How to Use WhatsApp and LinkedIn for B2B Sales Prospecting
LinkedIn is the go-to platform for B2B prospecting. It lets you identify decision-makers easily, connect with them, and start conversations that can later lead to strong relationships. But while it’s great for initiating contact, it falls short when it comes to continuance. Inboxes get crowded fast, notifications create distractions, and responses might take days or never come at all.
So what do you do to keep prospects engaged? You add another communication method to your prospecting strategy with higher response rates, fewer distractions, and easier follow-ups. Luckily, WhatsApp checks all these boxes.
If you want to build a winning B2B prospecting strategy, your best bet is combining LinkedIn and WhatsApp, and we’ll show you how to do so in this article.
Why LinkedIn alone isn’t enough for B2B prospecting
The pros of using LinkedIn for outreach are as clear as day. You get access to important insights about your prospects, can filter them according to your criteria, and can connect with decision-makers without too many obstacles to overcome. So why is it not enough for B2B prospecting?
InMails and connection requests get ignored
For starters, connecting with decision-makers on LinkedIn isn’t a done deal. Your connection requests can get ignored, and your InMail messages might go unnoticed. Why? Because you’re not the only one reaching out to these businesses. They probably get hundreds of requests and messages each day, making it nearly impossible to reply to each one with care.
Since getting replies is step one in building a relationship with your prospects, LinkedIn creates a barrier that’s not easy to get around.
Limited responses from cold outreach
Cold outreach on LinkedIn is always a hit-or-miss. It might feel intrusive to the prospect since they don’t know you. Not to mention, prospects get a lot of these tries daily, and most of them are AI-written, generic, and vague propositions.
So what naturally happens? Prospects tune out most of the cold outreach messages. Even if your message is personalized and genuine, it might get lost amidst all the low-quality ones.
Hard to follow up efficiently
LinkedIn isn’t exactly built for ongoing conversations, so if you or your prospect don’t reply immediately, it can be difficult to get the conversation going again. It’ll most probably get buried beneath other notifications and messages, and while you might have won at breaking the ice, you won’t get a chance to follow up on your prospecting.
Also, since LinkedIn is a professional platform, some prospects might feel odd when having back-and-forth discussions on it. They might prefer a more direct or convenient platform, like WhatsApp.
Why you need WhatsApp for sales prospecting
It’s now apparent that LinkedIn isn’t enough for prospecting. Which platform fills the gaps? WhatsApp, and here’s why.
Higher engagement and faster responses
WhatsApp has an unmatched open rate of 98%. No other business communication platform even comes close. What does this mean for you? Your messages will likely get opened, and there’s a very high chance you’ll get a fast reply.
WhatsApp is already a huge part of everyday life, and your prospects likely open it multiple times per day, unlike LinkedIn. Seeing your unread message constantly makes it harder to ignore.
While you might wait for days or weeks before getting a reply on LinkedIn, WhatsApp gives you faster responses and helps you connect with more prospects.
Easier meeting scheduling and lead qualification
Scheduling meetings can feel like a never-ending cycle. You keep going back and forth to tell the prospect your available slots, confirm their availability, and book the meeting. It takes time, and even more so if you try it on LinkedIn. You’ll have to wait a long time to get a reply before each step.
Even if you send a Calendly link to speed things up, your message might get buried under other notifications. On WhatsApp, it’s different. Prospects are more likely to see and respond to your messages in real-time. You can quickly share booking links, send reminders, and confirm meetings without delays, making the whole process smoother and and faster.
Keeping prospects warm with personal touchpoints
LinkedIn is a professional platform, and while it gives credibility for B2B outreach, interactions on it are often formal. On top of that, it doesn’t encourage ongoing conversations because there’s always a distraction lying around. A new post, a connection request, a notification, and so on.
These drawbacks lead to impersonal conversations that get interrupted a lot, which makes it challenging to build a genuine connection with your prospects.
Now, WhatsApp is a chat-only platform. There aren’t any distractions, and its real-time nature makes it easy for conversations to flow. It also has a few features that make communication easier and more personal, like voice notes, images, emojis, and so on. While LinkedIn has voice notes and images, they’re not as commonly used for conversations. Instead, most interactions happen through text, making exchanges feel formal rather than personal.
When and how to move a LinkedIn conversation to WhatsApp
The ideal combination for B2B prospecting is using LinkedIn for the initial contact and then WhatsApp for follow-up. But it can be tricky because if you move too soon, you might come across as pushy. If you wait too long, you risk losing the prospect’s interest.
