| So you are getting some sales leads. |
So, you are getting some quality sales leads. WooHoo!!!
Someone is interested in what you are selling and you have their contact information: like a name, email and phone number. So now what? How do you turn that lead into a customer?
The biggest challenge small (and very small) businesses have today is converting leads into customers.
Here are 4 easy things you can do to improve your chances of turning that lead into a customer:
1. Contact the lead right away…..like NOW
When someone is interested in your product or service, they are in shopping mode. Besides looking at you, they are looking at your competitors and probably looking at several different ways to solve their problem.
For example, if you are a real estate agent, the lead you just received may be someone looking to buy a house, so they may be checking out different agents in the area. But they may also be looking to rent something or even looking to move out of town. So it’s not that you are just in competition with other agents, you may be competing with other ideas as well.
This is why it’s so important to contact that lead immediately to get you in the front of the line. The method of contact might be a phone call, a text, or an email. But you MUST reach out as soon as you get the lead.
What you are going to find is that, in many cases, you are already too late. You will get this old familiar response: “Oh, thanks, but I am already working with Joe Schmo” And that’s just because Joe beat you to it by 5 minutes!
2. Contact them the way THEY want to be contacted
People are different. Some live in their email, some are all about text messages and some want to talk to you on the phone. Therefore you can’t just make a phone call, leave a message on voicemail and think you are done. What if they only check voicemail once a day, and they just checked it? Maybe they are always on the go and will respond better to texts or emails.
Since you probably don’t know a lot about the new leads coming in, it’s best to contact them using all 3 methods until you get some indication of which might be best for this particular prospect.
Email is always going to be your safest choice because it is not intrusive. People can read their email when it is convenient for them. Phone and text are different because those methods interrupt the person and you could be reaching them at a bad time.
3. If you don’t engage with them right away, drip on them!
You probably have heard the terms “Drip Campaigns” or “Drip Marketing”. This refers to contacting them on a regular basis or “dripping on them”. You want to get something in front of your lead on a regular basis, especially in the first week. The easiest way to do this is by sending emails. Remember, we want them to choose YOU to help them. If we can get them in your court at the beginning, it will lock out your competitors and others who can possibly help them.
Let’s say you didn’t get to talk to them right away and they haven’t replied to any of your emails in that first week. That’s OK – stay the course. Continue to send them emails, but maybe just once a week, and don’t forget to mix in phone calls and text messages here and there.
4. Don’t assume no contact means they are not interested
Every lead has its own timetable. Sometimes a lead turns into a customer right away. Sometimes you work with a lead for months (or years) and then it turns into a customer. Sometimes you don’t hear from a lead for months and then all of a sudden they reach out and they are ready to buy.
Since we don’t know exactly how it’s going to go with each lead, we need to stay the course, even if we haven’t heard from them for a while.
Keep dripping on them!
At some point they will either opt-out of your emails, tell you they are not interested, or in the best case they finally buy!
This is the end of Part 1.
In Part 2 we will explore easy ways you can systemize steps 1-4 above.
