Any best practices for lead management

Lead Liaison

New DataSpring™ B2B Database Module Enriches Sales Enablement Solution, Offers Millions of Pristine Contacts & Company Profiles

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New DataSpring™ B2B Database Module Enriches Sales Enablement Solution, Offers Millions of Pristine Contacts & Company Profiles


Searching for contact and company data just got easier with the release of Lead Liaison’s DataSpring™ module. Native to Lead Liaison’s extremely flexible Sales Enablement platform, the module provides clean, premium business-to-business (B2B) prospect and company data compiled from the most reliable sources.

Nested in an intuitive swing-out side bar, the widget provides instant access to nearly 10 million company profiles and 400 million contacts. Searchable with advanced filtering options such as job title, location and industry, profiles can easily be added to the user’s CRM and Sales Enablement workflows with the click of a mouse. Data is automatically verified prior to delivery, subverting the painful process of manual list cleaning and importing.

DataSpring™ is native to the Lead Liaison Sales Enablement Platform at no additional cost. Users purchase contact credits at highly competitive prices that rival the competition and make the process of gathering valuable, GDPR / CCPA / PDPA compliant leads a painless process.

Director of Marketing, Brad Froese, says,

“Lead Liaison has built a reputation for being a one-stop software solution for marketing and sales professionals. Its modular structure delivers the kind of flexibility that is required to adapt to ever changing markets, enable high levels of creativity, and quickly execute on new strategies. DataSpring™ is the latest example of Lead Liaison’s “easy button” solutions that save organizations time and money.”

Available exclusively from Lead Liaison, DataSpring™ becomes available November 30, 2020 and is included with any Sales Enablement license.

For information or a demonstration of Lead Liaison Sales Enablement Solutions, visit: https://www.leadliaison.com/


About Lead Liaison

Lead Liaison provides cloud-based sales and marketing automation solutions that help businesses accelerate revenue by attracting, converting, closing and retaining more prospects. Filling a void in the small pool of automation providers that focus on marketing-centric functionality, Lead Liaison gives equal focus to sales providing sophisticated visitor tracking and sales automation to boost sales effectiveness. Additionally, Lead Liaison is the global leader in event lead management, enabling companies to capture and manage leads from trade shows and events. Lead Liaison blends ease-of-use, a flexible architecture, deep external integration, marketing across social, web, mobile, email and offline channels and powerful functionality into a single platform, called Revenue Generation Software®. Lead Liaison is headquartered in Dallas, Texas. For more information, visit http://www.leadliaison.com or call 1-800-89-LEADS (895-3237).

Lead Liaison

3 Tips for Success at the Virtual Trade Show You’re Attending

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3 Tips for Success at the Virtual Trade Show You’re Attending

Attending virtual trade shows is a new reality for most of us as we navigate this “new normal.” The playbook on this topic hasn’t been written yet. Most of us are figuring it out as we go.

The year 2020 has brought along many new challenges & hurdles that we have had to navigate through. For those of us in the event marketing space, virtual trade shows rank fairly high on that list of challenging experiences. These events are nothing short of intimidating to setup & oftentimes difficult to wade through as each event has varying rules & regulations. In the article below, we will attempt to answer the big question everyone is asking: What does it take to be successful at the virtual trade shows you’re attending? 

The main takeaway from this article is that,

“a virtual trade show is still a trade show.”

You must prepare for this with the same passion, dedication & discipline that you would apply to an in-person trade show. Even though it is hosted virtually, you still have the valuable opportunity to gather qualified leads from around the world & create meaningful connections.

 

1: Think strategically about the reps you choose to “send” to the show

In the same way that you would plan for face-to-face trade shows, you must first analyze the expected audience and decide on which products or services you would like to highlight. From there, you can make knowledgeable decisions about which sales reps to “staff” your booth. While the standard qualifications for a qualified rep would include things such as advanced product knowledge and charisma, you also need to account for the reps that have the highest level of comfort with digital communication channels such as chat, email & video conferencing. 

 

2: Have reps capture leads consistently in one place

Similar to F2F events, it is vital that your sales reps are capturing leads in a consistent manner and that all leads can flow into one location that is easily accessible. You also want to make sure that your Marketing Team is receiving leads in real-time so that follow-up can be done immediately while your brand is still top-of-mind for your potential client. 

Lead Liaison makes this seamless by offering an easy-to-setup Lead Capture Form & native integrations with major CRMs & Marketing Automation Platforms such as Eloqua, Salesforce & more. 

