How to get started with lead scoring

Seems like the marketing topic du jour is lead scoring.  What lead scoring does it assign a point value to who prospects are, how they interact with your company and what their need is for your product, the assumption being that the higher their score, the further they are along in the buy process.

Lead scoring works.  Let's take the example of a car dealership.  Perhaps a prospect walking in off the street and poking their head in the window earns them a score of 10 points.  Maybe he opens the door and sits in the driver's seat, imagining how it would feel to be on the road with the vehicle.  Perhaps that's 25 points.  Maybe they take it out for a test drive.  50 points.  Etc.

Obviously, the more interest they indicate, the deeper they are moving towards making a purchase decision.

With marketing automation software, you can start scoring your leads according to online and offline activity.  Say someone visits your web site.   Perhaps that's only one point.  They return to the site and look over your products.  Ten points.  Let's say they hit your job postings and look for a position in their area.  Perhaps that's minus 25 points (not because they're bad people, just because this is an indicator that they may not be a potential customer).  Maybe they'll sign up for a Web cast.  Then they'll attend.  More points. 

Then you sent them e-mail.  Every open is worth a certain amount of points but every response is worth more. 

Over time, your contact database will have a key field appended to it -- your prospect's lead score.  This is a strong indicator of interest and can help your team prioritize which leads to pass to the sales team and which to hold back.

If you're just getting started with lead scoring, here are five tips to get you on your way:

1.  The actual score doesn't matter.  Like scores on a pinball machine, it doesn't matter if an activity is equal to 50 points or 500 points.  Many people have asked me how many points they should assign to a person who signed up for a seminar, but didn't attend.   The important thing is that the point value is relative to other activities so in the end, the higher the score, the more actionable the lead is.

2. Lead scores should REPLACE your old ranking system of A,B or C leads in your CRM system.  If you begin to score on a relative scale, it becomes less of a psychological issue to categorize leads as A, versus B versus C.  So many sales people reject working with C leads because of the bad reputation they have as being too cold to develop efficiently.  With a relative lead scoring system, you always know who rates more highly and you don't have to inculcate a culture of "bad" leads at your organization through a grading system.

and as a follow on to that...

3.  Don't assume that a low score is equivalent to a low value lead.  Studies have shown that up to 70% of the bona fide leads that come through the door of a B2B demand creation organization end up buying a product from someone (though it may not be you).   Low lead scores indicate either a person is early on in their buying process, their need is not fully developed yet, they don't trust you enough to share their information with you, or a whole host of other reasons.   Don't assume because a contact has a low score that they won't develop over time.

4.  Start simple.  'Nuff said.

5.  All successful processes are ongoing in nature.  Tweak your programs, tweak your scores, change the metrics you look at to analyze the scores of your leads.  Be open and flexible when you get started and you'll find  you have a program that your whole team, marketing and sales, buy into.

If you're a Salesforce.com customer, you can get some good tips on lead scoring on the SuccessForce blog.

The Lead Dogs has a short article on lead scoring with a bit more information.

Posted by Steve Gershik

Ten Tips for Lead Generation Landing Pages

As I've discussed before, landing pages are critical to getting the most from your pay-per-click campaigns. Our customers at Marketo have found that targeted landing pages can improve their conversion rates by 200% or more.

So how do you create better lead generation landing pages? I recently contributed a guest post to Lee Odden's wildly popular Online Marketing Blog in which I shared ten tested and proven tips you can use to improve and optimize your landing pages.

Read the entire article: Ten Tips for Lead Generation Landing Pages.

Here's a short summary:

1. First Impressions Matter. Make sure your landing pages are instantly relevant to the search term.
2. Have an Offer. Your landing page only needs to convince the visitor to sign up for a free offer; it doesn't need to sell your company.
3. Remove The Site Navigation. Simpler pages usually work better for lead generation.
4. Use Graphics Wisely. Graphics are main thing that draws the eye — the right one can work wonders, the wrong one can distract from your conversion.
5. Make Your Content Scan-able. People don't read landing pages, they scan them.
6. Only Ask What You Really Need. Simple forms convert better, and you can always collect more during your lead nurturing process.
7. Capture Implicit Information. Use hidden fields and click paths to capture additional information about your leads.
8. Have Reasons to Give Valid Info. Don't just give the offer to the prospect, email it to them — this ensures you get a valid email address.
9. Say Thank You. The confirmation page is a great opportunity to deepen the relationship by making another offer or asking more information.
10. Test… But Don't Over Test. Testing is a great way to optimize your pages, but don't over-test — A-B testing works great and most B2B companies don't have the volumes to support more sophisticated techniques like multivariate testing.