So when and how do you make the transition between the two platforms?
When is the right time?
Transitioning to WhatsApp should feel like a natural next step rather than a sudden request. For that to happen, you need to choose the right time to suggest it.
Here are some moments when it’s suitable to move from LinkedIn to WhatsApp:
- When scheduling a meeting: If you’ve reached a point in your conversation where you’re scheduling a meeting, it’s a good moment to move to WhatsApp. Suggest coordinating the details there instead of LinkedIn for easier and quicker communication.
- After a positive response: If you receive a positive response to your outreach efforts, it means your prospect is already interested in what you’re selling, and you’ve built some rapport. This is an ideal moment to suggest moving to WhatsApp for a more detailed conversation.
- After content engagement: If a prospect engages with marketing content on your profile, you can jump into their inbox and suggest a chat on WhatsApp to discuss more about your product.
How to transition LinkedIn conversations to WhatsApp smoothly
Here are the steps you can take to ensure a smooth transition between LinkedIn and WhatsApp.
Step 1: Start the conversation on LinkedIn
First, identify your prospects and prepare an outreach message to send them on LinkedIn. Make your message valuable and personal so that it stands out from other generic outreach efforts. Before making any request, you need to demonstrate clearly how your product can help them.
Step 2: Move the conversation to WhatsApp
Once your prospect replies to your outreach, try to move the conversation to WhatsApp in a natural way that doesn’t look forced. Try to make it about convenience. For instance, tell your prospect that you know how LinkedIn inboxes can get cluttered and that you’re open to moving the conversation to WhatsApp. This way, the prospect has a good reason to leave LinkedIn.
It’d also help if you presented it as a soft ask. For example, you can send your prospect a message similar to this:
“If it’s easier for you, would you like to continue this on WhatsApp? I can send over details there.”
This way, it’s not a demand, and the prospect can make their own choice.
Step 3: Use WhatsApp to book and confirm meetings
If your prospect agrees to move the conversation to WhatsApp, you can use it to book a meeting with them. Instead of your message getting lost on LinkedIn, you can send a simple and direct message with your calendar link so that they know your available time.
When the meeting is near, you can use WhatsApp reminders to ensure your prospect doesn’t forget.
What to avoid
- Don’t ask for the prospect’s WhatsApp number in your first LinkedIn message: Jumping straight to WhatsApp without building a connection on LinkedIn first can feel intrusive, especially since WhatsApp is a personal platform. Build up to the moment where you ask for their phone number if you want to get a positive response.
- Don’t spam prospects with cold messages directly on WhatsApp: Only move to WhatsApp if your prospect is willing to learn more details about your product. If they don’t show interest on LinkedIn, respect their privacy and continue your efforts there without moving to WhatsApp.
How Rasayel helps sales teams master LinkedIn + WhatsApp prospecting
You’ve connected with dozens of prospects on LinkedIn. You’re starting to transition the conversations to WhatsApp. Your list of WhatsApp chats keeps growing. How do you keep up, knowing that you still have to log customer data into your CRM, follow up at the right time, and avoid missing valuable opportunities?
Managing all these conversations on WhatsApp is already overwhelming, especially since you need to personalize each outreach. Plus, with the constant shuffling between LinkedIn, WhatsApp, and your CRM, it’s easy to lose track of who’s interested, who needs follow-up, and where each prospect is in the pipeline.
The solution? Use a tool that ties your sales tech stack together, like Rasayel.
Rasayel helps you integrate WhatsApp with the rest of your tech stack, giving you a centralized workspace where you can manage all your interactions. You won’t have to constantly switch between tools, scramble to find old messages, or manually update the CRM data.
Some of Rasayel’s features that can help you with prospecting are:
- Automation of meeting reminders and confirmations
- Tracking of WhatsApp interactions directly from the CRM
- Automatic lead qualification and follow-up suggestions from AI
Final takeaway
LinkedIn helps you make the first prospecting move, but the real deal happens on faster communication channels, like WhatsApp. That’s why you need to combine both platforms to build a successful prospecting strategy.
Using LinkedIn for initial contact and WhatsApp for follow-ups helps you increase response rates, speed up scheduling and follow-ups, and build deeper relationships with your prospects.
Overall, integrating WhatsApp into your sales strategy can help you work more efficiently and boost your sales, and you can do it using Rasayel.
Hania is a content writer with four years of experience, driven by deep passion for writing and reading. She helps B2B companies market their products and boost their sales using one of the most powerful tools of mankind: words. Writing has always been her way of connecting with people, sharing her ideas, and leaving an impact.
