Do you know that there may be 12 company crushing killers roaming loose inside
your business right now! It’s true!
We call them the Deadly Dozen and it doesn’t matter if you’ve been doing
business for 5, 10, 20, 30 years or more, and have been getting what most people
would consider pretty good results—I’m here to tell you that these CULPRITS are
costing you a lot of money in lost opportunity and lost business.
The Deadly Dozen is a 12 part business insight series.
THE DEADLY DOZEN – A 12 PART INSIGHT SERIES FOR BUSINESS OWNERS
In this “Insight Series” every day we will be sharing one of the company crushing
killers we have identified and then will provide a simple solution for ridding the
culprit from your business. If at any time you decide you don’t want to wait and
would like to access the entire series all at once you can just click this link
https://www.cyberfunnels.com/ddm-social/
COMPANY KILLER # 6 - Manual Follow-Up By Humans
According to Gleanster, 50% of leads are qualified but not yet ready to buy. Without a sound follow-up strategy, you have no way of ensuring those qualified leads become buyers – or that if they do buy, they’ll be buying from you.
Connecting with your customers and prospects on a personal level is a powerful force that builds greater trust, value, and positive response with every encounter. As human beings, we feel flattered when someone takes the time to get to know us on a deeper level. No one wants to be treated like just a face in the crowd or an entry in a database.
Ideally, your sales reps would nurture these prospects, maintaining steady communication until they turn opportunities into closed deals. However, your follow-up is likely driven by humans who are subject to feelings, fatigue, and easily disrupted schedules. While your sales and marketing teams may recognize the importance of prompt and continued follow-up when trying to close deals, they’re often too busy to make it a priority. There’s always another meeting, another client to call, another fire to put out.
But the average sales cycle has increased 22% in the past 5 years. The importance of lead nurturing – keeping potential customers interested and engaged until they’re ready to buy – is critical. According to a report on lead nurturing done by the Annuitas Group, nurtured leads make 47% larger purchases than those not nurtured – making lack of follow-up a critical error.
Too much follow-up, however, can be as ineffective as not enough. BUY NOW! THIS DEAL WON’T LAST FOREVER! BUY NOW AND SAVE! This sort of annoying persistence - no, face it, nagging – does nothing to build trust or encourage a long-term relationship. It’s more likely to get your number blocked.
It also takes valuable time to draft and customize communications. But what if 50% of that communication is with people with zero intention of ever buying…but you’ve told your sales team that they MUST follow up with everyone? Isn’t that time better spent on qualified leads?
Lack of effective follow-up can have other consequences. Are you leaving money on the table by missing cross-sell or up-sell opportunities? Are you reminding existing customers to purchase your products again once previous purchases are past their use-by date? Are your sales reps targeting customers who’ve purchased a specific service in the past by highlighting the benefits of an upgrade? Or are they simply so busy trying to cultivate new prospects that they’re overlooking these opportunities?
SOLUTION
You need to develop your follow-up process! Companies excelling at the practice of nurturing leads generate 50% more sales-ready leads—and do so at a 33% lower cost per lead. Imagine a sophisticated method of timely follow-up without any prospects slipping through the cracks or being forgotten. Imagine a system where a unique follow-up strategy generates goodwill and trust while positioning the professional as the authority in his market.
Buyers make their way through 57% of their journey before they even talk to sales, but only 25% reveal their interest during the early stages of that process. At that point the burden is on marketing to retain the attention of uncertain customers for an indefinite period of time.
However, once potential buyers have completed their research and start reaching out to sales reps, they’ll already be educated. Sales reps won’t have to waste time guessing at their pain points and needs.
This is where developing an effective automated drip email campaign comes into play. Utilizing this system lightens the load of your sales team and sets them up for success with prospects who become more and more engaged over time…all in an automated fashion.
These automated, personalized messages allow sales reps to have regular touch points with each of their prospects, reducing time spent on manual tasks and letting them focus on closing deals.
This type of campaign also extends your search for potential customers to even otherwise inaccessible regions of the Internet. It offers an introduction on your behalf and keeps your brand in the forefront of the consumer’s mind When they’re ready to buy, they’ll buy from you.
Automation can also periodically “drip” informative email content to leads that have gone cold, potentially re-engaging them. Renewed interest (such as clicking a link) can be reported automatically, immediately alerting your sales team to potential lead activity.
Email marketing is already exceptionally profitable, posting an average return of 4,300%. Personalized email sent through an automated campaign is even more effective - 22.2% more likely to be opened and earning 18 times more revenue than generic email “blasts.”
This could be a game changer. Automation saves time and money by streamlining the sales process and reducing the time it takes for a potential lead to become a customer. Automating cross-sells, up-sells and customer follow-ups potentially increases customer lifetime value - and certainly increases revenue.
So if you thought this insight was helpful and would like to learn more and see how
it is actually part of an overall Done-For-You marketing system called
a CyberFunnel. . . Just CLICK BELOW to watch a short 5 minute video to learn more.
Otherwise be on the lookout for the next company crushing killer tomorrow.
http://www.cyberfunnels.com/