How Social Selling Can Improve Your Sales Process

What is social selling?

Social selling is a selling strategy that uses your brand’s social media channels to connect with potential customers and build real relationships. Instead of relying on cold calls or email marketing campaigns, social selling emphasizes meeting prospects where they already spend time online. Sales reps can share useful content, participate in discussions and watch for buying cues to build credibility and remain visible — all without seeming overly aggressive.

The social selling framework

To create a successful social selling framework, it’s important to focus on five key pillars. Understanding and implementing them will help you adjust your sales process, build stronger buyer relationships and turn casual social media interactions into meaningful business connections.

1. People: Social selling helps you identify the right decision-makers and grow your network. For instance, you can network on LinkedIn and find good sales leads using the platform’s search tools, which can suggest prospects based on factors like job changes or company growth. You can search by job title, seniority or function to target the right people, and then keep expanding your network to increase your chances of referrals and authentic connections.
2. Channel: Select the platform where your buyers are most active and open to business conversations. LinkedIn is at the heart of B2B social selling; according to Content Marketing Institute’s report, 84 percent of B2B marketers say LinkedIn delivers the best organic results. That said, some businesses may do better on other platforms — a personal trainer might find Instagram DMs useful, while B2B software pros will lean into LinkedIn for the right connections.
3. Message: Your social media outreach should be engaging and relevant — you don’t want to sound like you’re giving a cold pitch. Before sharing content or sending a message, ask yourself:
   1. Who in my network could I reference that the lead might know?
   2. What types of content are my prospects actually interested in?
   3. What would grab their attention without feeling forced?
   4. How can I show credibility without overselling?
4. Timing: Timing can make all the difference. Social listening tools highlight signals like leadership changes, funding announcements or company expansions — all of which can indicate a good moment to reach out. Even simpler social media data, like when your audience is most active, can help you send messages at the right time for better engagement.
5. Ask: The “ask” in social selling should come only after you’ve built trust. Don’t jump straight into a sales pitch. Start by providing value — share a relevant insight, answer a question or point to a resource your prospect can benefit from. After establishing rapport, your outreach feels more genuine and is more likely to be well-received. Encourage your sales and marketing teams to share what they’re seeing in buyer behavior and competitor activity, so you can personalize the experience and sharpen your social selling approach.

How social selling can improve your sales process

After setting up an effective social selling framework, your brand can reap the benefits of an improved sales process, which includes the obvious advantage of boosting sales. HubSpot’s State of Sales Report (cited earlier) shows that 35 percent of sellers say social media delivers their highest-quality leads, and 42 percent say it generates the best cold outreach response rates — beating out email and phone.

Beyond improving sales, consider the following ways social selling can improve your sales process:

• Social selling accelerates trust building. Edelman’s Thought Leadership Study found that 75 percent of B2B buyers said a single piece of thought leadership content prompted them to explore a product or service they hadn’t previously considered, and 60 percent said it revealed a business opportunity they might have missed otherwise. Of those buyers, 23 percent eventually chose to buy from or work with the company that published the content. In other words, consistently sharing useful insights builds credibility and can directly lead to new business that buyers weren’t even planning to pursue.
• Social selling increases web traffic. As your brand gains traction on social media, you’ll see a rise in traffic to your website. This traffic boost helps your site rank higher in search results and build brand authority.
• Social selling enables data-driven personalization. Modern social selling platforms give sales teams a clear view of prospect behavior and preferences. By analyzing which posts a prospect engages with or which industry discussions they join, you can tailor your outreach to address their specific pain points accordingly.

How to measure your social selling success

Measuring social selling doesn’t have to feel overwhelming. The key is to look at both what you’re doing (activity metrics) and what results it drives (business outcomes). In other words, track how you’re showing up on social platforms and how that presence is contributing to leads, opportunities and revenue.

Here’s a simple way to approach it:

• Set clear goals: Start by deciding what business goals you want social selling to accomplish. Do you want more online brand awareness, stronger engagement or actual lead conversions? For awareness, look at reach and impressions. For engagement, track conversations, comments and content shares. For conversions, measure meetings booked or opportunities created through social channels.
• Choose the right metrics: Once you know your goals, pick the numbers that matter most in the form of key performance indicators (KPIs). That might include LinkedIn’s Social Selling Index, response rates to InMail or DMs, content engagement, and most importantly, the percentage of your sales pipeline that came from social selling. These indicators tell you whether your efforts are moving the needle.
• Connect the dots: CRM software can show you how social touchpoints influence the customer journey. Use attribution tracking to see how conversations, shares and posts contribute to closed deals and larger contract values. This helps you prove the impact of social selling beyond likes and clicks.
• Keep refining: Don’t get discouraged if your first round of stats looks modest — social selling is a long game. Keep monitoring your efforts, test different messages and content formats and watch for patterns in when your audience responds best. Small adjustments over time can lead to big gains in reach and results.

