There's only so much time in the day and so much money in the marketing budget.
You need to spend most of your time and effort on high-quality leads that are most likely to convert into paying customers.
Since you can't afford to treat every lead with the exact same level of focus, you need to know how to qualify and then convert your high-quality lead opportunities.
We’ll break down how you can do just that using automation and online services such as YouCanBook.me’s online scheduling tool to your advantage.
That depends on your industry and your consumers’ focus.
A quality lead will probably share most, if not all, of the key characteristics of your target audience.
These characteristics can include their location, age, occupation, behavioral data, and more.
You can use historical sales data to determine where most of your profits come from and figure out what categories of products or services are the highest converting with different demographics.
Use this to develop a lead rubric and score potential leads based on which are most likely (based on historical trends) to convert into paying customers.
For instance, say that you run a bespoke apparel shop online.
You look at your consumer data and find that most of the people who make a purchase on your site are women, millennials, tech-savvy users, and traffic that arrives from Google or Google Ads.
With that in mind, you can start paying more attention to leads that fit these criteria, customizing your branded materials and marketing accordingly.
Lead qualification means identifying, and hopefully predicting, the behavior of target leads based on their key attributes and behaviors.
This can include demographic factors like age, sex, and location, but it can also include more technical data such as product history or how customers interact with your website.
It follows that a lead qualification process is a plan to use a specific set of attributes to determine whether it will be worth your time and money to pursue a particular lead.
Then you can go about acquiring those leads and converting them into customers.
Let's say you run a sales automation platform whose main target is small businesses.
When examining leads, you see lead A is an established eCommerce company with 100 employees and lead B is undergoing a digital transformation, putting strain on their small team of 10.
It's clear that lead B might be an easier sell for an affordable sales automation solution.
Make no mistake – you need several elements to acquire leads and turn them into customers.
For example, you need a user-friendly website, high-quality invoicing software that comes with crucial features like recurring payments for repeat customers, and an excellent product that fills the needs of your target audience. But with the right lead qualification strategy, you’ll be able to identify the best leads for your marketing efforts.
Lead qualification is critical to ensuring you are maximizing your budget and your employees’ time.
Knowing which leads are most likely to convert will help you prioritize where you invest your time and energy.
It’s no good to waste valuable time and marketing budgets chasing prospects that are never going to buy.
Plus, it’s not just about gaining potential customers but gaining customers that will stick with you long term.
A strong lead qualification strategy will guide you to pursue leads that will turn into repeat customers and loyal brand enthusiasts.
Identifying high-quality leads is one thing. Reaching them is another.
You’ll have to rely on time-tested marketing tactics and invest in the right tools for the job.
Many of these functions can be automated these days, making lead conversion more efficient and effective than ever.
People respond more positively to emails that address them by name and use historical data to recommend specific products tailored to their interests or buying patterns.
This type of data-driven marketing is sure to attract leads efficiently and help you find customers who really need your services.
Even if your emails are sent automatically, you can still tailor the content towards greater engagement.
Chatbots are great for some functions, such as helping with checkout and returns and fielding basic questions. But you will likely need a human if you want to upsell or cross-sell.
According to one study, 86% of people prefer talking with humans over bots. Chatbots are a
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You can do this in fairly simple ways, such as following up after inquiries or first purchases and asking for feedback in the form of reviews and surveys.
Then, use the information gathered to recommend products or even free resources that your prospects can benefit from.
This is a good way to show you care about things other than making a sale and that you invest in long-term relationships.
Nurture your high-quality leads by giving them the attention they deserve. Don’t forget the oft-cited five-minute rule.
Studies show that success rate decreases by 10x within the first five minutes of initial contact with a lead, so the first five minutes after a prospect reaches out are the most critical in cementing that relationship.
Whether it is an inquiry on your website chat feature or a web form requesting more information, you should promptly and gratefully respond to both prospects and customers.
Thank them for reaching out and offering as complete a response as possible.
Even if you don’t have an immediate solution, be transparent and tell them what you're doing to work on it.
It's not uncommon for even the most qualified leads to hold off on making a purchase initially.
Follow up with them or send a reminder email to keep the communication line active.
Ask them if they have found a solution to their problem, and if not, remind them why your solution is the best on the market.
The key to all of the above strategies is efficient and effective communication.
To that end, there are lots of automated tools to help you streamline your communications and convert quality leads into paying customers.
You can use the tools below to improve your workflow and give you more time to cultivate strong customer relationships.
