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Following up with Internet debt leads can be as challenging as securing them. Once you have a ready list of fresh debt leads, you need to take the right steps in following up on them. There are different follow up strategies that can be adopted to contact and convert the Internet leads.

Below are simple and effective tips for lead generation follow-up:

Call your mortgage lead or debt lead on priority basis – It is important to call your leads as soon as you get them to avoid losing them to your competitors or to hear that they have already been contacted by someone and are working with them. The more time taken to call your debt leads, the higher the chance that you will not be able to convert them. For call centers it is extremely important to consider the response time in order to maximize on the high volume of debt leads.

Call your debt leads more frequently – A single call is not enough to convert your debt leads. You should work on your leads persistently and call them as frequently as you can to get in touch with them. You should work through your Internet debt leads aggressively. It is important to ensure you do not sound very aggressive to them on the phone. However, you should make aggressive outbound calls to follow-up with them and give them your contact details including email, work and cell phone number.

Email your debt leads – It is essential to run email campaigns to convert your debt leads into profitable sales. Personalizing the email to each prospective lead takes you a step forward towards closing the sale. It is a good idea to let your lead know how you got their information and your purpose in contacting them. It will make them more open to the rest of your email when they are able to associate you with an online request they made.

Calling or emailing the lead just once will result in poor conversion ratios and a waste of your effort and money spent on procuring them. Setting up a pattern to follow up with them constantly throughout the sales cycle can be surely rewarding. You should make them feel comfortable to contact you if they have questions at any time. Responding to every phone call or email of your debt lead within 24 hours can go a long way in building your credibility, lead trust and boosting your lead conversions

Effectively following up on your mortgage leads will require you to dial your leads as often as you can in a timely manner. It is possible that your lead may not answer your call despite their expressed interest for debt help. At times, too many calls may also not result in contact with your debt leads. However, to get the best closing percentages on your debt leads, you need to be proactive and follow up with them persistently through calls and emails using a unique pitch personalized for each lead. Giving your leads a regular update can also go a long way in closing the sales.

Have you ever purchased Internet leads? If you haven’t it may be because you didn’t think they were available for your business’ product or service. Take a look at some of the lead types that are available to you. Chances are there is a lead type to support your business. And you will probably be surprised at how they will out-perform some of those old marketing methods (i.e., Yellow Pages, newspaper, restaurant menus) that are sucking down your marketing dollars with no return.

Debt Leads

The debt business is one with a very long sales and return cycle. That means to stay in business you need a steady flow of prospects and clients that need your help to fix their debt problems. Internet debt leads are the best way to consistently fill your sales pipeline. They also have the added value of actually showing intent to take action on their debt problem by submitting contact information.

Loan Modification Leads

There are lots of homeowners in trouble. The collapse of the housing market and the crunch being placed on borrowers is widespread. And there is relief. However, that relief is complex and hard to for an individual homeowner to research. Therefore, most of these borrowers are turning to the Internet and asking for help. Internet loan modification lead providers are capturing those inquires. Loan modification leads are a great marketing short-cut to find these borrowers in need.

Refinance Leads

Believe it or not some people still have equity in their homes and can refinance their mortgage. And with great mortgage rates they are refinancing by the thousands. These requests are efficiently captured and turned into leads for sale.

These same leads are often good loan modification leads as well. Many of these requests to refinance existing mortgages are frustrated by declining home values or loss of income. Consequently, those not qualified to refinance make great prospects for loan modification.

Mortgage Leads

The mortgage lead market is probably one of the most mature. These leads are expertly generated and continue to increase in quality. And with mortgage rates still at historic lows you are sure to have as many prospects as you want to call every month.

Insurance Leads

Insurance is another well developed lead market. What’s more there are a large number of niche products that are supported by Internet insurance leads: life insurance, health insurance, auto insurance, and many more.

Auto Warranty Leads

This is one you might not have heard of–auto warranties. With Americans hanging on to their cars longer in this economic downturn there is significant opportunity in auto warranty leads. Consumers are turning to the Internet to learn how to extend their auto warranties and reduce their growing auto maintenance expenses.

Cash for Gold Leads

Another hot Internet lead type brought on by the failing economy is turning gold into cash. These leads are starting to fill the inventories of many lead providers because consumers need cash to put food on the table, pay their utilities, and keep that car running. As with anything else these consumers are turning to the Internet to find help.

