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Lead nurturing gets a lot of attention. Wondering why? Jon Miller, co-founder of Marketo, defines lead nurturing as this:
“…the art of maintaining permission to ‘keep in touch’ with potential customers as they educate themselves, with the goal of being top of mind when they are ready to move into a buying phase.”
Notice that key point – as customers educate themselves. It’s a marketers job to nurture that process and to be the first company that pops into their minds when they become active buyers. As you know, the self-directed buyer relies less on sales professionals than ever before.
Here are three ways to stay valuable to your leads as they guide themselves through the process:
1. Bite-sized bits
Leads are busy. They have a lot of decisions to make in a little bit of time. Nurturing them in quick, digestible ways is the most effective way to maintain a compelling conversation. Though it’s tempting to provide comprehensive touchpoints, it’s better to leave leads wanting more. If your strategy is smart and personalized, you’ll be able to do this without sacrificing anything that’s critical.
2. Funnel-based content
As we discussed last month, it’s imperative that you create content for each stage of the funnel. Leads will be intrigued to hear exactly what they need at exactly the right time and more importantly, start looking to you for more. Having content ready to go, paired with sound lead scoring practices, is one of the most useful lead nurturing strategies available.
3. Emails – more relevant, more frequent
When your content is specifically tailored to your leads, you can communicate with them more frequently. Emails can be brief but useful, directing prospects to content that aligns itself with their point in the process.
What lead nurturing practices have worked best for your company?
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Monday was all about the role data plays in lead management. Lead scoring, however, isn’t the end of it. Data should shape your entire lead management strategy — including content.
Isn’t demand generation essentially smart content strategy, anyway? When it comes to content planning, consider your data a directive. The links your leads have been clicking determine exactly what you should send them next. To nurture leads, increase future engagement and encourage sales, pay attention to the information you have.
Here are three ways to shape content to your leads’ interests:
1. Create Segmented Email Campaigns
Your leads should be divided into segmented lists, determined by two things: interest indicated at sign-up and level of engagement shown. Prospects nearing the end of the funnel (high lead scores) should be sent different content than new subscribers. Likewise, prospects showing signs of indecision should be sent educational content that provides value to the process.
2. Send Personalized Product Download Invitations
Tailor content directly to lead behavior. And it doesn’t have to be new content, either. If a lead spends time reading all your blog posts on a particular subject, send them an invitation to download an old whitepaper or eBook on the same topic. They’ll be impressed that you pay attention.
3. Fill Your Newsletter with Popular Material
Being popular isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Your most-clicked content was popular for a reason, so give it one last hurrah in your monthly newsletter. To generate more engagement, send your leads a round up of your most popular recent links, and consider developing popular themes further in the future.
What role does content play in your lead nurturing process?
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Every lead management strategy tackles lead scoring, like it or not. Thanks to the data and detail-oriented tracking involved, it sounds intimidating, but today, we’re showing you just how accessible and useful it really is.
Defined, lead scoring is gauging a prospect’s interest level by actions taken. The digital age has provided us with a wealth of insight into lead behavior, and not using it wastes a valuable pathway to increased revenue.
In case you’re new to lead scoring, here are the basics:
What to track and why
The first part of lead scoring matches a prospect to your ideal buyer profile based on fundamental facts, such as industry, company and job title. The second part – the part that helps propel sales – is measuring their level of interest. Track email clicks, product downloads, site visits and social interactions. When it comes to your website, no amount of information is too much. Your scoring system should tell you exactly what a prospect does on your site and what it means. Data analysis plays a heavy role in lead management, because taking a look at the hard facts – what links a particular prospect clicked in your e-newsletter, for example – will help convert them in the end.
What scores mean
With your product or service in mind, business rules should be developed to interpret lead scoring for your company. These rules distinguish what makes a high score and lead you to the most valuable prospects. If an executive from your industry spends time on your product pages or examines your case studies, for example, the score should rank much higher than a student reading your blog. If an attractive prospect’s behavior is showing red-hot levels of interest, sales knows it’s time to make a call.
How to keep up
Don’t worry, no one expects you to keep track of all this data by yourself. Marketing automation software and CRM tools do most of the work for you. You just have to meet them halfway – understand what data is there, and have a plan in place to help your company use it.
Why it pays off
Your marketing and sales teams will be much more effective when they use lead scoring well – they’ll know exactly when to deliver educational content to one prospect, and when to make a direct sales call to another who actually wants to talk. Analyzing interest level behaviors is the best way to optimize your company’s time.
How has lead scoring helped your company succeed?
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Yep, that’s right – our policy is No Lead Left Behind. Sometimes, despite careful nurturing, leads choose not to buy. Even if your lead management framework is smart and strategic, and your leads get the right content at the right time, some prospects get cold feet in the final stage. That’s why it’s important to have a plan in place.
