Why Hire B2B List Building Services

Building a list full of leads can be much easier.
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Most people are familiar with the phrase "it takes a village".

Your great idea can only go so far before you need the help and expertise of others. It's one thing to come up with the idea, and yet another to execute it.

In sales, it's prudent to begin with lead generation since we need customers to sell to. And this is where hiring a B2B list building service will come in extremely handy.

You can think of companies like these as an extended arm of your sales team giving you the kickstart you need to get the ball rolling.

Why You Should Build a B2B List

It's important to understand what a B2B list is and why companies need to build one.

B2B lists are a collection of the information of leads collected together on the basis of an ideal customer profile that you might turn into real prospects and potential customers.

As such, if your company has a B2B model, you can imagine that there are several reasons why you should consider building a B2B list.

A good B2B list will lead to high-quality leads, with up-to-date and accurate information. The results of this list will deliver you a higher customer conversion rate, a lower CPA, and a streamlined sales process. To further convince you, here are a few reasons why it's such a good idea for the overall health and prosperity of your business.

1. Good email addresses

Building a B2B list will enable you to have reliable, quality email addresses you can count on. And all sales and marketing teams need emails to contact: you need to make sure you find B2B emails you can contact to start a conversation.

These emails will be verified, up to date, and they likely have interest in your product or service already. They will make for unique leads, specific to your industry that other companies may not be aware of.

2. You know the prospects on your list

We know cold emails are an integral part of the sales process. But when building a solid B2B list, you want the prospects you're targeting to be warm at the very least.

This list will contain email addresses you've earned legitimately and not taken from someone else's list or site. That would only slow you down and many of those would prove to be of no use to you in the long run. Know who you're contacting and have a good reason why, and you'll find yourself ahead of the game.

3. Grow and maintain your list

Having a B2B list is just the start. You will find that any list is only as good as its information. You'll also learn you should never be content with what you initially have. It is important to continue to add to your list with qualified leads and current data.

You want to make sure you are both adding to your first list and reviewing older contacts to make necessary changes as need be. Promotions, title changes, downsizing, and similar changes will all wreak havoc on your list if you're not paying attention.

Building a B2B list isn't easy and it takes a lot of work. You need to be sure your contacts are relevant and updated constantly. And a great way to ensure this is to work with a B2B list selling service.
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What Are B2B List Selling Services?

Quite simply, B2B list selling services are organizations that help you build and maintain a B2B contact list that helps you start and grow your lead generation efforts. The leads in these lists are designed to become prospects and potential customers.

They have been pre-vetted and carefully selected according to the customer profile created by you as a customer based on your service or product, and research conducted as to who would be the best customer for you.

Working with these companies means that you and your company do not have to take time away from your own work in the development of product or service betterment and having key meetings to close deals. Another way to consider this is that you are outsourcing your lead generation efforts. If you're interested, it's possible to outsource your sales development entirely as well.

The lists created by these services are beneficial for any business. The information provided helps plan out sales strategies and sales cadences. For example, depending on the type of information provided, you can create a B2B call list for your sales development representatives to focus on calling for a bit.

You can also separate them into B2B marketing lists or B2B sales lists depending on how you decide you want to approach them based on the information you have. If your leads are inbound, for instance, you might add them to a marketing cadence, and outbound leads would fit more in a sales cadence.

This is why these lists are important and prove that information is key for any business. Often, companies find out too late that their databases are outdated, contain inaccurate information, and are just plain useless.

Consider you've spent ample time putting together a list of information and sales cadences related to those lists. You've been doing all the touchpoints and sending them information, only to realize too late you've misspent your time and resources because the information was wrong to begin with.

You want your B2B sales list to be kept fresh and up-to-date at all times. Time is money. If you're constantly trying to sift through leads that may or may not be accurate or relevant, you're wasting time that should be geared towards building relationships and closing deals.

There's a lot of work that goes into forming and maintaining the right leads for your business. It's not an area that should be overlooked or thought to be something the "new hire" can do because no one else wants to.

Studies have shown that around 22% of the data kept in B2B contact lists become irrelevant each year. That means that only 78% of your leads are workable. This has the potential to cripple any business that does not ensure they stay updated. And a B2B list building service will help you stay at the top of your sales game.

How Do B2B List Building Services Work?

