Practical Tips

If you never had to prospect for clients the hard way - i.e. cold call, prospect, go to multiple networking groups chasing business, would you be interested?

What if you had prospects ringing you up, asking for more information? People who were already interested in your product or service, actively looking to buy, or at least be in a frame to get more information from you as to how you could help them. How would that feel?

Dare I say it, but you’d probably be skipping with joy, bouncing off the walls, and the rest of your co-workers might wonder what you’re on!

Sadly, this rarely happens, and if it does, it’s usually to someone else, isn’t it?

But it could happen for you. If you know how. And that’s the subject of this article.

But before I get into that, here’s what inspired this missive…

I was at a BBQ on Sunday with a bunch of old friends. One of them has been selling networking infrastructure (the stuff that keeps the net working) for over 20 years. He’s been pretty successful and often made selling high ticket items look quite easy.

Of course nothing could be further from the truth. Selling something where the capital cost ranges in the millions takes time and a lot of effort. And he’s been successful in a field where a lot of his colleagues failed.

So naturally I asked him what he was doing that others weren’t.

His answer was quite insightful. He went out and found people who were ready to buy!

While this sounds obvious, contrast this with what many sales people do.

They go out and look for prospects - and often the criteria is, “If it’s breathing, it’s a prospect”. The qualification criteria is weak to non existent. The prospect is no where near ready to buy and may not even really want your solution.

And as the salesperson has very few prospects on his radar, he makes himself busy by badgering the prospect, wondering why they never return phone calls, ignore emails and do their best to be invisible.

Now to add insult to injury, instead of going out and finding better prospects, these sales people will go around in circles, reporting back to their management that “it’s going to be any day now - they’ll sign the order…”.

Why do they do this?

Put yourself in their shoes… It’s taken such an effort to find someone to talk to. Someone who’ll give you the time of day and not reject you overtly. So you’ll do anything to keep talking to them rather than do out into the cold, hungry world where you get overtly rejected.

The thing is, it’s not your fault. No one likes being rejected. But this doesn’t serve the organisation paying you!

So why don’t organisations fix the problem?

The sales culture in many organisations is built around salespeople prospecting for new business.

Probably comes from the days of the door to door salesman. You’re expected to go knocking on doors and the conventional wisdom is, if you knock on enough doors, someone will tell you to come in.

Add to this it takes a special type of person to be good at “hunting” for new business. You have to love the chase, cold calling (and it’s not uncommon to be given the Yellow Pages and told to go call someone), and be really persistent.

Not everyone’s cup of tea, but many organisations don’t realise this and more importantly don’t understand the role targeted marketing can play in getting qualified prospects in front of their sales team.

These organisations believe that the marketing and sales are totally different functions. Their marketing focuses on brand and image, rather than directly getting prospects in the door.

While brand and image can be important for large organisations who want to be household names, it can be a total waste of money for a smaller organisation that has very specific target markets they want to penetrate.

These companies could be far better served if they replaced sales prospecting with targeted Lead Generation Advertising, which would provide a steady stream of qualified prospects that the sales team can work with and close.

So what is Lead Generation Advertising?

Simply put, this is advertising in media your prospect will respond to. And by media I mean magazines, newspapers, infomercials etc.

Your goal is to get your prospects to ask for more information, come in for a free trial, get a free sample etc.

You want them to EXPERIENCE what you have to offer. You can offer the experience at a discount or even free.

Think of a beauty salon that offers a free 3 hour makeover. Once you’re in the chair getting pampered for 3 hours, you’re a captive audience while they talk about all the products they’re using and the benefits to you. Chances are you’ll walk out with a whole heap of stuff and if they’re smart, a program.

Think book club that offers you the first set of books on a trial basis. If you don’t actively unsubscribe, they’ll charge you after the first month and keep sending you books. Reader’s Digest has made a fortune along these lines.

How about a car dealership that runs ads offering a free report on “How you could save 20% on your next car purchase”. If you were in the market and this ad ran in the motor section of a paper, would you be interested?

And once you asked for the report, the dealership would send you a whole of letters encouraging you to come in and take a test drive.

Once you’ve had the test drive, another series of letters would arrive with “specials” encouraging you to buy the car. And so on…

The beauty of a Lead Generation Advertising strategy is that people will respond when they’re ready. Your job is to keep the ads going so that when they’re looking, you’re there. Sure beats the hell out of chasing people who really aren’t interested in what you have to offer, but are too polite to tell you so!

Now before you rush out and place ads, you need to have a strategy.

What action do you want your prospect to take? What’s the cost of a lead to you and how much are you prepared to spend acquiring a client? Do you just want their details so you can start marketing to them?

Running ads can seem expensive, so you have to do your maths. If an ad costs you $100 and you get 5 responses, you’ve paid $20 a lead. Even if your close ratio is one in five and you make $200 in profit from a sale to this person, you’re well ahead.

There’s a whole heap of stuff to consider, so if you’re stuck, give me a call on (02) 9499-7958 and we can help.

Till next time,

Happy lead generation!

Rashid.

P.S. We’re creating a Lead Generation Toolbox. It’ll contain everything you need to get qualified leads into your business. Advertisement examples, sales letters, referral letters, you name it.

While we’re doing this, I’d appreciate your telling me what your lead generation issues are - it’ll help me hone the product. So if you’d like to help out, send me an email to mailto:rashid.kotwal@revealedresources.com.

Thanks!

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