Wednesday Wins: How FM:Systems Gets the Full Picture on Pipeline with LinkedIn Sales Navigator

FM:Systems is a computer software company based in Raleigh, NC. FM:Systems helps facilities and real-estated professionals improve customer service, reduce costs, and increase productivity enterprise-wide. The company’s Web-based software improves management of space, occupancy, moves, maintenance, projects, sustainability, assets, leases, and property.

Challenge

FM:Systems sought more sales intelligence around the state of its progressing deals and key players involved. Without full insight into the changing landscapes of buying committees over lengthy sales cycles, it was all too easy for FM:Systems’ sales reps to overlook a decision maker, or to have a stakeholder leave mid-deal without the rep knowing.

Solution

FM:Systems began taking advantage of the Deals feature in LinkedIn Sales Navigator, which offers greater visibility into the buyer’s circle and improves pipeline management.

The ability to sync this feature with their existing CRM made it simple for reps to quickly catch on and gain proficiency with Deals and its holistic prospect information.

Results

With the comprehensive, real-time buyer data made available through Deals, the sales team at FM:Systems is now able to identify stakeholders they previously missed. And if a contact leaves mid-deal, they can act quickly.

“We make sure that legal is at the table, procurement’s at the table, finance, IT, that there’s executive buy-in,” says FM:Systems' former Digital Marketing Manager Christian Bogue. “We look really closely at the Buyer Circle column header to make sure that we’re talking to the right people at the right stages.”

Seeking Stability

Like many B2B organizations, FM:Systems wanted a more stable and resilient pipeline that would yield more predictable wins and consistent revenue.

“I’ve branded it internally as pipeline fragility, which is having a pipeline full of just one or two people at the table,” Christian says. “We have a lot of deals that take 12 or even 18 months to close. We’ve never really had a great way of keeping in touch with the buyer’s circle throughout the sales cycle.”

How They Did It

The FM:Systems sales team started to view the leads list in Sales Navigator as a “private news feed,” leveraging insights when prospective buyers post, publish, or share on LinkedIn. By engaging at opportune moments, even if a contact isn’t ready to buy, FM’s reps can stay top-of-mind for when that time comes.

Overall Impact

The depth of data available through Sales Navigator has brought greater sophistication to the strategies deployed by FM:Systems, helping reduce “pipeline fragility” and make deals more sticky. This enables the sales team to close opportunities at a higher rate while relying less on continually feeding the pipeline.

Bogue described how Sales Navigator helps like this: “Sales Navigator allows us to stay up to date with what’s going on in a prospect organization internally … We can anticipate things and that helps us shape the landscape when we’re closing a deal.”

Read the full case study on FM: Systems. And for more information on Sales Navigator, visit our microsite.