Microsoft is very big on the value of building relationships in business. In addition to the release of Relationship Insights and Relationship Assistant, there is a new SKU called Microsoft Relationship Sales Solution. Microsoft Relationship Sales Solution is not entirely new. It essentially bundles 2 existing solutions: Dynamics 365 Enterprise Sales App and LinkedIn Sales Navigator Enterprise. The ability to integrate LinkedIn Sales Navigator has been around for a little while but this bundle makes sense from a seller’s solution standpoint as well as a Microsoft marketing standpoint.
Microsoft Relationship Sales Solution is priced at $135/user/month and only available to Microsoft customers that license through an Enterprise Agreement. If you’re an existing Dynamics 365 Enterprise Sales App user, you can add on LinkedIn Sales Navigator and use them together but you’ll pay more like $160/user/month. I assume that excluding non-EA customers from the new SKU is temporary and it will be available for small and mid-size business customers soon.
Let’s look at a few scenarios where integrating Dynamics 365 and LinkedIn Navigator represents real value to a seller:
Displaying Sales Navigator information in Dynamics 365
Create a new view on your Dynamics 365 lead, contact, account or opportunity record exposing your prospect’s:
Company information
Your LinkedIn connections at the company
Recommended new leads at the company
You can see right away this can be big help in respect to educating yourself on a customer, identifying potential leads and contacting members of a purchasing committee that impact a buying decision.
Synch Between Platforms
With a single click, select Sales Navigator activities (InMails, messages, notes and call logs) to Dynamics 365.
Synch LinkedIn Marketing Campaign Leads to Dynamics
Pull lead data resulting from LinkedIn campaigns into Dynamics 365. Add these leads to campaigns and marketing lists that are generated from Dynamics.
Keep in mind you’ll need the Dynamics 365 Connector for LinkedIn Lead Gen Forms to sync leads captured on LinkedIn. It’s useful if you use Lead Gen Forms in LinkedIn. The connector will be available on Microsoft AppSource.
Deliver Sales Collateral and Content Within LinkedIn with PointDrive
There are some other interesting ways to utilize LinkedIn tools to help you get marketing and sales content to influencers and decision makers. Using PointDrive you can deliver all sorts of content to LinkedIn members within the platform. This is a great way to deliver content to LinkedIn members that you may not have an email address for. You’ll be able to pull statistics on who’s looked at these assets to gauge their level of interest and get cues on when to follow up.
Microsoft is still ramping up the value derived from the LinkedIn acquisition. Expect to see more and more synergy and integration between Dynamics 365 and LinkedIn. Contact us to learn more.
By Mark Abes, Vice President Sales and Marketing, Dyn365Pros, Microsoft Dynamics 365 Partners, San Diego, Southern California.