As we've seen, B2B list building services have the experience, resources, and data strength to source high-quality data for your business constantly. The know-how and information they can provide will prove to be a significant boost to your bottom line. But how do they work?

Think of a B2B list building service as an extension of your sales team. They will focus on the work that some companies find tedious and time-consuming. Regardless if you need help with both the inbound and outbound sales processes, hiring a B2B list building service could be the answer to your time constraint problems.

Let's take inbound sales first. Inbound sales is a customer-driven sales approach where leads come to your business then your sales team moves them through the funnel.

A good list building service will develop records that are relevant to your company from your inbound efforts. Typically this means leads have provided you their information in some way or another, most usually via a form.

In addition to the basic information the lead provides, the list building service will obtain further information via research about why they might be interested in your company. This will be used to put together the list so that they can be contacted with the correct messaging.

Once the connection is made, just as you would with any inbound approach, you nurture the process: sending your prospects informative content that makes them want to hear more from you about why you're the right fit for them. After all, you always need to keep in mind the needs of those you're trying to reach and tailor your approach accordingly.

What about an outbound approach? Different than inbound of course, but just as important.

Outbound lead generation is the process of finding potential prospects that may be interested, if unaware, of your product. In terms of B2B list building services, it means getting out there and after the exact leads and prospects you want, using tools like LinkedIn Sales Navigator.

With outbound sales tactics, your team will likely become more proactive which can bring high-end results in a very timely fashion. Time is of the essence for most of the sales process and working with a B2B list building service is a great way to make time work for you.

Every sales organization has its opinion on how to generate leads and which tools and processes it wants to implement. With B2B list building services though, you will get the best of both worlds and be better off because of it.
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Successful Examples of B2B List Building

There are many ways to build a successful B2B list and the best companies find new and exciting ways to do just that. If the idea is to attract targeted and qualified leads, what better way than to bring people to your business because you showed them how good you are and what you can do for them?

Deloitte is a great example. Among the so-called 'Big Four' of the accounting industry, they offer countless professional services such as consulting, auditing, and legal assistance, amongst others, to clients worldwide.

Deloitte put together an educational content hub called Deloitte Insights for each industry and topic they work in. This hub provides videos, in-depth reports, podcasts, articles, and more. The content is researched-based, with insights that can help people and organizations reach their full potential. Deloitte's website now attracts close to ten million monthly visits, with popular business media personalities and companies regularly citing and backlinking their content.

It's easy to see in hindsight that this was a very good idea. You don't need hindsight though in order to start thinking outside the box and allowing yourself to get creative. Not only will your prospects be much more inclined to become customers, but your current customers will also take pride in the fact that they are partnered with such creative business people.

Another example of how to be creative with the development of your B2B list is what Salesforce did. The popular CRM brand helps businesses form strong connections with their existing and potential customers. And to attract even more people and more leads, they successfully ran a three-month content campaign that used humor, art, and creativity.

The campaign involved the creation of amusing videos on sales and marketing, highlighting customer success stories as animated slides, and other visual marketing techniques. They knew what their prospective customers liked and they gave it to them. This puts Salesforce in a customer-centric light which tells prospective customers that this is a place they need to be.

The innovative content helped generate interest from new audiences and prospects. Due to this sudden spike in interest, Salesforce saw a significant increase in traffic, eBook downloads, and newsletter signups. This is not only an example of great B2B list building, but it's also an example of a good idea with compelling execution to reach a common goal. Unique thinking and focused energy will lead you to places you haven't been before which will likely lead you to success.

Gathering information and contacts shouldn't be a drag. If you view it that way, you've already lost. Instead, approach it with the same creativity and dedication as the examples mentioned previously. There's no reason to believe you won't share in similar success if you get creative and take the time to develop your strategy.

Conclusion

So, should you hire a B2B list building service?

To ensure your sales processes are in tip-top shape and you continue generating revenue, outsourcing certain parts of the cycle results in faster turnaround and better prioritization for you. After all, creating a good list is hard work which is often time-consuming. Time is money as they say and your time is better spent doing something you're an expert at.

The examples in this article further demonstrate why hiring a B2B list building service is important for your business. Let the experts at list building help you so you can focus on running all of the other aspects of your business.

You should build your business while you let the other pros build your B2B lists.

Read more relevant articles and feel free to get in touch with us for help building your own B2B lead lists.
Post by Rob Janicke.
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