linkedin strategy

As if landing new wholesale suppliers wasn’t hard enough it, seems they’re being flooded with requests by other sellers – our competition.

Although this isn’t a major issue, it does make it harder to get through the noise and stand out.

While picking up the phone and calling suppliers is my go-to strategy that works like a charm (nobody seems to do this anymore!) I’ve developed a new strategy taken from a completely different industry that seems to work incredibly well as another channel to connect with suppliers.

Here’s a recent LinkedIn resource that I’ve been reading through.

When you realize that all we’re really doing is sales every single day, you can immediately use strategies successful salespeople are using, including LinkedIn.

You probably thought you’d never use your LinkedIn account again once you decided to start your own business, but it’s time to dust that account off, give it a polish and put it to work!

 

The LinkedIn Sourcing Strategy

Although this strategy won’t help you find new products, it will give you another way to easily connect with suppliers that others simply aren’t using (so don’t tell anybody ok)?

Here’s how it works…

Let’s say I find a product that I really want to carry but for whatever reason, I cannot seem to make contact with the company or can’t find a phone number or email address.

They could simply be ignoring us, but we’re team Vendrive and we don’t give up that easily, so we log into our nicely polished LinkedIn account and put their company name into the search bar at the top.

 

Linkedin Strategy

 

From there, depending on the company’s size, LinkedIn will show us every employee… see where I’m going here?

 

 

Now we just need to find the correct person to connect with, typically in a sales position. Connect, send them a brief message and voila!

 

 

There are two really great leads to reach out to if I wanted Entertainment Earth as a wholesale supplier!

Most people go through the front door (aka sending a generic email to sales@company.com), but Vendrive users go through the back door, know how to land accounts and make it look easy.

If there is no good contact information online, most sellers will move on to the next company.  However, hunting them down on LinkedIn will allow you to make a connection that others will not make, and you could become one of a limited number of sellers that carry a stellar product.  

Many times, the harder it is to get in, the more profitable the reward.