I’ve waited a long time to be able to write a headline like that. It feels pretty good. So, if you’re sales people are still cold calling, it’s time they enter the 21st century. Believe me, they’ll thank you. All sales people hate cold calling, and everyone hates being the recipient of a cold call – in short the era of the cold call has come and gone. And, I say, “Good riddance!”
The reason there is no longer a need for cold calling is because we have so much information at our disposal. There’s no reason why you can’t find out beneficial information about your prospects and put that to good use. It’s time to nurture your leads.
How To Nurture Your Leads
A good lead-nurturing program has to have ongoing, relevant communication with targeted prospects. Through lead nurturing you can build a trust relationship that fast tracks your leads to money.
Involve your sales people in your lead-nurturing program. They are the ones interacting with your customers and prospects on a daily basis. Use their knowledge! Have an ongoing dialogue with your sales people. Ask what the most frequent questions they get are, what are the biggest objections they hear, what are prospects telling them they need – you get the idea. Once you have their input, you can develop content that speaks to these issues, creating white papers, articles, targeted e-mail campaigns, etc.
Cold calling has always gotten a bad wrap, and rightfully so because most calls are not beneficial to the person on the other end of the line. Cold calls are intrusive and more often than not miss the mark. Lead nurturing on the other hand allows you to select targeted prospects and deliver customized, useful information to them. Marketing automation can also assist by letting you know your prospects’ habits on your website, e-mail campaigns, and webinars. This is invaluable information that enables you to communicate with your prospects based on their actions and responses, so you can guide their journey along the buying process, feeding them easily digestible information along the way. Combine this with lead scoring, and you’ll know when it’s time to pick up the phone and have a “warm call” with your prospect because you’ll know where they are in the buying process and what their potential concerns are because you’ve nurtured your leads.
Digital Media Insider 