Consumers are turning to the Internet more than ever for products and services. Fortunately, lead providers and aged lead brokers are helping you capture this interest more efficiently. No need to invest in web designers and lead generation experts. You can just buy the final product–on a per prospect basis.

Is there a specific lead type that you need for your business? Give me a call and I can help you find a steady flow of sales prospects for your business.

Last week was quite a week for mortgage rates. On the heals of climbing consumer confidence and an “all-clear,” “our economy is recovering” statement from President Obama the equities markets surged and the yield on long-term mortgage bonds shot through the roof.

So, what does that mean? Your mortgage customers are all going to be paying higher mortgage rates very soon–a lot higher mortgage rates!

Market Rising Mortgage Rates

This is a perfect time to increase your marketing and touch all of those consumers that have been sitting on the fence. Waiting for the lowest mortgage rates have come and gone. It is time to get a mortgage rate that is still reasonable. You need to get this message to as many of your mortgage and client pipeline as possible. It may even be a great time to add to your lead buying to capture the opportunity to help more customers.

Here are a couple of immediate adjustments you should make to your mortgage marketing:

Change Your Email Messaging

Email should be one the central components of your marketing. However, the recent reversal in the mortgage rates market has probably invalidated most of those marketing messages. Take this week and carefully review your email messages and autoresponders to ensure they speak intelligently to the current mortgage rate environment.

Show Them the Facts

There is no better time to do a few blog posts or develop an eBook that walks your customers through the changes. Lay out the current shift in the mortgage rates. Explaining, in plain english, the current sense of urgency can add value and trigger your prospective customers to respond.

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Morgan Brown, of BlownMortgage.com is one of my favorite mortgage bloggers. He spent time in the trenches of mortgage marketing and loan originations. He knows what it is to buy and work a lead. So, when he writes about how to convert an Internet lead we should all listen.

I think Morgan captured this process best in one of his older posts–Climbing Distrust Mountain. Read the post, but here is my quick spin on the concept.

Every time you contact an Internet or aged lead you are starting at the bottom of a very challenging mountain to ascend–trust.

Little Promises

Building trust with a new lead or prospect has to start with little promises. Things that you tell customers and you make damn sure you follow-through on. Little things like:

• “I will get an answer from my underwriter”
• “I will see if I can waive that fee”
• “I will email you a checklist of the documents I need, in 10 minutes”
• “I will call you back tomorrow and update you on your appraisal status”

Always On

Always be available for your client. Convince them you are “always on” for their needs, wants, and concerns. Give them your cell phone and answer it whenever it rings. Even at your kid’s soccer game.

Exceed Expectations

Customers come in, especially from mortgage and debt help requests with incredibly low expectations. If you start exceeding those depressed expectations you will be creating wow, with very little effort.

Those incredible experiences not only close deals, but they also create great referral opportunities.

Customer is Always Right

Never forget that the customer is ultimately in control of your success. That means that they are always right. Treat them with the highest priority and they will sing your praises.

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Conventional market research and wisdom tells us that a customer must hear our message multiple times before they will buy. The same rules apply to aged leads. In fact, it may be even more important.

Most aged leads are generated by Web inquiries based on a single marketing impression. Unfortunately, most lead buyers do little to build on or reinforce that first message. Smart lead buyers simply leverage that first impression to quickly build a better image of their company, brand, and capability to assist that customer.

To do that effectively you need a good marketing mix strategy.

Email

From the moment your lead provider transmits that lead to your lead management system you need to be reinforcing that you are ready. This usually means a lead receipt email.

Take the time to make this first marketing impression professional and a confidence builder in the quality of your company. You should tell them who you are, what makes you the best choice, and what they should expect.

Web

Email is an important marketing tool to quickly get out the message: “I am  ready to help and I will contact you shortly.” However, if you really want to assure customers that you are for real and serious about your business you should have a website.

Your website should allow the customer to really get to know you and your company, without pressure. It should be a detailed reinforcement of your marketing message.

Calls

Nothing really closes the marketing message like a phone call. This should be your most effective marketing touch. It gives you direct interaction with your customer–an opportunity to learn what it will take to close the deal.

