Any best practices for lead nurturing

Lead Liaison

Five Steps to Building an Effective Lead Nurturing Program

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Five Steps to Building an Effective Lead Nurturing ProgramThere are five fundamental steps to building an effective and productive lead nurturing campaign. A solid lead nurturing program needs to consist of finding worthy leads by utilizing lead qualifying and scoring methods then segmenting leads based on their personal interests. It also involves developing a compelling content strategy, optimizing landing pages and tracking results. The more thought and planning put into developing a compelling lead nurturing program, the more likely it will secure new customers.

Here are more details on those five factors and how they can help convert more leads into revenue.

1.       Lead scoring

Leading scoring is a process that ranks each potential visitor based on their likelihood of purchasing a company’s product or service. It searches for clues in their online profile that coincide with their typical customer and then it ranks them on importance or relevance. A company can discover significant information on a lead simple by examining their browser history. Also consider using Lead Grading, a feature of Lead Liaison’s platform, to identify how well a prospect matches your ideal buyer profile.

2.       List segmentation

After you have qualified each lead as being valuable, the next step is segmenting them into distinct groups. By using demographics and their personal interests to segment leads into designated categories, efforts can be targeted by group instead of on an individual basis. Use Lead Liaison’s Dynamic Target Lists to “set it and forget it”. Dynamic Target Lists enable marketers to establish list building rules that always run resulting in an always-updated list of targeted contacts.

3.       Developing a content strategy

A content strategy is the key to the success of any lead nurturing program. A company must first determine what type of content you want to send and how frequently you should send it.  Every piece of information sent needs to be relevant information and grab the reader’s attention.  If the content fails to impress then the entire campaign fails.

4.       Landing page optimization

The first page that a lead sees is a crucial element in whether or not they convert into a sale. Start by reviewing the intended customer flow to determine where each segmented lead will most likely end up. Then create a dynamic landing page designed to convert a lead into a sale.

5.       Tracking results

There is no point in creating an effective lead nurturing campaign if a company is not able to track and review the results. Businesses need to know what works and what didn’t so they can plan future campaigns accordingly. An effective lead nurturing program has to evaluate each attempt and how easily it was able to convert leads into sales.

Following these five factors will help your company build an effective lead nurturing program. Your business will have the ability to tap into each potential customer, group them by interests, and then develop content that appeals to them. It will also direct them to a powerful landing page to seal the deal and track the results of each successful conversion.

Lead Liaison

Five Effective Lead Nurturing Tools

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Five Effective Lead Nurturing ToolsLead nurturing is a strategy of maintaining contact. An effective campaign should build a relationship that turns marketing leads into qualified prospects. In order to change a lead to a prospect, it usually takes multiple communication channels used during different buying phases. There are several digital and customer-facing options that are effective in building relationships. Let’s look at five lead nurturing tools that can transition leads into sales opportunities:

Web Content Articles

Publishing articles that interest your markets is a good way to connect with leads. Companies maintain contact by providing knowledge, ideas, advice or reviews to their audiences. Selecting topics and creating articles that are relevant to both your business and the interests of your markets is critical to success. Links to a landing page or squeeze page connect the reader with your company or product. Content articles can be effective when they’re posted on the company website, but are more effective through distribution via content publishers and directories.

Webinars

Hosting or participating in webinars provides a vivid impression on leads. The practice of using webinars to attract leads has been used in B2B commerce for years. Shared knowledge and engagement through Q & A and post-event information requests provide a connection that builds trust. Webinars are often most effective within a tiered exposure strategy, where touch points are introduced during advanced stages of the decision cycle. Most hosting software vendors provide reports about attendance duration, IP addresses, and other valuable data.

Trade Shows & Conferences

Attendance at trade shows and conferences allows businesses to connect with their markets, partners, vendors and competitors. Lead nurturing can be achieved through presentations or exhibits. Presenters are seen as industry authorities, which boosts company credibility. Q & A sessions and social events provide great opportunities to establish deeper connections with leads.

