Prospecting can be difficult without the proper guidance. Resquared was developed as a platform to help simplify the outreach process, making it easier to contact with local businesses. As the new Content Marketing hire, I knew the best way to learn was to prospect through Resquared, Google, and in-person Canvassing. What do you guess was the most effective? Keep reading to find out.
As a guideline, I gave myself 30 minutes for each prospecting tool, to replicate how a professional would do it similarly. I defined exactly what businesses I would be searching for and in what area. And I set myself a goal of getting at least five great leads! After the rules were set, it was time to start prospecting.
First off, I spoke with our Customer Success team to figure out what my objective would be in my prospecting. We determined that the goal was to achieve leads for a prospective restaurant space. We landed on searching for Wine Bars in the Boston area. I loaded Boston, MA as my search location and Wine Bars for my business search. I then filtered to businesses that only had an email and saved it as my first list! From there, I pulled up my new lists and prepared to send my emails. I gave myself thirty minutes to see how many businesses I could reach. I used a Resquared template and started sending and sending. For the first time ever, I was able to email over 80 businesses in thirty minutes! I decided to take a breather before checking on potential leads and got ready to begin my Google searches.
Having previous Commercial Real Estate experience as a marketing professional, one of my tasks for junior/senior agents was to do prospecting. But I never had the benefit of Resquared.
For this, I replicated my past process. I loaded “Wine Bars in Boston” into Google and was immediately directed to the Google Maps feature. I set my timer for 30 minutes again and was off to the races.
It was extremely difficult to find reliable contact data. Most businesses only had an email on their website, requiring an extra sleuthing step on my end. At the end of my search, I was only able to find 20 businesses that had emails and fit my search criteria. I hadn’t even sent my emails yet!
This process was akin to “Playing Detective”, sleuthing online for data that was not straightforward and I was not even sure would reach the business owners directly. With another 30 minutes done and not even a business emailed, I decided it was time to hit the streets and do some in-person canvassing!
Living in New York City, I have a much easier time doing in-person canvassing than a professional that would have to drive from business to business. However, I was making sure to stick to my search criteria: Wine Bars. I loaded up Wine Bars on my phone, set my route, set my timer, and was off!
I met pretty cool owners in some very cool spots near me! However, after 30 minutes I was only able to visit THREE wine bars. Three! While it was great to be in person and have more of a personable touch and conversation, none of the businesses were interested in expanding or had any plans for it in the future. While I came up empty with no leads, at least I had a cool new wine bar to try out with a friend!
After returning home from the in-person canvassing, I opened up the Resquared Communication Center to find out I already had five responses from various businesses, all leads that were interested and wanted a follow-up with more information.
To recap, I sent 80 emails in 30 minutes on Resquared, found e-mail info from 20 businesses on Google but sent no emails, and was able to meet with business owners in person, but only 3.
After utilizing different methods of prospecting, I was able to gain so much perspective into what makes Resquared such an effective tool for finding and reaching local businesses! By far, I was able to contact and develop the most leads by using Resquared, in only thirty minutes. If you’re interested in maximizing your prospecting performance, sign-up for a demo below!