How to use social media platforms for social selling

Not every social platform is the right fit for social selling, and that’s OK. The trick is to focus on where your buyers actually spend their time. For B2B companies, LinkedIn (and even X) tends to deliver the best results. For B2C brands, platforms like Instagram and Facebook work well, and TikTok is becoming a go-to channel for reaching younger audiences.

Here’s a look at some popular options and how to create a strong presence:

X (formerly Twitter)

After setting up your X profile, getting familiar with the platform’s style and connecting with a few relevant accounts, you can begin using it to expand your business reach. Try these straightforward strategies to get started:

• Tweet thoughtfully: The golden rule is to think before you tweet. X has plenty of examples of posts gone wrong, so aim for content that builds positive attention around your brand.
• Join conversations in real time: X shines as a platform for news and trending topics. Keep an eye on industry trends and add your perspective. Posts tied to live conversations almost always see stronger engagement than standalone updates.
• Host live events: With X Spaces, you can hold live audio sessions once you’ve built a bit of a following. Share a clickable link in a tweet and invite people to join your discussion — whether weekly, monthly or just when you have something timely to share.
• Use X tools: Features like Analytics, Lists and X Pro help you organize feeds and monitor specific keywords. The Analytics dashboard even shows you details about who follows you, how your content performs and when your audience is most active.

Instagram

More and more companies are using Instagram for business. When you sign up, you can choose a business or creator (influencers, content creators and public figures) account type. Instagram business profiles are free and allow extended content space for industry and contact information.

Instagram’s evolution into a commerce-first platform has made it essential for B2C social selling. With over 3 billion monthly active users, the platform offers unparalleled opportunities for visual storytelling and direct sales. 

Instagram has the following formats, which can help you keep your presence engaging:

• Instagram Stories: An excellent brand storytelling tool. With 500 million daily active users, Stories now drive more engagement than feed posts for many brands. Use interactive features like polls, questions and quizzes to boost engagement even further.
• Instagram Live: Broadcast live content directly to your audience.
• Instagram Carousels: Hootsuite data shows that carousel posts consistently achieve higher engagement rates than standalone photo or video posts. Use all 10 slides to tell compelling product stories or share educational content.
• Instagram Reels: Reels have become Instagram’s fastest-growing format, with the algorithm prioritizing Reels content in both the feed and Explore page. Reels are key for organic discovery, as they are shown to non-followers more aggressively than static posts.
• Instagram Guides: A cross between carousels and blog posts, Guides include a main image, title, intro and optional descriptions.

Be aware of Instagram posting best practices to maximize your efforts:

• Use high-quality images: Instagram is all about getting the money shot. When your budget allows, use photo editors or hire photographers to give potential customers the best product shots possible.
• Optimize posting frequency: According to Hootsuite data, consistency matters more than volume, but aim for three to five posts per week to maintain visibility. Posting more frequently can lead to diminishing returns and follower fatigue.
• Create an active presence: Respond quickly to comments on your posts and mentions of your brand on other accounts. According to the Sprout Social Index, 73 percent of social users say that if a brand doesn’t respond to them via social media, they’ll buy from a competitor.
• Use hashtags: Hootsuite recommends using three to five relevant hashtags (though you can have up to 30). Mix popular hashtags (over one million posts) with niche ones (10,000 to 100,000 posts) for optimal discovery.
• Collaborate with influencers: According to Aspire’s State of Influencer Marketing Report, nano-influencers average a 7.2 percent engagement rate and micro-influencers 4.8 percent. That’s significantly higher than macro-influencers at 4.3 percent, showing that smaller creators often drive more authentic interactions despite having fewer followers.

Facebook

Creating a Facebook business page is a great start to establishing your presence on this venerable social platform and taking advantage of all Facebook’s marketing strategies. Despite perceptions of declining relevance, Facebook remains the world’s most-used social platform with more than 3.07 billion monthly active users, according to Statista data, making it essential for businesses targeting audiences over 35.