Trade show exhibition should be used to nurture leads that are almost prepared to buy. The level of personal engagement that trade show exhibition can provide surpasses many other lead nurturing tools. It is a great way to announce new products, perform market testing and engage new markets.

Email

Email marketing can be effective at the start and throughout the lead nurturing process. Email drip campaigns provide continual contact; companies connect through news, offers, references, advice, and other helpful information. Email is effective for lead nurturing because of its message reinforcement capabilities, allowing you to review previous messages while adding new information. One strategy is to set up auto responders that provide solutions to questions or issues that are raised through other channels or previous messages.

Press Releases

Press releases provide occasional opportunities to connect with leads. Announcements that are newsworthy – such as events, releases, achievements and company activities (such as executive appointments) – allow leads to become familiar, and comfortable, with your company. It is important to note that press releases should be used to announce significant news that may be interesting to your audience; saturating readers with insignificant news will likely turn leads cold in a hurry.

Many of today’s lead nurturing tools not only connect companies with their markets, they provide detailed reporting on campaign effectiveness. This allows marketers to be nimble. The trick is to use each tool at the appropriate stage of the sales cycle.

To find out more about how Lead Liaison’s Revenue Generation Software™ can provide your organization with professional-grade, effective lead nurturing contact us.

Lead Liaison

Creating an Effective Lead Nurturing Program

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Creating an Effective Lead Nurturing ProgramIt may not seem that complex to set up a solid lead nurturing program; however, it requires more than just planning email campaigns, importing contact lists, and sending prospects down automated marketing flows.  There are so many important things to consider for your efforts to be effective and well received.

Know your flow!

Businesses need to map out the direct path each potential lead should take to reach their website’s intended landing page.  Companies need to identify the starting and ending points of their flow, so they can guide each lead in the right direction.  Successful lead nurturing comes from knowing where you want each prospect to end up and then making sure that they get there with the least chance of interruptions or distractions.

Know where to collect data!

Every person online is leaving a trail of their personal interests based on the sites they are visiting, the products they are buying and their own unique comments or posts.  It is important that every company has a system that can pinpoint specific areas where data can be collected on the prospect and then analysed to determine whether or not the lead has any real potential.

Know your weaknesses!

Part of creating an effective lead nurturing program is finding potential problem areas where prospects may fall out of the flow.  Anytime a potential customer is within reach of your marketing efforts, it is important to grab their attention and hold on.  By identifying weaknesses in advance, specific plans can be developed to capture every valuable lead.

Know your lead’s expectations!

Today’s business-to-business buyer is highly educated and has easy access to an abundance of information, including articles and blogs posted by competitors.  To effectively nurture a lead, every message a company sends need to be relevant, informative and regularly updated.  Consumers have high expectations and lead nurturing campaigns need to meet or exceed them to stand out.

The better method you have for collecting information on leads, the easier it will be to direct them to content that will obtain and maintain their interest.  By understanding potential leads and their expectations, lead nurturing campaigns will have a higher rate of conversion.  Follow these steps to ensure that no valuable lead is lost along the way.

Lead Liaison

The Real Value in Lead Nurturing

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The Real Value in Lead NurturingInterested in knowing the real value in lead nurturing? Your business needs quality leads in order for it to generate revenue and stay competitive.  There needs to be a constant flow of new potential customers in order to survive.  By using modern marketing automation software, it will give you a greater advantage when it comes to generating leads and making the most out of each new prospect.  The secret to successful lead generation and effective marketing starts with an accurate scoring process.  The scoring process assesses the potential in each online inquiry to determine which leads are qualified and worth it for your sales team to pursue.  The next and most valuable step in the process is turning the qualified leads into actual sales.  This happens by using a process called lead nurturing.

