Don’t Confuse Suspects with Leads

There is a distinct difference between leads and a list of names. I call a list of names and numbers suspects. Data providers often mislead clients into believing that they are getting leads when they get these too good to be true prices on thousands of leads.

Make Sure You Have Leads

The fact is that a lead implies that the consumer has taken some intentional action on an offer. That may be calling an 800 number, requesting over phone to be transferred, making an email or contact form inquiry, or opting into an email campaign. Short of that you have a list of names.

Regardless of what type of lead data you are buying, you need to move each of them to a viable lead. Develop a sales process that assumes all your contacts are simply data until you make contact and convert them into “your” personal leads.

Turning Suspects into Leads

Here is the simple sales process I recommend:

1. Load all new data into a “suspect” email campaign
2. Power dial all new data with an intro message and phone number verification
3. Invalid emails and phone numbers are cleaned out of the suspect list
4. Positive responses to emails and phone calls get bumped up to leads

Now you can go into sales mode on these leads. All of the verified data now needs to make it’s way into your lead management software or CRM system.

Notice this initial process can easily be accomplished in-house or even outsourced–potentially keeping you focused on sales.

Turning Leads into Sales

With good clean leads in your database it is time to begin moving them towards a sale. I recommend again using a combination of email campaigns and regular calling.

Your emails should focus on education and market updates. These will give your customers confidence and build trust. It also allows for your calls to be more about touching base, checking for questions, building a relationship, and hopefully closing a deal.
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Tagged as: Customer, Customer relationship management, Database, Marketing and Advertising, sales process