Once you gain a potential client’s contact details that person becomes a cold lead and this is where lead nurturing comes into play. If you don’t nurture your leads, the probability of you making a sale is slim to none. 



What is Lead Nurturing?

Lead nurturing is the employment of certain methods to keep in touch with potential clients and turn them from a cold lead into a sale. Research findings show that “companies that excel at lead nurturing generate 50% more sales ready leads at 33% lower cost” (Source: Forrester Research). Leads will eventually buy the product or service they are looking at on your site, but it might be from a competitor. They are in the early stage of the sales cycle and you need to keep in contact with them to ensure they choose you over whoever else is out there.

Out of Sight, Out of Mind

Lead nurturing is all about keeping in touch with potential clients. It is a way of enlarging your intelligence about the specific client in order to serve him or her better. Lead nurturing allows you to ask questions and find out who exactly your client is because the more you know about your lead the more targeted you can be.

10 Considerations

1. Frequency
   You don’t want to drown your lead with too many emails and questions and as such seem spammy. In other words, don’t do too much too soon. On the other side, if you take too long to start the nurturing process the lead might not remember your first contact and you have the risk of becoming irrelevant. You need to balance the frequency so as to not seem desperate but not slack either.
2. Vary the Medium
   Email is a staple when it comes to lead nurturing because it’s cheap and efficient – you can add links and leads can reply if they wish. Mediums need to be varied regardless of how well email works for the nurturing process. Fluctuate between personal phone calls, business letters, direct mail, invitations, and for high-end clients you can employ dimensional mailers.
3. Refer to Previous Contacts
   You need to remind your lead why you are contacting him or her and when your last point of contact was. This reminds the lead that he or she has a certain relationship with you and shows him or her how it is growing.
4. Refer to Future Contacts
   You need to create the perception of making promises and then actually keep them. You can, for instance, contact a lead and tell him that you are working on a new eBook about social media marketing. You would like to send him this book next month. The book can, for all he knows, already be written and in your arsenal of content. If you prove to the lead that you are reliable, you’ll gain trust and move a step closer towards closing a sale.
5. Be Real
   Correspondence must be personal and seem authentic – people won’t look twice at an email if it looks like spam. Even if you make use of a marketing automation system, you can still create an authentic perception.
6. Ask Questions
   You should ask questions to test if people are sales ready. They can easily reply to emails so gaining information is not exactly difficult. The more information you have, the more you can improve an individual lead’s profile data.
7. Use Blog Articles & eBooks
   Use content from your blog, website or eBooks as interesting material to send to leads. By doing this you can stay relevant as you are sending them information on topics that you know they are interested in. This is also a way of showing leads that you are offering them something instead of asking for something.
8. Test for Sales Readiness
   Make offers to leads to test where in the sales cycle they are. For instance, invite them to a demo event – their response to invitations and so forth should be a pretty good indicator about where in the sales process they are.
9. Be Targeted
   You need to accommodate different personas, grab and hold their attention. You need to get the right message, to the right person, at the right time. Attention is a scarce resource and the best way to keep it is through relevance.
10. Know When to Hand Over Sales
    You need to know when a lead is ready to make a purchase. You can’t miss the boat on this one as this is when all the hard work pays off. Conditions for sales readiness will usually be agreed upon between the marketing and sales departments of companies. Make sure to hand over sales at the right time – not too early and not too late.

All of the above are important to consider when nurturing your leads. If prospective clients feel that they are being individually catered to and taken care of your company will stand out above the rest. 


Related Article: Are You Losing Your Leads?

Have any more tips about lead nurturing? Share them with me here or on Twitter @SoundIdeaMA


Sound Idea Digital is a full service digital marketing agency that specialises in content marketing. We can develop a comprehensive content marketing strategy for your company | info@soundidea.co.za | www.soundidea.co.za