Lead nurturing will score leads based on inherent buying signals and it will assess how well they match your ideal customer profile.  By scoring the lead based on their personal compatibility to your company, you can then determine which leads are worthy of more effort and which are not worth your time at all.  If you are using marketing automation for your lead generation then you can also program the software that you are using to send automatic alerts to your sales reps based on the ones that have the highest potential for conversion.

Lead nurturing through marketing automation will also set up auto-response emails and
marketing campaigns directly to potential customers.  Typically, a lead nurturing program includes a variation of informative letters, emails, articles, voicemails, case studies, success stories, events, white papers and webcasts strategically planned to target specific qualified leads.  The greater variety in the approach, the more likely there will be a positive response.

A key aspect of effective lead nurturing is the ability to provide valuable education and information to prospects at no charge to them, so that you are first establishing yourself as a trusted advisor.  You will then become the perceived expert in your respective field and they will turn to you with their future questions or concerns.  You don’t need to have a strong sales pitch or an outrageous gimmick to grab their attention.  Instead, simply provide insights and solutions on your area of expertise to build your reputation in the potential customer’s eyes.  Then the odds are that you will be the first company they will call on when there is a need for your services.

Your business cannot grow without a stream of quality leads coming in on a regular basis.  Your business needs to continue to secure new customers and now the process of obtaining and converting those leads into sales is more efficient.  Through a solid lead nurturing strategy and a productive sales team, the possibilities are endless!

Lead Liaison

Target Marketing Strategy

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Target Marketing StrategyDoes your target market strategy involve selling to a finite set of accounts? Is your Total Available Market (TAM) a small list of companies you can list on one or two pages of a word document? Does your company avoid buying marketing lists and limit outbound marketing to the masses? If the answer is yes to any of these questions then Revenue Generation Software™, driven by marketing automation technology under the hood, will boost your business to the next level and drive your target market strategy.

Here are six ways you can make the most out of your well-defined target market:

Relationship Marketing

Competitors are chasing the same target market as you are. It’s vital to differentiate your company from your competitors. One way to do that is to invest in building relationships. Use Revenue Generation Software™ to automatically and intelligently interact with prospects to create meaningful conversations that keep prospects thinking about you, not your competitor, first. Pre-configure relationship nurturing tracks that enable sales people to instantly drop strategic contacts into a nurturing program. Consistent, company-generated messaging will permeate your target account better than disparate, sales-generated messaging. Make sure to leverage technology to build relationships as part of your target marketing strategy.

Prospect Tracking

Sales people have a challenging job breaking into strategic accounts; it is not easy navigating an organization from the outside in. Many calls and emails can be sent with zero visibility as to the effectiveness of a sales person’s outreach. Use desktop software that streams business to business website visitor traffic in real-time to get feedback on sales outreach. Sales people will know when a strategic account responds to a call or clicks a link in an email with software that alerts the sales representative when the strategic account visits your company’s website.

Account Profiling

Unless they know an insider, sales people have a tough time finding whom to call without an organization chart. Use Revenue Generation Software™ to build a list of employees and their roles and map out an organization. Find a contact you need to call then instantly import the contact into your CRM, such as Salesforce.com, saving time on data entry. Also, business intelligence information such as description, revenue, headquarter location, financials, executives, jobs and more are available to help profile companies.

Competitive Landscaping

Once your company identifies an ideal target identify their competitors. Use Revenue Generation Software™ to augment sales prospecting by quickly viewing competitors of a target account. Then start relationship marketing efforts with your strategic account’s competitor.

Marketing Engagement

Relationship marketing helps businesses and sales people stay in touch with their target market. It’s also important to engage your target market. Use surveys to stimulate interaction and engage your audience. Make sure to process the results and respond. Shield competitors from your finite account base by showing prospects your company is inquisitive and ready to listen.

