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Sell more with whitespace analysis

Prospecting doesn’t have to be a void where productivity goes to die. The quickest path to revenue opportunities is right in front of you, and whitespace analysis will help you find it.

You know the drill for prospecting—get a list, make calls, leave voicemails, send emails, rinse and repeat until you make a sale. This process seems relatively straightforward until you drill down into the hard numbers that are eating away at your bottom line.

In the run of a day, the average salesperson will make 52 calls, leave 42 voicemails, and send 94 emails. Let’s be generous and say all this time was spent prospecting.

  • It takes 18 cold calls to reach one potential buyer that has less than a 1% chance of converting.
  • 80% of cold calls end up in voicemail, and 90% of first voicemails are never returned.
  • Only 24% of sales emails are opened by c-suite executives, with a 1% response rate.

Add these numbers up any way you want, and you will get the same result—the old ways of sourcing new revenue aren’t working.

What is whitespace analysis?

Whitespace analysis finds new opportunities in the customer data you already have. It helps you easily identify untapped revenue in accounts, industries, or regions where you have established relationships.

These hidden opportunities in your data are “the white space.” This is where you will find gaps in customer needs that can be filled with your product or service.

How does whitespace analysis work?

Imagine you are a treasure hunter looking for gold on the beach, digging randomly until you find something. Now give yourself a metal detector and a map. Think about how much time you will save knowing exactly where the treasure is.

This is how whitespace analysis works. Instead of buying a prospecting list (half of which are usually not accurate or outdated), whitespace analysis digs through data (the beach) to find new revenue opportunities (the gold). It’s like a GPS that leverages your customer relationship management system (CRM) to highlight gaps and potential areas of consumer spending that haven’t already been achieved.

Uncover new opportunities

You are 70% more likely to sell to an existing customer. With whitespace analysis, you can target accounts with cross-sell and upsell opportunities. This helps you focus sales interactions on what the customer is most likely to purchase next.

Reduce acquisition costs

Referrals are 4x more likely to make a purchase. Whitespace analysis will show you accounts, industries, and regions where relationships exist, but there is little to no incoming revenue. Easily spot warm intros and referrals to open greenfield market segments with a high-closing potential.

How will whitespace analysis increase sales?

68% of businesses struggle with lead generation, so we get the urge to buy prospecting lists. Even if every contact is up to date, you’re still wasting half your time on cold calls and voicemails that end up in limbo.

Time is money. Whitespace analysis saves you both by creating prospecting lists from your existing customer data. The fancy filters you use for paid lists will now give you a sightline into sales opportunities across every market segment in your network.

Segment accounts to sell more strategically:

  • Geography
  • Annual revenue
  • Industry
  • Demographic
  • Buyer behavior
  • Average deal size
  • Lifetime customer value
  • Referrals
  • Conversion rate
  • Deal velocity

These insights give you the information you need to build more connections with customer accounts. You can make the most of every touchpoint with data that tells you where you can sell a product or service that complements a previous purchase (cross-sell) and what upgrades or add-ons are a good fit (upsell).

Sell smarter, not harder

Hard work is only rewarded when you’re closing deals. Instead of crossing your fingers with every cold call, whitespace analysis lets you spend time on real opportunities that influence conversion, win rates, and customer expansion.  

The selling magic really happens when you pair white space insights with relationship mapping and champion tracking.

Book a consultation to learn how these three steps will transform your customer data into insights that reveal every revenue opportunity.

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