 

3: Invest in your virtual booth

Many virtual trade shows that we have attended recently feel slightly…boring… at times. You want to make sure that your booth stands out from the crowd. Find something that attracts, captures attention & ultimately converts your lead to a customer. Lead Liaison has recently launched an innovative way of accomplishing the goal listed above. The answer is simple: GAMES & GIVEAWAYS! Just as we’ve seen with traditional events, attendees are looking for different. They’re looking for swag. They’re looking for an incentive. We have over 20 fun & exciting games like whack-a-mole, spin-to-win & blackjack. These not only grab attention & create buzz about your brand, but they also capture lead contact information to help your sales reps and marketing team in their followup. All of these games are completely customizable & can fit your brand personality. Contact us to learn more. 

It is our hope that the ideas listed above will spark your creativity & help your next virtual event to be a success. Keep in mind that, as with in-person trade shows, a virtual trade show doesn’t end when reps “leave” the show. Meet with your team. Get their feedback about what worked well, and what didn’t. Ask what they’ve heard from chatting with prospects or what they’ve seen in other booths. Any and all feedback will help you add to and refine your virtual trade show playbook.

Lead Liaison

The Last Thing Anybody Needs is Another Boring Virtual Event

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The Last Thing Anybody Needs is Another Boring Virtual Event

This September of 2020, about 6 months into the COVID-19 pandemic, we here at Lead Liaison noticed an interesting comment on LinkedIn from Katherine M. describing the 3 factors that entice her into engaging with a virtual event:

“For me it’s either

1) I learn something EXTREMELY valuable;
2) I get to connect with awesome people; or,
3) it’s super fun and/or entertaining”

We agree 100%!

Virtual events absolutely demand one of these 3 elements (and preferably all 3!) to avoid coming across as flat, boring, useless agents of overhype.

 

Let’s start with #1 – Educating and bringing extreme value to your audience

First and foremost, you must understand the wants and needs of your audience going into the event. Pre-event polling regarding potential topics on a scale of 1 to 10 will help your team to evaluate and further facilitate the presentations that will help bring in more attendees and keep them involved over the course of your online event.

Be sure to make the best use of imagery! Look to create fascinating and quick informational videos with colorful images, interactive elements and photography that commands attention.

Keep educational portions concise. Provide links to additional resources on your company site if your participants would like to learn more. The last thing you want to do is have your event drone on like a requirement that attendees must sit through in order to benefit, because trust us – home distractions, email inboxes waiting to be cleaned, and a treasure trove of other online diversions are readily available and waiting to steal your thunder.

Think strategically about how your team can interject sales initiatives, sponsors, and other business strategies along with vital education that will help your virtual event attendees find value in the time they invest.

Moving along to #2 – Helping produce authentic connections with inspiring like-minded people

Your event must allow time for participants to network and create friendships and new connections. Live chats and Q&A’s in sessions are wonderful, but encourage your team to think deeper about how they can help facilitate introductions and lasting relationships between audience members.

Breakout rooms, well thought out roundtables with attendees who are pre-determined to benefit each other from dedicated discussions, and ease of use connecting via social media during the event can add a next-level feel to your virtual event.

There is even software that provides online cocktail happy hours designed to allow for 5 minute discussions (much like speed dating). Use the premise of connecting with others over a drink as a tool to keep people at your event engaged and curious about what’s coming next. The opportunity to unwind, connect and discuss hot topics after a full day of learning together is a welcome conclusion.

Finally, and perhaps most important, we arrive at #3 – Bring the fun and entertainment!

We’re all living through unprecedented times that few have previously encountered. The wide spread use of masks, physical distancing and navigating a climate of ever changing politics and science has instilled an elevated desire for fun, captivating and thrilling experiences.

Gamify your event with classic trade show games such as Spin to Win (similar to Wheel of Fortune), Pick a Winner (akin to drawing a business card from a bowl), or online Scratch-Offs. Set probabilities of winning and automate gift cards to be emailed to the winners.

Perhaps your team is more interested in hosting a casino night with marketing gamification fun including Blackjack, Slot Machines or Roulette with real-time leaderboards. Competition amongst attendees promotes participation and guarantees engagement!

Think about the event from an attendee’s perspective. If your team was taking part in the virtual event instead of running it, what would THEY want to include to make the experience appealing and enjoyable throughout the course of the sessions?

The stellar news is that by integrating game dynamics before, during and after your event, you can assist in converting passive attendees into ENGAGED participants.

Lead Liaison’s gamification features are self-service and integration is inexpensive, simple and most importantly – FUN!

Don’t hesitate to reach out with ideas on how we can help liven up your next event!

keeping email campaigns clean
Lead Liaison

The advantages of targeted emails, personalization, and list cleaning!

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The advantages of targeted emails, personalization and list cleaning

“One thing I often see companies doing is emailing to the same list, day after day, week after week without any idea if the emails are being looked at or giving the ROI they desire.”- Mike Pauer


If you’ve had an email address for any amount of time, and used it to sign up for accounts, I’m sure you will have seen the same emails you never open mentioning a flash sale or special offer for the hundredth time.