Recycling isn’t just for the environment.
A shocking 80% of leads end up lost or discarded, but effective lead management strategies prevent losing potential revenue in that black hole. Wondering how to do that? We’re here to help. Your plan should include ways to re-engage and re-nurture, whether a salesperson manually puts leads back in the system or they’re placed there through web interaction.
Four essential parts of lead recycling:
1. Develop timelines for re-engagement
Your system should have set timelines for re-engagement of recycled leads. These provide directives for sales contact and automatic content distribution, helping your team deal with varying levels of lead readiness.
2. Manual placement by Sales Rep
If sales determines a lead isn’t ready to commit, they should return them manually to the beginning of the process. Their insight determines which of the set timelines, described above, should be applied to a recycled lead.
3. Automatic Placement
Sometimes leads aren’t working with salespeople when they decide to wait. Your lead management should have a set of lead scoring rules in place to determine digitally if a lead needs to be recycled. Certain web behaviors indicate a failure to buy, but that doesn’t mean the lead should be lost.
4. Web Opt
In some cases, leads get to decide for themselves when it’s time to be recycled. Some newsletters and product pages allow a lead to indicate their level of readiness, at which point the system can respond by sending them the right content or alerting a salesperson for outreach. To recycle effectively, think outside the box when it’s time to align web design with the buying process.
Lead recycling is a long-term, strategic commitment that won’t always seem to pay off in the moment.
Trust us, it’ll help you in the end.
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As every marketer knows, the big data conversation has taken off this year. Suddenly, we have more data at our fingertips than we know what to do with. Data and marketing are both powerful standing alone, but together, they’re unstoppable. Every aspect of marketing is influenced by data in different ways, which brings us to today’s question:
How exactly should data shape lead management?
With so much lead insight available, it’s hard to know where to focus. Here are the sets of data most crucial to an effective lead management strategy:
Lead Source
Tracking where your lead originated gives important insight into behaviors, preferences and needs. For example, if they clicked an ad, they were probably searching for a product to solve a particular problem. Whether it’s PPC or a social network, keeping a record of lead source helps you nurture effectively and understand how to spend future marketing dollars.
Site Behavior
What does a lead do when they spend time on your website? Are they reading your case studies, viewing your product pages or visiting your blog? Dissecting this helps determine when a lead is ready to buy and how serious they are about making a purchase. It also informs future content.
Company Info
Especially useful in B2B, a sign-up form that collects professional data identifies buyers who are likely interested in your product because of their occupation. It guides you through the nurturing process and determines which email or newsletter to send them next.
Employment Level
This is important to include, because a C-level executive viewing your product pages is probably closer to purchase than an intern.
Location
Don’t waste valuable form fields on information you can obtain yourself. Location, for example, is easy to determine with analytics, so devote your form to more compelling and insightful things that you’d have trouble discovering without a lead’s help.
Social Footprint
As big data advances, so does consumer insight. Taking a look at leads’ social footprint – how they participate in digital community, even off your site – helps you understand their needs and influence. You can match this social data to your ideal buyer profile, and you might even figure out more effective ways to nurture to sale.
What next?
With data management, structure and organization are key. Later this month, we’ll provide some tools and best practices to get there, because learning to harness the power of data will take your lead management to new heights.
How are you using data to shape lead management?
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One of the biggest issues surrounding lead management is the hand off – that moment when marketing knows a lead is ready for sales to work its magic and confidently turns it over. Understanding exactly when that should happen is a challenging, yet critical part of a good lead management strategy.
Many B2B companies rely heavily on outreach from their sales teams, making it crucial for marketing to provide them with leads who are primed for the next step. Done correctly, this transition leads effectively to the end of the sales funnel.
If you’re unsure that you’re handing leads to sales at the right moment, chances are you’re not. Here’s how to streamline your process and make it better:
Data-driven criteria
Together with your sales team – or with your aligned “new sales team” – develop a precise set of criteria addressing the process your company’s leads go through. Form a set of checkpoints that determine exactly when a lead is ready for a sales call.
Data that matters
With such an overwhelming amount of data available, it’s hard to decide what really matters. Assess whether leads are sales-ready by rating their level of engagement, their behavior on your website, the content that engages them and their company and employment level. For example, a C-level executive within your industry who views your product pages ranks much higher than a student perusing your case studies.
Stick to the plan
A clearly defined lead management strategy will take your process to the next level. Once you’ve put a system in place to identify sales-ready leads, stick to it. Your sales force will know when to call, and as a marketer, you’ll know when to deliver sales-based content. The hand off between marketing and sales will be more efficient than ever before, and you’ll have results to prove it.
How do you determine when a lead is ready to buy?
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Lead management has faced big changes in the past ten years. The rise of the self-directed, knowledgeable buyer has forced marketers to focus less on blanket outreach campaigns and more on getting discovered by consumers who are looking for answers. This can be challenging, but the most successful marketers have no problem. They rely on a smart, integrated approach to demand generation and inbound marketing.