Direct Mail

With aged leads, direct mail is an often forgotten winner. Sometimes these customers have been left without follow-up on their inquiry for several months. You may be starting from marketing “square-one.” Direct mail is a very effective way to cheaply retart the conversation and introduction yourself in a brand, low-risk way.

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Social media is booming, but no site or social networking platform is growing like Facebook. And you have heard me say it before–if you have something to sell and there is a big audience, you had better figure out how to be at the party.

Here are some simple starter tips for getting started with your Facebook marketing:

1. Attractive Profile: Take some time in creating your profile. Make it easy for people to see what you do and how you can help them. Don’t avoid the personal profile question either. It is amazing how often your personal interests, preferences, or background will make a personal connection.

2. Getting Connected: Start with people close to you like friends and family, maybe even past clients. Then let them introduce you to other others like them and you start a pretty powerful referral network.

3. Leverage Groups: Groups are people of like interest on Facebook. A lot of times they are formed around cities, sports teams, even charitable, political, or religious interests. If any of these groups are target customers–join. You will have tons of like minded people to with which to discuss yourself and what you do.

4. Flow in Other Social Media: If you have a blog or Twitter stream–flow in that content. It will help you to maximize the effect of that existing content and economize your work.

5. Use Event Pages: Use these special pages to announce new things going on with your company or important changes in the the market. Event pages are a great way to pull in people with specific needs and questions. Maybe host a webinar on new loan modification programs and promote it with an Events page.

6. Social Applications: Make it fun by joining the variety of social games and applications. It is a fun way to interact with friends (prospects) in a non-threatening way.

7. Create a Community: Nothing nurtures leads better than knowledge adn and education sharing. Starting a community on Facebook will allow you to keep clients informed and education educate new ones. Not only that, but their own interaction will only reinforce your brand.

Facebook marketing can be a great community part of your mortgage or debt marketing strategy. Educating your clients and making them feel connected in this volatile market is important and Facebook can help.

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The free mortgage or debt leads is what got you here. Now you are wondering what the heck Twitter is? Twitter is an increasingly popular social networking tool. It is also sometimes referred to as a micro-blogging platform.

Why is it important to mortgage and debt companies? Simple! They have 6 million users and their website and search engine gets 55 million monthly visitors. That is a big audience and you should be talking to them.

As good as those numbers are it is not going to flood your whole sales team with leads. However, it should be one of the tools in every mortgage or debt counselor’s sales arsenal.

Setup a Twitter Account

This is the easy part. Go to http://twitter.com and join. You provide your email and a few short details. Once you have done that you have access to millions of potential clients.

Optimize Your Account Settings

There are three key steps in making your account attractive to potential customers:

• Upload a picture: This gives your account a personal feel and helps assure people they are working with a real person.
• Provide a website URL: This should be a blog or company website. This will give you a bit of traffic and again help people trying to decide to follow you
• Fill out the bio: Give a short biography of who you are and the people you can help. This helps attract clients via Twitter search

Start Twittering

The key to attracting the right customers and prospects is to provide short tips, advice, links, and discussions about what you do. The key is filling your Twitter stream with lots of 140 character pearls of wisdom about mortgage or debt solutions.

Good content will draw prospects in like flies.

Following Good Prospects

Seeding the audience with good targets is part of the secret. Use http://search.twitter.com to find people that are already talking about keywords and questions you might think that a customer would use. This will turn up prospects that are asking questions and seeking help.

Another great technique is finding current clients and prospects (say from your lead provider) that are on Twitter. You can have Twitter search your emails for people already on Twitter and help you follow them. This gives you one more piece of contact information.

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This is probably one of the classic “religious” questions of online marketers. Is there a right answer? This is one of those audience participation questions. What do you think?

I think this is an answer that is very dependent on your business, target audience, and budget.

Ultimately, marketing is the attempt to attract the attention of consumers that are likely to buy your products or services. As such, picking the best lead generation can take a myriad of forms.