Landing Pages Don't Need To Be Hard

Unfortunately, three out of four B2B companies still send clicks to their home page. The biggest reason for not using more landing pages is a lack of resources, and time from web developers is the most difficult resource to get. That's why Marketo Landing Pages allows you to create landing pages with no IT, using an easy-to-use PowerPoint-like interface. Check out www.marketo.com/demo to learn more.

Read the entire article: Ten Tips for Lead Generation Landing Pages.

Posted by Jon Miller on September 27, 2007 in Landing Page | Ten Tips for Lead Generation Landing Pages

Traffic Demographics

How much do you know about the visitors to your web site? Are they directly interested in what you have to offer them? Is what you are speaking about on your site general information that is available anywhere on the Internet or something that they can only get from you? If you are simply rehashing what everybody else is saying than you are losing out on a lot of traffic and a lot of income.

Exactly how much you need to know remains something of a mystery. However, it is relatively safe to say that if you offer only generalities on your web page, you may generate a lot of traffic but you will probably not get a lot of return visitors. While people who come to your site initially may provide some base ad revenue, unless they can interact on your site, they are probably not going to be very receptive to actual sales pitches from you.

For example, if you are involved in the health care niche and you only put out a couple of hundred articles about how important health care is without giving your visitors and readers any real or useful information, it is not likely that they will be returning to get any real information from your site. When you offer them something of substance, no matter whether it is a digital product or something more tangible, they will remember your mediocrity and not be compelled to purchase your offering.

On the other hand, if you have fifty well-written articles discussing the different types of health care and different concerns, benefits and hazards of specific health care needs, your visitors will be more likely to return. When you have something specific to offer those readers, they are bound to be more responsive to your offers.

You can have ten thousand people on your list regarding your particular niche, but are you taking all of the possible variations into consideration in order to offer something that is directly relevant to your list? That is not to say that you have to get into too much detail but that you do need to offer them something that is directly related to a specific need. If there is no specific need to fill, none of your visitors will feel a need to purchase it.

While you do not want to narrow your niche down so far that you no longer have any real audience at all, you do want to include specifics about as many of those subgroups in your niche as is possible. Concentrate on building them up one at a time and you will actually fare much better than you would by bombarding them with everything all at once.

If you return to our health care niche example, you could very well start off with a general site stating the relevance of health care and how important it is for everyone. That main heading can than be broken down into sub-categories in order to meet and fulfill the needs and requirements of all of the people that visit your site.

The health care needs of a professional athlete are going to be different than the needs of an elderly and infirm person. However, by including sections in your site to cover the needs of both of those groups, you have expanded your audience by providing more specifics separated into different areas. You have also accomplished this without alienating either group. This is something that is very relevant when you want to generate return traffic or confidence in the products you have for sale on your site.

Whatever particular niche yours happens to be, try expanding it as far as possible while continuing to provide enough information for the casual reader to learn what category they belong in. Offering something for both the general audience as well as more specific information for each of the groups within that arena will only expand your audience, your credibility and your income.

Ward Tipton has been writing for over three years in the fields of Writing, SEO, SEM and for Internet Marketers across the globe. No matter what your writing or Internet Marketing needs may be, they can be met on time and on budget by visiting this site!

Passionistas: A Marketer’s New Best Friend

According to a new study by Yahoo and MediaVest called "Passionistas: The New Empowered Consumers," highly-engaged consumers are more likely than most to create and share content online about issues they are passionate about and even the brands associated with them. Should marketers tap into this community, they would find a "unique opportunity to engage these credible, influential advocates to spread brand messages through digital media," according to the release.

The study tracked the behavior of online consumers interested in sports, health, food, entertainment and other passions. The results showed that Passionistas spend a significant amount of time engaged in their passion related activities than the average consumer.