Personalized Selling

Generic, company-to-company or company-to-person communication might be effective for businesses blasting out emails to massive marketing lists. However, if you know your target market and never buy lists there’s a good chance each of your target accounts, leads and contacts have been assigned a lead owner by your company. Use Revenue Generation Software™ to send closed-loop email messages from the lead owner and make communications personalized and intimate, vital for building relationships.

We encourage you to learn more about how Lead Liaison’s Revenue Generation Software™ can amp up your target market strategy and help your company break into strategic accounts. Even if your company only sells to a finite set of target accounts our technology can deliver immediate value and help your company increase revenue.

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Free Lead Nurturing Software

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Free Lead Nurturing SoftwareThere are a few free lead nurturing software packages out there; however, don’t be fooled. My momma always said, “son, there’s no such thing as free”. Free usually comes with a cost. Whether its license limitations, an underperforming product or poor support/backing – nothing is free. If it doesn’t cost now then it will cost later. In my professional experience I’ve seen companies opt for free or less expensive solutions over slightly more expensive solutions that are higher quality. They implemented alternative solutions just to save a few thousand dollars. These companies got so deep into the implementation that they couldn’t back out. A poor performing, feature-limited and license right-limited product ended up costing them more money in the long run. What people don’t realize is it’s not all about cost. It’s about value, quality, direction and a partnership you (hopefully) get from a vendor. Seek out a partnership, not a vendor-customer relationship. Seek out an investment, not a low cost solution.

Lead nurturing is such a critical part of any B2B operation – don’t sell it short. Bringing a “freemium” or free lead nurturing solution into your organization could introduce serious ramifications. Go with lead nurturing software that’s easy to use, modular, and extensible with no limitations. I’ve seen some solutions in the marketing automation space that limit the number of emails that can be sent or the number of users than can create and/or deliver nurturing. There are also some scary, difficult to use user interfaces to build lead nurturing campaigns but we won’t go there. If you stumbled across this article for free lead nurturing software then you’re probably looking for a lead nurturing solution. If so, here are a few things to look out for:

• Free attracts the wrong crowd that you don’t want to be involved with. Companies/individuals inundating a system, overloading it and/or taking advantage of it for purposes different than what it was intended for. That could have adverse effects on your business and implementation such as performance hits.
• If you need help with your lead nurturing strategy you probably won’t get much attention from a vendor if you’re not paying them. Consider the whole solution necessary to drive results. Usually, the whole solution is product plus people.
• What’s next after the free version? How much do you have to pay? What are the boundaries of the free license?

Fill out the form on the top right if we’ve convinced you to stay away from free. We’re not free, but we’re worth every penny. Don’t look at lead nurturing as an added cost to your business, think about it as an investment in your business. Learn more about Lead Liaison’s lead nurturing software today!

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Lead Nurturing to Keep Your Customers

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Lead Nurturing to Keep Your CustomersLead nurturing is an excellent tool for new prospects; especially those who aren’t quite ready to buy yet. Lead nurturing helps sales people build relationships with prospects while ensuring prospects keep the vendors solutions top-of-mind. All of this is great for prospects; but, what about the benefits to existing customers? Businesses rarely think of lead nurturing as a tool to help their customers. Let’s explore one way you can use lead nurturing to keep your customers.

Simply put, lead nurturing will help keep your customer’s business. Let’s suppose you’re running a subscription-based business. Every year, or every contract period, customers need to renew. Discussing renewals with customers you’ve rarely communicated with over the current contract period can be uncomfortable at times. It’s natural to think – “if ain’t broke don’t fix it” – so why wake the sleeping dog. But, is that the best way to practice business? Nurturing your customers during their contract period will keep the relationship warm and invite your customer to provide you with feedback. But remember, it is imperative you send lead nurturing content from a person, such as an Account Manager, rather than a company. Company-to-individual communications are much more impersonal than one-to-one communications.

Even if your company is not selling subscriptions then they’re probably selling perpetual licenses – unless they’re in the business of providing services only. Most perpetual licenses have a Maintenance and Support fee associated with them. Consider the opportunity to use lead nurturing to secure customer’s Maintenance and Support payments as well.

