proactive referrals (every deal!) drove trust no startup could build so early. 3. Make referrals a pipeline stage, not a wish Referrals beat cold outbound any day of the week – if you treat them like a deal stage. In late-stage negotiation, Trevor’s team asks: “If we deliver our promise, can we get 2 warm intros to peers?” They give a shortlist of lookalike accounts and track every intro like a must-win deal. Win rates crush cold calls because trust is already baked in. 4. Make buying from you feel like buying from a $1B vendor No brand? Make the buying experience your brand. With no big website or product marketing backup, Trevor designed buying moments that say: “wow, they’re real pros!” – using Deal Rooms (Aligned). All materials, timelines, and updates in one collaborative, smart workspace. No critical info buried in emails, out-of-the-loop stakeholders, or decision overwhelm. Buyers say it feels like working with a top-tier enterprise vendor, and deals moved faster. 5. Built a buying signal engine Half the F500 buying team never talks to reps. But their clicks, views, and activity tell the real story. Trevor built a signal engine in Gong (pushed to Slack) that pulls data from every Deal Room interaction (hidden buyers, content views, chat, MAP updates, AI assists) plus email and call data. It became their most accurate deal health score and deal execution decision center – letting them double down on engaged deals, tailor every move, and save at-risk ones before buyers went dark. —— Trust is the currency of enterprise. You can’t buy it. You can’t fake it. But you can design for it. From email-one to the $500K ask. That’s how a startup wins at the big table. P.S. Here’s free access to the Deal Rooms they use: https://lnkd.in/dwujpFvM

Tomorrow is Monday. Are you ready to get pitch slapped again? You know the ones: “Hey, saw your profile, let’s connect.” Followed by a 5-paragraph cold pitch. No context. No care. No chance. So… should you sell on LinkedIn? Yes. And no. Yes, because LinkedIn is where your buyers hang out. No, because cold-pitching strangers doesn’t build trust. It burns it. Here’s what actually works: 1. Earn attention before you ask for it. Post helpful stuff. Comment like a real person. Let people see how you think before they hear what you sell. 2. Warm up your leads. Don’t just DM. Engage with their posts. Be in their notifications before you’re in their inbox. 3. Start real conversations. Ask questions. Share insights. Show you actually care before showing your product. 4. Personalise everything. Templates are obvious. And lazy. One thoughtful message beats 50 generic ones. 5. Play the long game. Not everyone’s ready to buy today. But when they are, They’ll go straight to the person they already trust. Outreach isn’t dead. But lazy outreach is. Sell without selling. And when Monday hits, be the person they want to hear from. Not the one who pitch slapped them at 9am.

In order to sell something new, you have to unsell them on what they have. This is one of my favorite mantras. But here's where most sellers mess it up: Either they don't really focus on unselling at all, it's all about trying to sell the new fancy thing... or They try to unsell by telling. "Your current solution doesn't do X." "You're missing out on Y." "Our product is better because Z." That doesn't work. Nobody wants to be told what they have isn't good enough. They need to discover it themselves. The best sellers unsell through two things: 1. Great questions 2. Education 𝗚𝗿𝗲𝗮𝘁 𝗾𝘂𝗲𝘀𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀 𝗲𝘅𝗽𝗼𝘀𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗴𝗮𝗽𝘀. Not leading questions. Not gotcha questions. Questions that make the prospect connect the dots on their own. → "How are you currently handling X so that X doesn't happen?" → "What happens when Y breaks down?" → "How much time does your team spend on Z?" → "How are you able to do A?" → "Have you ever run into/noticed B" → "What do you think YOUR customer would prefer?" When they answer, they start to realize the status quo may not be the right way to do it. You didn't tell them. They told themselves. 𝗘𝗱𝘂𝗰𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗯𝘂𝗶𝗹𝗱𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗰𝗮𝘀𝗲 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝗰𝗵𝗮𝗻𝗴𝗲. Not education on YOUR product. Education on the CONCEPT. Why does this approach matter? What does the data say? What are the best companies doing differently? If you're selling online booking to doctors, don't start with why YOUR booking tool is great. Start with why online booking in general changes patient behavior. Use real data. Third-party research. Industry trends. Teach the concept first. Then your solution becomes the obvious answer. Here's the unlock: The more time you spend on the unsell, the easier the sell becomes. Most sellers skip straight to pitching. They focus on the upsell without ever doing the unsell. And then they wonder why prospects "need to think about it." They didn't think about it because you never made them think about what they already have. Unsell first. Sell second. The deal will close itself.

If 2024 taught us anything about Cold Email, it’s this: 👇 General ICP Outreach isn’t enough to drive results anymore. With deliverability getting tougher every day, there’s only one way to make outbound work: → Intent-Based Targeting Here’s how we do it at SalesCaptain to book 3x more demos ⬇️ Step 1️⃣ Identify High-Intent Triggers The goal? Find prospects showing buying signals. ✅ Website visits – Someone browsing pricing or case studies? (We use tools like RB2B, Leadfeeder, and Maximise.ai). ✅ Competitor research – Tools like Trigify.io reveal when prospects engage with competitor content. ✅ Event attendance – Webinar attendees or industry event participants often explore new solutions. (DM me for a Clay template on this) ✅ Job changes – Platforms like UserGems 💎 notify us when decision-makers start new roles (a prime buying window). ⚡️ Pro Tip: Categorize triggers: → High intent: Pricing page visits → Medium intent: Engaging with case studies This helps prioritize outreach for faster conversions. Step 2️⃣ Layer Intent Data with an ICP Filter Intent data alone isn't enough, you need to ensure the right audience fit. Tools like Clay and Clearbit help us: ✅ Confirm ICP fit using firmographics ✅ Identify the right decision-makers ✅ Validate work emails ✅ Enrich data for personalized messaging ⚡️ Key Insight: Not everyone showing intent fits your ICP. Filter carefully to avoid wasted resources. Step 3️⃣ Hyper-Personalized Outreach Golden Rule: Intent without context is meaningless. Here’s our outreach formula: 👀 Observation: Reference the trigger (e.g., webinar attended, pricing page visit) 📈 Insight: Address a potential pain point tied to that trigger 💡 Solution: Share how you’ve helped similar companies solve this pain 📞 CTA: Suggest an exploratory call or share a free resource ⚡️ Pro Tip: Use tools like Twain to personalize at scale without landing in spam folders. 📊 The Results? Since focusing on intent-based outreach, we’ve seen: ✅ 3x Higher Demo Booking Rates 📈 ✅ 40% Reduction in CPL (focusing on quality over quantity) ✅ Larger Deals in the Pipeline with higher-quality prospects It’s 2025. Let’s build smarter, more profitable campaigns. 💡 Do you use intent signals in your outreach? Drop me a comment below! 👇