When you send out the right email, to the right person, it should feel more personal like it’s coming from a friend, rather than a mass marketing message trying to sell something.

Use personalization in the email and segment your list towards who is most likely to be interested.

An email subject that mentions the person by name and how it relates to their interests has a much higher chance of being opened or clicked. 

As a personal example from my own inbox: within the last few days I received emails with the subjects, “Massive 8×10 Live auction tonight!”, “Flash Sale—up to 60% off bedding, bath and more” and “Spark some happiness in your home from $4!” all of which just immediately went into the trash because I had no real interest.

On the other hand, email’s with the subjects “Michael, open this e-mail to load your offers!”, “Great escapes close to Toronto” and “Extra Discount on A Deal You Viewed” were all opened. Why? Because they were personalized for me and sparked my interest. The more interest the recipient has, the more chance they will open, read, and click the email.

When crafting your email, the other thing to keep in mind is the pre-header. It can be just as important as the subject. A brief description of just what’s inside the email and why it’s important to the recipient can go a long way towards increasing your opens.

Something to consider when bulk sending: How clean is the list you’re sending to?

Have you been sending to the same list of people for 5 years without any statistics on engagement? This can lead to very poor open rates, or even to having a spam trap in a worst case scenario. When it comes to list maintenance, the best practice is to always remove anyone that bounces, and consider pruning anyone that has not opened or clicked the email for a period of time. 

What if you are concerned about cutting prospective clients?

Run a campaign directly to them! Segment the list to those who have never opened an email in the past year, then send a campaign asking if they still want to receive emails, or offer a special discount. If you go with the first option then as people confirm they do still want your emails you can move them back into the main sending list. With the second option, you can see which email addresses are alive, and may still be interested in your product or services. Overall you are reducing the number of emails you send out, helping to increase your list quality and sender reputation.

Defining Lifecycle Stages
Brad Froese

Qualifying Leads by Lifecycle Stage

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Qualifying Leads by Lifecycle Stage

 

Defining Marketing Qualified Lead, or MQL, can be a slippery process because companies, departments and individuals can have very different viewpoints as to what really makes a prospect and MQL.

At Lead Liaison, we let Marketing and Sales define the stages together, so everyone owns and clearly understands what is taking place inside the sales funnel. Here’s how we’ve defined lifecycle stages, including MQL and SQL. We hope this is a helpful resource for your company as well:

Lifecycle Stage Definitions

People progress through Lifecycle Stages at Lead Liaison as we sell and market to them. Lifecycle Stages represent the different phases of a person as they evolve from a lead to a Prospect and ultimately into a customer.Our CRM, called OneFocus, tracks and reports on people in their Lifecycle Stage. Marketers can pull reports on the three Vs of marketing, the Velocity (how quickly people move into and out of stages), Viscosity (where people are getting stuck), and Volume (how many leads they have) of their leads. Depending on the stage, statuses change automatically, manually, or by customized business rules defined in the system. A critical function of Lifecycle Stages is that a person can never go backwards in their lifecycle. They only move forward. Lifecycle Stages are:

Suspect > Engaged > Marketing Qualified > Sales Qualified > Opportunity > Customer > Evangelist > Disqualified > Other

Suspect

Behavior: Automatically updated

When a new person is loaded into the system who we have never interacted with they become a Suspect. A Suspect has no idea who we are either. This is the first status for any net-new person in the system. This status is set automatically. 

Engaged

Behavior: Automatically updated

This status is set automatically. Prospects move from Suspect to Engaged whenever they generate inbound activity with us. For example, clicking through on a link in an email campaign, visiting a website, submitting a form, playing a game, etc. 

Marketing Qualified Lead (MQL)

Behavior: Updated by automated rules.

Prospects will be considered a MQL when any of the following happens:

  1. Prospect completes a form, or sends correspondence indicating interest in Lead Liaison solution(s) AND has submitted contact information pursuant to. This includes phone and/or email.
  2. Phone / Email Validity: Can be verified as a phone number or email where the prospect can be reached. Email should contain the company URL (no personal email domains), and if not, then verified by a response from the prospect which indicates ongoing interest in Lead Liaison solution(s).
  3. Prospect indicates current or future interest in doing business with Lead Liaison.
  4. Prospect can be considered a new MQL every 12 months. In other words, if the Prospect indicated interest in 2019, but fell off, and expressed renewed interest after 12 months, then the MQL will be counted as a new MQL.
  5. Prospect completes a process or form to receive a downloadable asset from a Lead Liaison website, landing page, social media platform or the like.
  6. Prospect replies to an outbound email campaign indicating interest.
  7. Prospect replies to an outbound social media communication indicating interest, and provides contact information pursuant to follow-up communications regarding Lead Liaison solution(s).
  8. Inbound Prospect reaches out to Lead Liaison via a website form inquiry, lead capture form inquiry of any kind in any Lead Liaison lead management platform.