Start using lead nurturing to keep your customers payments coming and you’ll find your renewals, as well as relationships, much easier to manage!

Learn how Lead Liaison’s nurturing solutions can help you secure revenue with your existing customers! Contact us today!

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2011 B2B Marketing Budgets

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B2B Marketing BudgetsA recent study by Marketing Sherpa showed a breakdown of B2B marketing budgets in 2011. Frankly, I’m shocked to see how businesses are allocating their marketing dollars. I propose B2B marketing companies re-prioritize their budgets by re-allocating dollars from one marketing investment to another to produce a higher ROI and generate more revenue. Specifically, marketing investments in website design and trade shows should be decreased while marketing investments in social media, marketing automation and lead nurturing should be increased.

Increasing B2B Marketing Budgets

Marketers must recognize it’s a buyer’s world. More and more buyers conduct research online before ever contacting a vendor. The internet-era changed the landscape of sales and marketing. Data sheets, white papers, webinars, blogs, forums, public profiles, employees, competitors and more can be researched without ever picking up the phone. It’s the same concept as in the B2C world when consumers buy a car. Case in point, Polk and Autotrader.com conducted a survey of 4,005 U.S. consumers and found 71% of those surveyed conducted research online before buying their car.

2011 B2B Marketing BudgetsThe same process applies to the B2B world. More than 80% of B2B buyers research the internet for answers about products and services before calling a sales rep. With the proliferation of mobile phones and tablets this percentage will surely rise. B2B marketers have got to be in the right place at the right time (social media), monitor/listen to buyer’s behavior (marketing automation) and engage prospective buyers (lead nurturing). As the volume of online and/or digital activity increases, so does the opportunity to interact and engage with potential buyers. Lead nurturing helps B2B marketers create meaningful dialogue with prospects based on their research and interests. The net result of lead nurturing is stronger relationships and shorter sales cycles as prospects will keep you top of mind through consistent and on-target communications. For these reasons B2B marketing budgets should include social media, lead nurturing and marketing automation as a high priority.

But, what if there’s no more money in the budget for these items? That’s an easy problem to solve. Reduce investments in website design and trade shows and re-appropriate the funds.

Decreasing B2B Marketing Budgets

Trade shows are generally a thing of the past and put pressure on B2B marketing budgets. We’re not implying you completely do away with trade shows; however, reduced investment should be considered. Trade shows are expensive and usually cost about $10,000 minimum just to get in the door. Do yourself a favor and analyze ROI from past trade shows. The easiest way to do this is to look at past sales wins and identify if the lead came from a trade show. If you can’t tie revenue to your trade show investments they’re not worth it. Although, attending a trade show might help prospects recognize your brand/image; sometimes you’ve just got to show up. My advice is to pick a few select trade shows that you must attend and get an exhibitor pass for the others.

As for website design, I encourage B2B companies consider moving their website into a content management system (CMS) such as Drupal or WordPress. These tools have very professional off-the-shelf themes and several plug-ins for search engine optimization, blog authoring and more. You might spend a little more up front to change your site but its well worth it over time. Many of the processes which you rely on 3rd parties for can be automated and you’ll have more control over your content and of course, reduce costs.

Take your money saved from trade shows and website development and invest in social media, lead nurturing and marketing automation.

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Email Automation

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Email AutomationMany businesses rely on email as a means to communicate with their prospects and customers. Unfortunately, plain vanilla email has become prehistoric. Intelligent email automation is necessary to hold meaningful, relevant and interesting conversations with prospects and customers.

