How to rock sales lead development? The quick answer…put a sales lead management team to work.
That of course, begs the question, “what is a sales lead management team?” It is, unfortunately, often the missing link between sales and marketing. It’s that gap between the two disciplines where leads are lost either because marketing doesn’t qualify them or sales doesn’t follow up on them. Conveniently, marketing points the finger at sales and sales points the finger at marketing.
If only there was a group in between marketing and sales that could take marketing leads and transform them into qualified sales opportunities.
That’s what a sales lead management team does via the phone, email, and more. And a Forrester Research study says that businesses which put a priority on lead qualification and nurturing have 50 percent more sales-ready prospects and reduce their cost-per-lead by 33%.
It seems like this missing link is made of gold. What are these sales lead management teams doing that is multiplying the number of ready-to-buy prospects while cutting marketing costs?
- Consistent and cost effective follow up
It’s just not feasible for a field sales person to follow up in the same way as a sales lead management team. And, it’s not economical to have them dialing the phone and sorting through a hodgepodge of leads to find the ones that qualify. So, marketing leaders, don’t berate your sales force for not following up on leads. They feel like it’s a waste of their time … because it is.
That doesn’t mean, however, that it’s not a valuable activity for the right team with the right tools.
- Quick response
I’ve stated some amazing stats before about response times. If you follow up in 5 minutes, for example, you’re 21 times more likely to qualify a lead than if you wait just 30 minutes. Is your sales force capable of such rapid response? Probably not.
- The human touch
The human touch is, of course, one of my favorite marketing tools. In fact, we wrote a white paper on the subject.
Now we’re hearing about the big trends in marketing for 2015 and one of them is personalization. One to one marketing is growing. And what could be more personal than a one-on-one phone call where a sales associate works with the prospect to help them solve their problems? In doing so, the prospect develops a personalized relationship with the company.
- Accurate data
The sales lead management teams are at their desks with easy access to your customer relationship management (CRM) system. With everything they need at their fingertips, it’s much more likely they’ll update data based on new information. It enables companies to track the flow of leads and conversion rates more precisely, gaining the insights necessary to improve sales processes and optimize conversions.
To learn more about sales lead management, call us now at +1 718-709-0900 (Americas) / +39 06-978446-60 (EMEA).
This article was syndicated from Business 2 Community: Turn Leads into Qualified Leads – How to Rock Sales Development in 2015
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