Sales Qualified Lead (SQL)

Behavior: Manually updated

Sales Managers have 10 calendar days to disposition a lead from MQL status before an alert is sent out to management, marketing, and the Sales Manager. The Sales Manager has three choices when dispositioning a lead:

  • Move to SQL
  • Move to Disqualified
  • Keep as MQL

Prospects will be considered an SQL using the following criteria:

  1. Prospect’s company has budgeted for our Services,
  2. Prospect has authority (or is closely connected to someone with authority AND awareness of the project) to purchase our Services,
  3. Prospect has a need to purchase our Services,
  4. Prospect has a clear timeline for purchasing our Services within six (6) months from becoming a MQL.

Opportunity

Behavior: Automatically updated

When a Prospect is associated with a Deal (Opportunity) then the system will automatically move their Lifecycle Stage to Opportunity. 

Customer

Behavior: Automatically updated

 

When a Prospect is associated with a Deal (Opportunity) and the Deal moves to Closed-Won then the system will automatically move their Lifecycle Stage to Customer. 

Evangelist / Disqualified

Behavior: Manually updated

Move Prospects to this status as you see fit. 

Other

Behavior: Manually updated

The Other Lifecycle Stage can contain any statuses you wish. We use Former Customer under Other to better track who our former clients are.

 

For additional information about Lead Liaison solutions, visit https://leadliaison.com or complete a demo request for a personalized walkthrough.

Bambeeq Bambeeq

Perfecting Event Follow Up

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What are the best methods of post-event follow up?

  • Email correspondence as soon as possible after collecting the lead.
  • Handwritten letters or cards with additional information about your products / services.
  • Telephone follow-up no within one week after the event.

Following a simple process will help you connect with far more of your leads.

Step 1: Get Serious About Lead Retrieval

You will ideally be using a full featured event lead capture solution. As part of a customized automated process, Captello Lead Retrieval App enables you to capture leads with any mobile device and follow up with prospects immediately and automatically with personalized email. Ideally, the prospect walks away from an amazing conversation at your exhibit, then checks their phone, where they will discover your email or SMS message.

Step 2: Add a Personal Touch

Handwritten letters and notes are a great touch that everyone appreciates. Going old school in this way communicates that you spent time considering this prospect and their needs. Including a brochure or collateral that you discussed at the booth reminds them about how your product or service provides a solution to their felt needs.

Writing handwritten letters at scale is not something most marketing teams/salespeople have the time to do, so Captello provides this service as a value add feature to their flexible suite of solutions.

Step 3: Phone Follow Up

After an email and a personal handwritten letter from you, most prospects are familiar enough with your to take your phone call. Make sure they don’t slip through the cracks by adding a call task within your CRM.

Captello’s native integration with all major CRM and Marketing Automation platforms makes it easy to integrate with your CRM and create a task or sequence of tasks and that work for you. Imagine the possibilities if every lead from every trade show was part of an intentional and full-proof follow-up plan with emails, call tasks and handwritten letters or postcards!

So much planning goes into the execution of an event, but follow-up is the most important. Make it the most effective part of the process with powerful and intuitive lead capture software and automated workflow.

Lead Liaison

21 Questions to Ask Your Event Lead Management Vendor Before Making a Purchase

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To download the PDF of this resource, click here. 

To access our Event Lead Management Kit, which includes this resource, click here. 

According to Forrester, marketing events such as trade shows and conferences occupy the largest share of B2B marketing budgets at 14%. Choosing the right event lead management solution for lead capture will be the most important decision you make. Before signing a contract, here are 21 important questions to ask your vendor.

1. Does your solution integrate with my CRM, marketing automation platform, and/or analytics platform?

What good is capturing lead information if you don’t accurately save the information and prepare it for follow up? Ensure that your event lead capture/management solution integrates with the technology stack you already have in place. If you don’t have the proper solutions in place, like a CRM or a marketing automation platform, ask your Event Lead Management (ELM) vendor if they offer solutions for that need, as well. Communicating with the registered list of attendees prior to the event, and with the qualified leads after the event, is essential to converting your marketing event efforts into closed business.

2. Does your solution allow for immediate follow-up?

Insidesales.com conducted a study that found 35-50% of sales go to the vendor that responds first. The amount of time that goes by before you take action on your leads is important. Many event lead management solutions require additional, manual steps to follow up with a lead. Some, however, allow companies to instantly sync leads to your system of record so that you can communicate with the Prospect before they’ve even left the conference.