• Email and Permission: Email engages consumers, on a permission basis, in one of the most active venues of most consumers online life. It is a great way to stay top of mind, create a discussion, and allow your message to go viral with a simple forward.
• Search Engine Optimization: Searches have become the measure of intent online. Consumers use searches on Google, Yahoo, and MSN to go straight to what they need. If you position your content to attract these inquiries you can grab some of the highest converting consumers.
• Display and Placement Advertising: Often considered a branding play–banners get your image front and center. Exposing consumers to your brand in targeted venues that already have buyers can bring you consistent traffic. The magic of course is turning that traffic into conversions.
• Co-registration: Associated offers are often weakly linked to the primary offer. However, if creatively linked to the original offer as an additional value or an abandonment alternative–these co-reg offers can turn into a strong lead.
• Surveys and Incentives: Not all incentive leads are evil. Sometimes delivering value first, or an incentive, can gather targets and information that builds a better audience and marketing campaign.
• Telemarketing: The cold-call–a classic sales tool. Not all consumers know they are eligible for an offer or know your services can help them. Taking your message directly to the consumer is an intimidating marketing approach, but built in a smart way these campaigns can build brand and direct sales.

Each of these can be used effectively to generate sales leads. Which is best? Which is best for your business? It could depend. What do you think?

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The natural reaction when sales slow or you hit a closing slump is to cut back on the important things: less training, less motivation, less sales people. This approach is guaranteed to set you on shaky ground to blast your way out.

Sales motivation should be a key element for any “recovery” plan. Just like our economy–consider launching a sales “stimulus” plan in your sales organization.

Sales People are Emotional

The best sales people are emotional. They are high energy, success junkies. They want to win.

If they don’t win they will often descend quickly into a funk. When success comes they hit the ceiling. That is why sustaining motivation and confidence is so important to getting consistent sales performance.

Cutting back on those activities (i.e., sales meetings and motivational moments) is a recipe for sales failure. Or, at least long-term droughts.

Confidence is Contagious and Training Induced

Confidence is contagious. It quickly transfers to other team members and most importantly to customers. Customers are naturally timid to make decisions in tough economic times. Your confidence can help customers through this silent objection.

So, how do you put confidence into the conversation with customers? Training.

Those training sessions with your sales team that motivates them, shares best practices, and gives them in depth information about the value of their products to customers will exude confidence on the very next sales call.

Wins Increase with Wins

The real benefit to getting motivation into sales and confidence on the phone is the win. Winning is as contagious as confidence. Any high school basketball team can tell you the power of a win to get another win–the value of a winning streak to extend it.

That is why pumping up a win, even a small win in your sale organization can spark a rally in your sales numbers. Look for those small examples to get your next rally started.

Sales is the Revenue Life Blood

Remember sales is your revenue life blood. Cutting back on the elements of success in your sales organization is certain to sack your revenue. So, amp up the motivation, training, and confidence and you will be closing more deals in no time.

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There is not a sales person out there that would argue with the role of sales motivation in winning deals. Every sales meeting and rally should be packed with motivation. Motivation to set goals, break records, and bring revenue.

Is something missing? Do you feel like this isn’t working anymore? Are your sales suffering in this down economy? Chances are there were a lot of “yes” answers to these questions. Want the secret to changing that fate–transferring that motivation to your customer?

Don’t Neglect Sales Meetings

Sales meetings are the heart and soul of your sales motivation. Unfortunately, as times toughen I see a lot of organizations abandoning their sales meetings. This will lead to a dangerous degeneration of confidence and motivation.

Sales people are social by nature and need that collaboration to prime their engines. Sharing best practices, reviewing products, and cheering successes are important. Even if sales are down you need to pull together that motivational moment. You need to look for and reward every little positive.

Building Confidence in Your Sales Team

Keeping the negative out of the room is critical. There is certain to be a lot of grumbling and “can’t” floating around the sales floor. That is not going to help any deals get closed.

Confidence is a state of assurance. Most of the sales people in your organization have been consistent closers at one time or another–remind them of those successes. Take some time at your next sales meeting to reflect on what worked to build past successes. Are there ideas to be relearned?

Most importantly look for and highlight the smallest successes in hard sales environments. Look for opportunities to leverage those small successes into larger ones.

Transfer Confidence to Your Customers

Confidence is contagious. That is the most important reason to crank up the sales motivation during tough sales environments. Your motivation, your confidence can and should be transferred to your customers.

Many of the prospects you will talk to will be timid and pensive in this economic environment. You have to cut through this hesitation. You have to flush out this silent objection. To get the deal you need to transfer your confidence to the buyer.

Your motivation will give them confidence to make that decision.

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