In order to effectively communicate with customers, you must first collaborate seamlessly within your own teams.
During the pandemic, many businesses realized the importance of tools like Slack or Microsoft Teams to help team members stay connected while working remotely.
These tools allow cross-team collaboration for greater efficiency.
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Plus, some of the same tools you use to meet with your coworkers can also be used to interface with leads.
Popular apps like Google Meet and Zoom, as well as most calendar applications, will remind invitees to confirm and join meetings without you having to lift a finger.
You can also try out YouCanBook.me as a top-tier scheduling software perfect for both internal scheduling across multiple teams and external scheduling of sales calls with prospects.
It is a highly personalized online scheduling tool designed to set up and facilitate human communication.
YouCanBook.me eliminates back-and-forth emails so that bookings for phone or video calls can be easily delivered straight to your calendar.
This saves you a significant amount of time that you can use to focus on lead conversion.
YouCanBook.me allows you to create multiple booking pages with different meeting types, so whether it is your colleague or a client, everyone can easily book the type of meeting they need.
Additionally, the software seamlessly integrates with other tools you already use, such as Google Meet, Zoom, Outlook, Gmail, and more.
In order to manage leads, all team members must be aware of the status of different projects and accounts.
In companies of more than a few people, this will require a strategy for tracking projects and assigning tasks efficiently.
Project management tools such as Asana are great for managing, organizing, and delegating all of your work tasks on a single platform.
Platforms like Zoho also offer full project management suites to take a project from inception to completion.
Whatever tool you choose, you can increase productivity in your teams by making sure everyone is on the same page at every step.
With automated lead management, you'll be able to respond more quickly to leads, cultivate high-quality leads more effectively, and sell your brand more easily.
CRM software is designed to start with lead generation and scoring as well as track and retain buyers throughout the customer lifecycle.
You still need to do your research, and there will always be times when it is more effective to reach out or respond to leads with human interaction.
Still, recent studies show that 80% of marketers that use automation software increase leads by as much as 451%, and 77% see increased lead conversions.
The key is to use automation as a tool in your overall strategy, not as the strategy itself.
Tools like Salesforce and Hubspot are well-known for their CRM suites, including features to help you score your leads based on their website activity.
There are also open-source alternatives, which have the benefit of being free if you’re on a budget.
Offering online scheduling gives your customers the ultimate convenience of scheduling time with you when they are most interested in your product.
It gives you end-to-end automation that allows you to focus on cultivating leads, rather than making appointments.
YouCanBook.me provides personalized booking pages, instant notifications, and complete control over your availability for meetings with customers.
It integrates with all the other tools you use, so all your systems are synced and you have real-time customer data at your fingertips. You can automate reminders and follow-ups to reduce no-shows and ensure your customers are always notified about changes.
With a tool like YouCanBook.me, your clients will appreciate how easy it is to schedule meetings with you or your colleagues, boosting their positive impression of your company.
AI-powered tools can look at browsing behaviors, social media engagement, and order history to trigger emails tailored to the action or interest of a specific prospect.
This can aid with functions such as encouraging sign-up for newsletters, increasing customer touchpoints, and decreasing cart abandonment - all important parts of a lead conversion strategy.
Natural Language Processing is a subset of AI that allows computers to parse and interpret human communication (written and spoken).
NLP is hugely useful for lead qualification and conversion because it allows marketers to see what is being said about their brand and who is interacting positively with it.
NLP technology also allows for automated communication like chatbots and triggered email campaigns.
Determining which leads are most worth your time is the first step toward improving business profitability.
As you learn to identify and pursue your highest converting leads, you’ll also perfect conversion strategies to maximize your marketing bang for your buck.
Practicing your customer communication strategies will go a long way toward developing an effective, efficient lead qualification strategy.
And by aiding your communications with the right tools, you can improve your brand’s conversion rate and maximize the effectiveness of your marketing strategies.
"Without YouCanBook.Me, we would lose 25% of our new business contract value. There would just be too much friction."
How they used it:
Sales Team relies on YouCanBookMe at every stage of their sales funnel. He embeds his booking page throughout his website and loves how he can customize it to match his brand perfectly.
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Written by
Nahla Davies is a software developer and tech writer. Before devoting her work full time to technical writing, she managed—among other intriguing things—to serve as a lead programmer at an Inc. 5,000 experiential branding organization whose clients include Samsung, Time Warner, Netflix, and Son
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