3. Does your solution allow me to respond to new leads via email, text, postcards, letters, and other types of communications?

Make sure you don’t limit the touch points you can send to new leads. According to MarketingProfs.com, 98% of all text messages are opened. Being able to instantly (or even introduce intentional delay) send a text message to new event leads could be vital to your strategy. You might also benefit from sending different types of touchpoints to nurture prospects through their journey.

4. How will you support me?

Some vendors in the ELM industry are headquartered in Europe, while some are in North America. Think about where your events will occur and make sure your vendor can support you. What if you have a problem on a Sunday while you’re setting up for your event on Monday? Will your vendor be there to support you? Are they truly a vendor or a partner?

5. Can I import and merge leads into your event object as if I captured them on the lead capture app?

You might attend some events where you’re collecting leads at your booth, and at the same time you get a CSV file with leads from a speaking session that occurs in parallel. Make sure your vendor can import your CSV file from the speaking session, and most importantly, merge the data with data you might have already collected at the event to avoid duplicates and keep your data clean.

6. Do you have an API for your event data?

Whether now or in the future, you might have a need to pull event data into your custom/third party software. If your vendor provides an API then you’ll be all set for your current/future needs.

7. How accurate are your transcriptions?

Why you should ask it: If the event lead management solution you are considering offers “business card transcription” as an option for lead capture, make sure you investigate a little further. You’ll want to double-check how accurate those transcriptions are.

8. How fast is the turnaround time for transcriptions?

The faster the transcription can happen, the sooner you can respond to your lead. Quick responses are vital. Your provider should be able to turn your transcriptions around quickly, within minutes, without sacrificing accuracy.

9. Do you offer true ROI metrics and allow me to see how much revenue we generated from an event?? Do you connect with the opportunities in my CRM?

Events occupy the largest share of B2B marketing budgets (14%), tracking accurate return on investment is critical. You’ll also need a lot of other key event data to be able to improve your process. Talk to your prospective ELM vendor about the data their solution can report back. Can you track cost per lead? Can you track which sales reps collected the most leads? Can you track post-event engagement? Can you track true ROI percentage, connect to my opportunities in my CRM, and show me revenue figures from my events?

10. Can I customize my lead capture forms? If so, how much? What about creating conditional questions?

Being able to customize your lead capture forms is important because the information a business wants to collect on a lead varies from company to company. You should look for an event lead management solution that allows you to customize the information you collect on the lead capture form.

To take it a step further, talk to your ELM vendor about customizing the look and feel of the form. A truly enterprise-ready solution will enable you to use your specific company colors, logo, explainer videos, etc.

11. Can I customize the invitations sent out to reps? Can I send an email and text message invitation?

Enterprises and large companies have large sales/marketing teams and get lots of email. If invitation emails are standardized, and not clear, you could risk inefficiencies by having your invitation emails deleted or marked as spam by recipients. Your vendor should help you custom your invitations. Also make sure you can send email, text, or both at once, so your invites are successfully received.

12. Do my reps have to log out and log back in to see changes?

Attending an event is stressful. The last thing reps need to deal with is logging out, tracking passwords, etc. to see changes/updates that might be pushed out to the mobile device. Make sure your vendor can push out updates in real-time without requiring people to log out and then back in again.

13. What if my team onsite at the event calls me at the office, explaining that they need to make a change to the event form? Can I make last-minute changes?

No matter how much you prepare for your event, there is a good chance you’ll need to make some last-minute adjustments as the team onsite adjusts to the environment and the audience. Look for an event lead management solution that supports instant updates. You want to be able to make changes to your event form in real time to best support your event staff.

14. Do you have offline mode?

Internet at trade shows and conferences can be spotty and expensive. You want to make sure that the solution you choose will support offline lead capture so you don’t lose a single opportunity.

15. Can I run my own events with the same platform?

If your company hosts its own marketing events, or even if you think it might be a possibility one day, ask your ELM vendor about running your own events. The solution you commit to should offer the option to run event check-in and registration. Bonus points if it supports the ability to print badges based on your registered attendee list.

16. Can you scan NFC badges?

Over time barcodes and QR codes on badges will be obsolete. The code consumes real estate on the badge. The modern way to create a badge is to embed a NFC chip into the badge (think Apple Pay) and hold a NFC-enabled device up to the badge to collect lead info. If your vendor doesn’t support NFC badge scanning then they’re not ready for the future and might not be ready to support you down the road.

17. What does your solution offer, on the back end, to enrich lead data and ensure that everything is up-to-date post event?

Let’s say that your team has a great conversation with an interested buyer. Your team collects their business card to follow up. But, wait! This person’s business cards was printed over a year ago and their phone number has since changed. Look for an ELM service that will enrich data. A superior solution will add key lead data such as gender, age, social presence, affinities/interests, social profile URLs, and much more.

