My snapcode. Be sure to take a picture of this and add me on SnapChat.

Alright, most of you know I’m a huge advocate of social selling. It works, I advocate salespeople use it and learn how to incorporate it into their selling process.

In case anyone still finds it necessary to debate, here are two studies I’ve done that highlight the impact of social selling on quota attainment and sales team success.   I’ll let them speak for themselves.

For the most part, there have been primarily 3 social networks for selling; Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook. YouTube, and Instagram are great for personal brand development, but not so much for social selling, making quota etc. (If anyone has examples of how to use Instagram and YouTube to sell, please share in the comments. I’m always down for new use cases.)

These three networks have been critical for what I describe as the four elements of social; discovery, listening, engagement and expression.

While all three offer some level of all four, each excels in one over the other.

Twitter is the ultimate in discovery. Everything is public. Things are easily shared and retweeted and information flies around. It’s the best way ever to be discovered or discover.

LinkedIn is the ultimate in listening. It’s good for discovery too, but not as good, because not everything is “public.”  You have to be connected to people to see their information and they decide whether or not you have access to their stream. You have to be “accepted.”  But once in, it’s the best tool to listen to your customers and clients, etc. They share personal information about their business, when they are on the move etc. LinkedIn is the best way to listen to what’s happening.

Facebook, is the ultimate in expression.  There are few rules on Facebook. It’s a shouting match. People don’t mind if you “express” constantly. They’ve come to expect it.  Facebook is the best place to say, hey check out me out, read my stuff, watch my videos. etc.

Again, all of these social networks deliver on all 4 of the social elements, but some do one part better than the others.

Now let’s add SnapChat to the mix.

This is gonna be a longshot, but I like where SnapChat is going. SnapChat is low on discovery very low. Unless you have a solid network elsewhere (Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, lots of personal contacts in your phone, etc.) building a following on SnapChat is going to be hard. Being discovered on SnapChat is not easy.

However, SnapChat wins when it comes to engagement. It’s a killer engagement app. It’s easy to reach out to someone, get through the clutter and engage.  SnapChat gives you good info around engagement as well. It tells you if and when someone read your snap and if they “screened shot it.”  There is also less engagement noise on Snapchat than other platforms. At least right now.

Is SnapChat The Next Big Thing?

I don’t know. I can ‘t tell you that. Like most new tools, only time will tell. What I do know is that it’s growing rapidly and is now the second largest social media platform behind Facebook.

What I do know is that good sales people know to leverage the best tools to help them do their job better. Like any good artisan, they recognize that they are as good as the tools they use. Great sales people are always open to new tools and are continually looking for any and every competitive advantage they can find.

I’m playing around with SnapChat and learning how it works. I’ll let you know what I find out and how it works for sales people. Until then, my suggestion, get on. Play with it, and see how and if it could be the tool you need to drive your sales quota and get a competitive advantage.

Remember, the winners are those who embrace change.

Let me know what you guys think?

Also, we’re breaking down SnapChat and Selling on The Word on April 7th. You don’t want to miss it.  Register now!