Here are a few ways to connect with your audience on Facebook:

• Create a status or link post: Use text updates to ask questions, request feedback or explain a current promotion. Link posts are ideal for driving traffic to your business blog or sharing relevant news, but always add context to encourage clicks.
• Pin a post: If you have a limited-time sale, upcoming event or company achievement, pinning a post keeps it visible at the top of your feed for a set time.
• Share a photo post: Photo posts are visually appealing and tend to grab attention. Rival IQ’s benchmark report finds that for influencer accounts on Facebook, photo posts led engagement rankings, outperforming video, link and status update formats.
• Create a video post: Video can showcase your company culture and extend reach through shares. According to Cropink, 40 percent of Facebook time is spent on videos and 3.5 billion Reels shared daily.
• Host a live video or watch party: Facebook Live Q&As or behind-the-scenes sessions are excellent ways to engage authentically and address common customer questions in real time.
• Leverage Facebook Groups: With over 1.8 billion users participating in Groups monthly, these communities are an excellent social selling tool. Join industry groups to share your expertise or create your own branded group to nurture leads and provide exclusive value.

Advertising tip: Facebook’s ad platform remains unmatched for targeting precision. Use Custom Audiences to retarget website visitors, Lookalike Audiences to find similar prospects, and Facebook Pixel to track conversions across your sales funnel.

According to WordStream’s Facebook Ads benchmarks, the average cost per click (CPC) across all industries is approximately $1.72, though this varies significantly by industry, making it one of the more cost-effective paid channels for retargeting warm leads.

LinkedIn

LinkedIn is a powerful way to connect with both decision-makers and potential customers. With over 1.3 billion members across more than 200 countries and territories, LinkedIn has solidified its position as the premier B2B social selling platform.

Here’s how to get the most out of the platform:

• Create a LinkedIn business profile: Make sure your LinkedIn business profile is complete, current and accurate, and includes attention-grabbing images and content. LinkedIn reports that company pages with complete information receive 30 percent more weekly views. Use relevant keywords naturally throughout your description to improve discoverability in LinkedIn search.
• Keep your audience in mind: As you complete your profile, think about what your audience wants to know about your company. Review your page regularly to keep information current.
• Optimize for LinkedIn’s algorithm: LinkedIn’s algorithm prioritizes expertise, relevance and engagement. Posts that spark meaningful professional conversations often receive wider distribution than promotional content. Focus on sharing insights, asking thought-provoking questions and providing actionable advice.
• Use the LinkedIn Social Selling Index: The SSI tool (primarily via Sales Navigator) assigns a score between 0 and 100 to assess how well you use LinkedIn’s social selling features — from establishing your professional brand, to engaging with insights, to building relationships. While SSI doesn’t directly affect your visibility, it remains a useful benchmark for evaluating and improving your selling strategy.

Your SSI score is based on how well you do these four things:

• Establish your personal brand: This component is based on how well you’ve designed your profile. Fill out your sections completely, including your profile picture, headline, summary and experience. LinkedIn reports that profiles with professional headshots receive 14 times more profile views and 36 times more messages than those without. Establishing your personal brand also includes posting content and engaging with others’ content through likes and comments.
• Find the right people: Use LinkedIn’s advanced search features and Sales Navigator to target decision-makers. Sales Navigator’s AI-powered recommendations can identify buying committees and suggest outreach sequences. You can also connect with second-degree connections (people linked through your existing network). LinkedIn’s “Who viewed your profile” feature is another way to identify potential leads.
• Engage with insights: This metric reflects the content you share and interact with. According to Buffer, posting two to five times weekly on LinkedIn generates an average of 1,182 more impressions per post and a 0.23-point lift in engagement rate compared to posting just once a week.
• Build relationships: This component is crucial — and often the easiest to improve. Personalized connection requests typically perform better than generic ones, and referencing shared content or mutual connections increases your chances of success even more. Leverage TeamLink (available in Sales Navigator) to see which colleagues are connected with your leads and request introductions. Once connected, nurture relationships with relevant updates and check-ins — even a simple congratulation can keep you top of mind.

A high SSI score provides insight into how well you’re using LinkedIn’s tools, but it doesn’t necessarily make you a better social seller. It’s possible to inflate an SSI score with surface-level activity like likes, comments or generic connection requests, but those actions don’t always translate into real business conversations.

A better approach is to monitor meaningful results such as InMail response rates, the percentage of connections that lead to conversations and how many of those discussions turn into qualified leads. LinkedIn notes that sales professionals with a high SSI score generate 45 percent more sales opportunities than those with lower scores.