18. Can you help me qualify my leads? Do you provide lead scoring and grading?

Lead qualification will help you differentiate look-alike leads and keep your sales team focused on important leads. Scoring helps measure how engaged a lead is, and grading measures how well they match your ideal buyer criteria.

19. Can you help me distribute my leads and report back to me on which reps are missing any response time requirements we put in place?

You might need to distribute leads based on various criteria, such as geography, names accounts, job titles, and more. You might also be interested in adding SLAs and report back to management for any reps that don’t follow up with your leads in time. Make sure your vendor can support your lead distribution and SLA needs, whether you have them now or are planning for them in the future.

20. If I have a list of registrants, can you help me market to them and/or load them into the app to search for them at my event?

Some providers have communication platforms that can help you reach out to a list of registrants prior to the show and build rich profiles at the same time. If you have registrants, you might also want to search for them on the lead capture app, select them, and pre-fill the form with their information. Make sure your vendor can help you make the most out of your registration lists.

21. Can you track the entire lifecycle of a lead, before and after an event?

Your engagement with a prospect may not start, and hopefully doesn’t stop, at your event. Look for an event lead management solution that can keep all engagement (inbound/outbound) in a timeline in addition to what info was collected when the lead was captured at an event. Examples of that activity are website visits, email link clicks or content downloads.

To set up an appointment to ask our team these questions, click here.

event lead management
Lead Liaison

Creative Uses for Lead Capture

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Download the PDF here!

To access our Event Lead Management Kit, which includes this resource, click here. 

Businesses can use Lead Liaison’s GoExhibit!™ in many ways – it’s not just for trade shows! GoExhibit!™ is an event lead management solution, powered by a slick mobile app, aptly named GoCapture!™. If you’re using an event lead management solution like ours, this article will help you explore the other ways you can use the system and/or mobile app to capture leads. We’ve rounded up seven creative uses for event lead capture using our system.

Everyday Lead Capture

Let’s say you are a salesperson running into a meeting with a client at their office. In the elevator on the way up to your appointment, you meet someone that might benefit from your service or solution. You grab their business card and hope to A) not lose it, and B) remember to enter the information into your CRM later. Or, you could open GoCapture!™ on your mobile device, quickly take a picture of the business card, have it automatically transcribed, and sync it with your CRM. Problem solved!

Corporate Event

Does your company host, or attend, corporate events or conferences? Use the power of GoExhibit!™ to collect lead information in a streamlined, unobtrusive way. The system also includes options to create your own custom badges with QR codes. A customized registration and check-in portal can be used at the front door to help manage attendance.

Trade Shows

Exhibiting at an industry trade show? Forget those antiquated badge scanners and opt for end-to-end event lead management. Use GoExhibit!™ to announce your attendance at the event via marketing emails, social media, and more. Go a step further and use complementary marketing services that integrate with GoExhibit!™ to book demos/meetings at the trade show. Then, have your team use the GoCapture!™ app at the trade show to collect lead information via badge scan, business card transcription, attendee list search, or manual form fill.

Lead Kiosks

Speaking of trade shows, another way to encourage excitement with potential prospects about your service or solution is to set up individual kiosks at your booth that allows visitors to fill out their information if they are interested.

Experiential Marketing

Instead of a table, a sign, and a person – create an experience at your booth. Your experience should engage the prospect in some way. Consider these 20 examples of experiential marketing to get your creative juices flowing. Be smart about setting up the experience though. When people engage, capture their information. GoCapture!™ can be configured to display custom content, such as videos, text, maps, and more to perfectly pair with your experiential display.

Product Showcase

Consider setting up your booth with individual solution areas. Each area could showcase specific solutions. Have each solution on display with a tablet sitting next to it. The tablet could run a purpose-built lead capture form that has an explainer video embedded into it. This approach helps you tailor the experience to specific solutions and results in higher lead conversion rates.

Sales Qualification

One aspect of GoExhibit!™ is lead qualification. Lead Liaison uses a system of scoring and grading to qualify leads. Have your sales team use GoCapture!™ as the primary method to get new leads into your system. Set up automated processes around each new lead that qualifies them. For example, give all CMOs captured with GoCapture!™ a grade increase from C (default you might set) to B. And, if the person is located in the USA then increase their grade another level, to A. On the backend, administrators can filter out ideal buyers captured anywhere, anytime, by your sales force using GoCapture!™.

Check-In System

If you host your own marketing events, then using GoExhibit!™ should be a no-brainer. With the ability to create custom badges ahead of time or on the fly, sign people in at the front desk, or register new attendees, your team can streamline the check-in process across all of your events. Leads are readily available after the event, in GoExhibit!™, for export or further processing. Statistics on attendance and return on investment (ROI) for your event is visible in the GoExhibit!™ dashboard.

