7 Ways Your Sales Team Can Use Quora

Quora made a big splash in the first quarter of 2011 as the online Q&A service’s popularity soared.  While growth has slowed since then, the company recently hired a former Twitter and Facebook techie to focus on user growth and engagement. As a result, this site still has big potential as a tool for your sales team to use to help promote and grow your business.

Here are 7 ways your sales team can use Quora:

1. Research – If your company has a blog, Quora is a great research tool for you to find new ideas. Look for unanswered questions in your field of business. Answer the question, and use the material for a blog article.

2. Open lines of communication – Quora is not the place to do “cold-calling.” But if someone “likes” your answer or comments on it, you can engage the person in a dialogue.

3. Don’t sell, do tell – Quora is not the place to advertise your company’s products or services. Rather, it is a platform to demonstrate your expertise about your industry. The trick to building your business with Quora is by helping the Quora community.

4. Ask good questions – It’s important to answer questions on Quora, but it’s also important to ask the right questions to generate a good response. Hod Fleishman, founder of driver technology company GreenRoad said, “For a business or a business leader, having the knowledge of which are the key questions driving his/her business provides a great advantage.”

5. Build a presence – Use your real name on Quora, rather than your business, so people get to know you as a real person and a trusted source. Quora gives you and others an opportunity to follow thought leaders in any given industry, or any one else who contributes meaningful information to the community.

6.  Monitor and engage – Save time by setting up a Google alert with “Quora and your company name” so you can monitor what people are saying about your business. You might also set up an alert for your competitors as well, so you can keep track of them.

7. Market research – Look up topics and questions that are currently on the minds of your prospects on Quora so you can provide an authoritative answer.

Remember – don’t over promote yourself on Quora. You can talk about your product or service, but only do it when you can add value to the conversation.