Not using intelligent email automation has the following drawbacks:

• It takes more time as individual emails need to be crafted and sent

• Communications are usually one to one and not one to many

• It’s ineffective since the same messages are broadcast out to a large group

• There’s no interaction and opportunity to converse with your prospects/customers

Don’t make the mistake of thinking email marketing is email automation, it’s not. Email marketing is great for things like newsletters; however, email marketing doesn’t understand how recipients engage or interact with email messages. Also, email marketing requires marketers to manually dig through reports to analyze email opens. Additionally, email marketing has misled marketers to believe ROI is measured on email opens.

Email automation technology solves these problems. It helps marketers measure the true ROI of email campaigns by presenting who’s genuinely interested in real-time. Email automation is commonly called lead nurturing or closed loop email marketing. When marketers automate email they’re able to nurture leads. Here’s an example of an email automation process:

• Marketer sends a single email message to many recipients

• Message is personalized by using the recipient’s name, company and other credentials

• Recipient opens the email message and clicks a link of interest in the email

• Lead tracking technology shows which link was clicked and tracks the recipient’s entire online behavior (pages viewed, web forms submitted, content downloaded, etc.)

• Email automation kicks in and triggers a series of related, future communications based off the recipients interests thereby nurturing the lead

By using email automation businesses can increase marketing efficiency and build stronger relationships with prospects and customers. Using intelligent automation results in closer engagement between a buyer and a seller as two-way conversations occur vs. one-way “email blasts”.

To learn how Lead Liaison’s email automation can help nurture your leads contact us using the form on this page at the top right.

How has email automation helped you nurture leads?

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Mitigate Email Unsubscribe

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Mitigate Email UnsubscribeIn our post last week we talked about why people unsubscribe from emails. Essentially, unsubscribes can be boiled down to three factors. Abusing the recipients information, sending emails too frequently and sending content that’s not relevant or interesting. Fortunately, there’s a solution to mitigate email unsubscribe problems.

Solving Email Unsubscribe Issues

There are two solutions to the aforementioned problems. First, don’t share your customer’s data with anyone. Sharing recipients credentials is disrespectful of their privacy. We realize this is an obvious one and should go without saying; however, it’s important to always be cognizant of this. Make sure to have a privacy policy and abide by it. Second, adopt a revenue generation software platform which includes marketing automation and lead nurturing technology. These technologies automate marketing processes such as email marketing and build relationships with customers and prospects through relevant and timely communications.

The Car Dealership Example

If you recall from our post last week I talked about my experiences with the GMC dealership. Let’s focus on that experience and how the dealership could have kept me on their email list. If the dealership added my activities (online quote, test drive, need to sell two cars, etc.) to their database they could use these events as triggers which spawn relevant actions. For example, they knew I wanted an Acadia Denali from my online quote request. Perhaps they could have added me to a lead nurturing campaign that educated me about the features and benefits of the Acadia Denali model. Also, when I told them I needed to sell my two cars before buying they could have added me to a lead nurturing campaign that combined emails and phone calls to address my need. For example, they could have sent me emails • advising where I could sell the cars and • notifying me when their buyer is in the office so he could give me an estimate and • sending me to Kelley Blue Book to lookup the value of my vehicles and • providing tips on how to sell a car. Furthermore, when I test drove the vehicle they could have added me to a lead nurturing campaign that sent me a follow up email thanking me for the test drive. The campaign could have also scheduled a call for their sales person to ask for my feedback after the test drive. In summary, the dealership missed out on several opportunities to engage me with interesting and timely content. The point of lead nurturing in this example is to send relevant communications based on what I (the buyer) care about and to send those communications when I express particular behavior indicative of buying. They’ve lost my interest since I continue to get communications from them even after I stopped interacting. It seems they’ve forgotten my needs. My suggestion to all B2B or B2C sales and marketing people is to get your organization to adopt marketing automation and lead nurturing technology. Start listening to your buyers. Automation technology will engage and nurture leads to build stronger relationships. When you’re up and running you’ll wind up with more qualified leads that are ready to buy. What’s your feedback on how to mitigate email unsubscribes? To be alerted of future posts, please click on the RSS button.