 

To learn more about GoExhibit!™, request a free, customized demonstration here.

Ryan Schefke

Infographic: Post-Event Lead Nurturing Strategy

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Want the executive summary? Download the infographic here.

To access our Event Lead Management Kit, which includes this resource, click here. 

Marketing events can be a very costly effort. There’s the booth rental, the booth design/display, travel and expenses for your employees working the booth. Service costs like electricity, cleaning, or wifi can sneak up on you. Badge scanners are expensive (have you looked into other options?).

I think you get my drift: marketing events cost a lot of money. Return on investment (ROI) is paramount. Once your team has captured hot leads at an event, you should be prepared to follow up with those leads quickly and effectively. There’s no time to waste – don’t let your competitors beat you to the punch.

We are often asked for examples of how a business can (and should) nurture leads post-event. Below is an infographic that examines a tried-and-true post-event lead nurturing strategy. 

Technology to Support Lead Nurturing Strategy

The first step in determining your post-event lead nurturing strategy is to make sure you have the technology in place to automate it. Don’t count on these things being done manually – it’s just not realistic. Companies are busier than ever these days, usually with multiple people wearing multiple hats – stretched thin. There’s also tons of room for distraction at (and after) marketing events. The more administrative tasks you can automate, the better. Let your employees spend their time building relationships and making connections.

There are lots of options out there, but we recommend a wholistic approach. Look for technology that works together, so you don’t have to spend time exporting and importing. For example, our event lead management solution allows businesses to create and customize lead capture forms, prepare intelligent post-event workflows, quickly capture leads onsite, instantly sync with a CRM, and then place them into those previously mentioned workflows. No additional technology is needed.

Of course, we love our solutions. But, there are lots of options out there! Just make sure you have something in place to be able to effectively execute your plan.

Lead Management Strategy – Instant Tasks

Create a list of all the actions you want to take once you’ve captured the lead’s information, and separate them into groups based on the time of the outreach. Here are a few examples of what you might want to do instantly:

  • Tag the Prospect with the Event Name
  • Add the Prospect to the Event Leads list
  • Assign a grade or score to the Prospect based on your ideal buyer criteria
  • Distribute the lead (Prospect) – based on round-robin, geography, or product interest
  • Sync the Prospect Record with your CRM

Side Note – Lead Scoring vs. Lead Grading

Let’s talk more about lead score versus lead grade. You may want your reps to call a Prospect if their score is high and their grade is high. Or maybe just one or the other. To make that determiniation, you should know the differences. 

Lead scoring is a way to measure engagement, and it happens over time. Even before your event, a Prospect may have already been to your website, scanning a few of your webpages, which would increase their score. It will continue to increase as they continue to interact with your website or your content.

On the other hand, grading is a way to measure how well a Prospect matches your ideal buyer criteria. Your reps can qualify and assign a grade onsite at the event. With our event lead management solution, reps can collect lead data quickly and either grade them in the moment, or they can go back later and grade them when they have a lull in booth traffic.

Lead Management Strategy – Starting Your Nuture

Once those organizational actions have been completed (usually within seconds), what do you want to do next? Let me answer that for you…you want to follow up. Insidesales.com conducted a study that found 35-50% of sales go to the vendor that responds first. That means that the timing of your follow up matters.

If at all possible, reach out to your leads within an hour of them visiting your booth. A great example of this kind of outreach is with a text message. If you’re capturing a lead’s mobile phone number, use your marketing automation platform to send a text message saying, “Hi Jane, it’s Bob. Thanks for stopping by our booth! We’ll be in touch soon – but in the meantime, here’s my number if you have any questions…” That is sure to make your company stand out.

24 Hours Later

Send an email. Even though you already sent a text message, send an email 24 hours later. Give your Prospect time to filter through messages from other booths, but not enough time that they forget who you are. Remind them of a product feature that sets you apart from other exhibitors at the trade show.

Pivot

At this point in the game, you may want to consider customizing your lead nurturing strategy based on the previously mentioned lead score and/or grade (depending on what matter most to your business) and how the Prospect interacts with your outreach or content. Your marketing automation platform should have the capability of customizing the workflow using this kind of criteria. If the lead score is high, assign a task to a rep to make a call. If it’s low, continue to nurture via email.

Don’t disqualify leads with a lower score or grade. They may be hesitant because they are taking this decision more seriously. Offer a piece of educational content, like an infographic or a case study. Try to be their source of education in the industry, so they begin to see your company as a thought leader.

If they download the content, you may want to pivot further based on that. If they downloaded it, offer another link to an informative blog post with a powerful call-to-action (CTA). Make the decision to reach out to you easy.