Here are five ways to help leads find you:
1. Get comfortable with SEO.
Using Search Engine Optimization effectively is one of the best ways to attract organic leads. SEO evolves quickly and often, so make it a priority to stay on top of the latest developments and maximize your potential. When consumers have a problem, the internet is usually the first place they turn. You should be ready.
2. Invest in content.
Make sure your company has a great content strategy, and trust it to fuel your inbound marketing efforts. If you want leads to stumble upon you when solving a problem, focus on content that provides value to their lives. Answer their questions before they even ask.
3. Go visual.
Our culture is visual. Put a priority on design, and make sure your content is outfitted with a clickable, shareable graphic. This will drive traffic to your site and get more people talking about your product.
4. Provide education.
Take your content production one step further. When consumers search for answers, they often look to videos, tutorials and webinars for help. Decide which issues are your specialty, and develop educational content to address them. Depending on your niche, you might consider SlideShare, YouTube, podcasts or eBooks as your next step.
5. Think value.
In everything you do, think value. Adding value to your community’s lives will generate word of mouth advertising, and more leads will discover you. Whether it’s your website or your next email campaign, value is key. Make it your top priority, even if it takes greater investments of time and money to make it happen.
What tips do you have for getting discovered by leads? Please share below!
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The digital age marks the rise of the self-directed buyer. Today’s consumer takes ownership of the buying process with internet search and social media, and as a result, they don’t engage with sales representatives until much later in the sales cycle. The old style of lead management – mass marketing and list purchasing – just doesn’t work anymore.
Marketers are required to nurture leads in innovative ways to bridge the gap between self-direction and closing sale. Last month we discussed how crucial a documented strategy is to content marketing, and believe it or not, lead management is no different.
You need a plan.
Many marketers fail to clearly define their lead management practices. They scoop up leads where they can and do their best to engage them, sometimes turning them over to the sales team at the wrong time or with little insight. This haphazard approach results in decreased marketing ROI and losing prospects before they buy.
Here’s how to get one.
At first glance, spontaneous lead management might seem to fit the world of digital marketing and social media, but a plan tells you what to do and when to do it – before it ever happens. With a strategy, leads are never lost, and you know how to deal with every situation.
To develop a plan, consult your data. Take a look at what you know about your customers – when they engage, how they respond to nurturing and why they buy. With that knowledge, build a system that outlines every step of your lead management process.
Let it be your guide.
Together with your sales department, follow your strategy at every turn. Use it to recycle leads, understand when they’re ready to purchase and leverage marketing to raise your bottom line. With some strategic direction, you’ll make the most of every lead that crosses your path.
Do you have a clear lead management strategy? How does it work for you?
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Like everything else, lead management has changed with the digital landscape. Internet touches have a lot of reach, but today’s lead generation process is different – there’s less direct contact. Marketers are required to find new ways to obtain the same old thing: a quality list with clean information.
Today’s knowledgable consumers often find companies before marketers even have a chance to discover them. And at that point, they’re often in an advanced stage of the sales funnel, nearing the point of decision. To adapt to this self-directed buying process, marketers face the challenge of placing their companies in a position to get discovered. Only then will they have a real lead to manage.
Once leads are found, they have to be nurtured in compelling ways that match today’s fast pace yet remain true to brand voice. They have to find value in your company’s content and come back for more, at which point they might consider buying. Sound challenging?
If lead management sounds intimidating, we’re here to help.
That’s why we’re devoting December to best practices and tips for lead management, from start to finish.
See you Wednesday, when we’ll discuss why lead management needs a careful plan.
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Ever find yourself up to your neck in content production, but wishing you had time to pay more attention to data and analytics in the moment? Yeah. Us too.
Deadlines and incessant social media chatter make it easy to bury yourself in content, but taking the time to dig into data is worth it. In fact, it’s necessary. It’s your job to not only create stellar content, but to measure how it’s working.
Three reasons you should commit to data:
Content should be tailored to your audience.
If you follow the metrics of each piece of content as you go, you will understand what engages your audience most. Armed with that knowledge, you can give your community more of what they like. This is crucial, because providing that kind of value increases engagement and leads to new prospects and bigger sales.
How much is too much?
The internet has made us content machines. There’s no getting around that, but getting to know your metrics will help you identify the ideal volume for your community. Many marketers have reduced content based on metrics, only to find themselves with increased results. Use your data to find that sweet spot.
Scheduling problems.
Along with the question of volume comes the question of frequency. Once you have good content, how often and where should you post it? Using marketing automation software and analytics, identify the times that your community is most willing to click or respond. Capitalize on that data, and you’ll get great returns from each piece of content created.
When it comes to content marketing, data is key. How have metrics helped you be more effective?
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