In the 1850s, "prospecting" meant searching for nuggets of gold buried underneath piles of dirt. While the tools and goals of modern sales prospecting are very different from those of the Gold Rush, the basic concept is remarkably similar. Sales reps go to great lengths to find that "diamond in the rough" who could become a loyal, high-value customer for years to come.

Of course, there's a right and wrong way to handle sales prospecting. In this 8-step guide to sales prospecting, we'll discuss how you can make your time spent prospecting practical, effective, and successful - and ultimately "strike gold" by acquiring new customers!

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Step 1: Define your target audience

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First and foremost, you need to determine which type of customers are "gold" for your company - in other words, which prospects would offer the highest ROI for your efforts.

For example, what if you run a local business that only serves a specific geographical region? If so, you should only pursue prospects who live within a certain mile radius of your home base. What if you sell a product geared towards seniors? You wouldn't want to spend the bulk of your marketing efforts on younger demographics.

The point is, you need to understand who could benefit from your product or service, who would be interested in it, and who could pay for it. Once you know these (and related) factors, you'll be able to focus your efforts where they'll do the most good.

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Step 2: Qualify your leads with data

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As you compile your list of potentially interested prospects, it's important to qualify each person (or each account) based on your "ideal customer profile" (ICP), which should contain the criteria mentioned in step #1. You'll want to make sure that a prospect is well-qualified before making the initial contact with them; otherwise, you may end up wasting both yours and the prospect's time.

Here are some examples of qualification questions you may want to ask:

• Does this prospect live in our target market?
• Does the size of their organization match the criteria in our ICP (for B2B prospecting)?
• Are they currently using a product from one of our competitors?
• Are they a good fit for using our product or service? If so, why?

Of course, to answer these questions you may have to dig into whatever information is available about the targeted account. If the prospect has demonstrated a measure of interest in your product, then they may have already provided you with some helpful data. Otherwise, you'll have to perform research on their website, along with other reputable sources, to determine their fit for your product. While there will almost always be gaps in your data, this is an important step in weeding out low-upside prospects from the ones with a lot of potential.

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Step 3: Prioritize with account scoring

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Once you have a list of the prospects that could be a good fit for your business, it's time to prioritize which ones should be contacted first, and which ones should be pursued most diligently. This is where account scoring (aka, B2B lead scoring) comes into the picture. Basically, account scoring gives a numerical value to each prospect based on how likely they are to become a paying customer. 

Obviously, how you score your prospects will depend to a large extent on your business' current sales process, and which types of customers are most desirable for your company. Here's one example of how account scoring could work:

• You assign a percentage value to each "qualification dimension" you uncover during steps #1 and 2, based on how crucial it is to the overall sales process. For instance, you could assign "Proximity" a value of 20%, "Organization Size" a value of 25%, and "Social Media Presence" a value of 5%. 
• Next, you give each dimension a score, from 1 to 100. The higher the score, the more closely the account meets your ideal customer profile for that dimension. (Let's say you give Account A a "Proximity" score of 50, an "Organization Size" score of 70, and a "Social Media Presence" score of 10.)
• Finally, you multiply each dimension's score by its percentage "weight" and add up the numbers to get your total score. (For Account A, mentioned above, the total score would come out to 28.)

When it's all said and done, you should have a list of prospects that can be prioritized based on your account scoring model, from the highest scores (best fit) to the lowest. 

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Step 4: Keep an eye on "buying signals"

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Even after you've identified qualified prospects and prioritized them based on account scoring, your pre-contact work isn't done yet. The reality is, contacting leads who aren't ready to buy yet - even those leads that would be a perfect fit for your product - is usually a recipe for disaster. It's not enough to know whom to target; you also need to know when to reach out to them. 

That's why it's crucial to monitor "buying signals" from your prospects - i.e., any action that a prospect takes which could indicate readiness to purchase. Some common buying signals may include:

• Spending a lot of time on your website, and especially on a particular product's web page
• Signing up for your newsletter
• Downloading a piece of content, such as a white paper or eBook
• Reaching out to one of your sales reps via phone, email, or chat
• Etc. 

It's critical to "strike while the iron's hot" in sales - and keeping a close eye on which prospects are sending out these buying signals will help you to know where to strike next!

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