If they didn’t download the content, perhaps they need the same information as the lead above, but rather they need it summarized within the email itself to reduce effort. Include your CTA within the email itself, to make it even easier.

In Summary

Continue nurturing your Prospects for several weeks until they are ready to buy, or place them into your newsletter list so that you can continue your educational content without being too pushy.

It’s all about creating a sense of authority and innovation within your industry. Those that actively attend trade shows, conferences, or other marketing events are not passive. They are engaged, and their presence at an event will make them hyper-aware of you and your competitors.

If you decide to exhibit at an event, be prepared to make it count. Here’s an infographic that you can save for when the time comes. And, good luck!  

Ryan Schefke

Decision Guide: Comparing Pros and Cons of Badge Scanners vs Mobile Apps

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Want the executive summary? Download the infographic here. 

To access our Event Lead Management Kit, which includes this resource, click here. 

It’s time to prepare for your upcoming trade show, but lately you’ve heard a lot about new mobile apps that allow you to forego the pricy badge scanners and use your own devices. It sounds intriguing, but you’ll need to know a little more before making the jump.  

We’ve rounded up the pros and cons of badge scanners vs mobile apps. Really, what you’re comparing is a standard lead retrieval system that captures basic information that attendees provide to the event host, versus a customizable, enterprise-ready event lead management system that can empower you to actually do something with those leads post-event.

Badge Scanners

Pros

  • Contact and rental info may be easier to find as most trade show organizers partner with lead retrieval companies who promote their solution.
  • Proven and reliable.
  • Badge scanners are fast. Scanning takes mere seconds.
  • Builds a list of contacts.

Cons

  • Managing and distributing leads after the event is a manual and time consuming process, and it could take days to retrieve your lead list.
  • There is only one way to capture a lead (by scanning a barcode). You’ll lack the ability to have multiple sources of integrated lead capture (like a kiosk for when your sales team is tied up with other attendees).
  • There is no qualification – unless you count your salesperson’s scribble on the printout from the badge scanner. Hopefully, he remembers all the notes he meant to write down!
  • You have to go through the process of renting and setting them up for each event.
  • They are expensive (ranging from $200 to $500 per device). Some might also require internet, which is another expense.
  • They are bulky and can get misplaced.
  • Limited ways to respond to leads, if at all.
  • No GDPR compliance options.
  • No control over entire experience.
  • No lead enrichment.

Mobile App

Pros

  • Leads are captured and in your possession instantly. This results in instant replies, instant lead routing, instant flow through your business process. And apps usually integrate directly with enterprise CRM and marketing automation systems.
  • Less setup & more options. Once you select your mobile app, you don’t have to keep going through the process for each trade show. You don’t have to set it up each time, outside of connecting your Media Kit. And, you’ll benefit from multiple lead capture methods, such as business card transcription, pre-registration, manual submission, and badge scanning.
  • Integration & automation makes it easier than ever to show a clear ROI for the tens of thousands of dollars spent on trade shows. Depending on the martech you integrate with, you should be able to easily track which leads actually convert to sales.
  • Sales and marketing staff can use their own mobile device instead of carrying around a bulky scanner.
  • Works offline, eliminating the need to rent internet which could cost 100s of dollars. You have complete control over the experience with your event visitors and managing leads internally.
  • Mobile apps are usually more current. For example, some mobile apps (like ours) offer GDPR/Privacy Management compliance options.
  • Consistent user experience as sales reps and marketers manning the booth only have to learn one system.
  • Leads are automatically enriched with social and demographic information.
  • Automation, automation, automation – mobile apps allow for immediate qualification, scoring, and follow up utilizing the integration mentioned above

Cons

  • There’s some legwork that needs to be done when choosing a mobile app solution provider. But keep in mind, you only have to do that legwork once.
  • You still have to purchase a “Media Kit” in order to activate badge scanning using a mobile app. These usually run around $500. That’s still significantly less than purchasing internet PLUS a badge scanner for each person.
  • Mobile lead capture apps are typically priced as a monthly subscription, so if you’re not going to a lot of trade shows, it may not be worth it. There may also be limitations on how many shows you can do or how many salespeople can use the app at one time.

Take Away

Using an event lead management system will reduce the amount of headache collecting leads during an event and managing leads after an event, while badge scanners are more convenient to rent prior to an event. Clearly define your goals, and if you go with a mobile trade show app, find one that integrates well with your martech.

To learn more about Lead Liaison’s mobile app, GoCapture!™, or our entire Event Lead Management soltuion, click here.

Plus…

We put together this infographic with the key points from above. Feel free to print and hang this at your desk, or pass along to your colleagues.

Badge Scanners vs. Mobile Apps

Badge Scanners vs. Mobile Apps