Passionistas are 52% more likely to recommend or influence other about a brand. Mark McLaughlin, vice president of Audience Strategies at Yahoo said in the release, "Being passionate today means digital content sharing and influencing others' brand perceptions and purchase behaviors. Marketers who build their campaigns from the start with the goal of tapping into passions are inviting consumers to get engaged and create an authentic dialogue."

Additional findings included: 53% said they would try a brand they had not previously considered if it were associated with their passion, versus 41% of regular users; 49% said their opinion of the brand would be more favorable if associated with their passion, versus 34% of regular users; and 46% said a brand has greater credibility if associated with their passion, versus 34% of regular users.

Passionistas look for relevant and timely information, including ads that look and feel like content, email subscriptions and RSS feeds, and customized suggestions from vendors like Amazon or Netflix. Marketers looking to leverage this valuable audience should look at this study and recognize the trends in their appropriate product space and how those events can shape the activity of their passionistas.

7 Marketing Mistakes To Avoid When Promoting Your Business

Many people rush into business thinking it will be easy to run, but very soon they realize that it is not as easy as it looks. A successful business is a finely tuned machine. In order to keep your business running smoothly it is important to avoid making mistakes.

Here are the 7 most common mistakes to avoid:

1. Not having clear objectives:
Many business people start a business without clear objectives. They fail to set realistic goals for their marketing and consequently set themselves up for failure. It is important to make a list of goals and objectives based on a quarterly time line. If you do not have company goals and objectives you are like a car driving without a road map. Make sure all employees are briefed on company objectives. When your employees are not properly prepared you will not be able to achieve company objectives.

2. Neglecting to analyze your potential customers
Neglecting to analyze your potential customers is a dangerous mistake. It can lead to many problems. When you do not analyze your customers wants and needs you do not know what products and services to develop for them. This will lead to targeting the wrong market and neglecting to understand your own niche market. It is important for any business to do their marketing analysis so that you can target your market and maximize your sales.

3. Not testing:
By not testing your sales copy and places you advertise with split testing your advertising, you will be losing sales. Split testing is simple to do but many businesses fail to do this. This results in a lot of wasted time and effort. If you do not test your ad copy and marketing promotions you will not have a proper idea of the ads and promotions that are pulling and what is not working. It is simple to do by placing 2 ads for the same product in a publication or website etc. You can then see which one is performing the best.

4. Not budgeting:
Budgeting is extremely important in business. Your business should never run out of money. This is especially true with your marketing and advertising ventures. It is important to have a monthly or quarterly budget for your marketing. Within that budget put aside money for each promotion you will be doing. Start small, test and then build on successes. This will allow you to always stay solvent and have enough for promotions.

5. Giving up too soon:
Companies go out of business at an alarming rate these days. One of the reasons is that the owners give up too soon. Just when success might be just around the corner they give up and decide to close the business down. In exactly the same fashion marketing promotions can fail. You need to give your promotions at least 3 months before you decide to scrap them. Some promotions will take longer than others to bring results. As always, test all marketing tactics before you launch a larger promotion. Patience is one of the hallmarks of business and you need to implement it.

6. Poor sales copy:
How often have you wanted a product but when you read the sales page you had serious doubts? Poor unprofessional ad copy will cost you sales. In fact without good sales copy you will not be able to sell effectively at all. It is critical to your business to get this right. If necessary get an experienced copywriter to do this. It is worth the investment, as you will see returns when you make sales.

7. Not screening your employees carefully:
To handle the extra load for the Christmas season you will need to hire new employees. It is very important not to rush into this. There is no dearth of people needing employment but you need to screen them carefully before hiring. One rude customer service agent can cost you customers. Do not take this type of risk. You want to preserve the integrity of your company at all times and screening employees is the way to achieve this. You will then be able to build a core of loyal professional employees that will be an asset to the company.

The golden rule is to diversify. You should always use multiple forms of marketing promotions in your business. Do not just do one or two promotions and then wait for results. This will slow company growth and your business will stagnate. The last thing you need is to slow your marketing in the Christmas season. So remember to diversify and enjoy the increase in sales.

By avoiding these mistakes you will take your company to the success you deserve. You will be able to have year round success for your business and really be able to cash in on the Christmas season. So plan ahead and be careful not to make these common mistakes.

Sean McPheat is a leading authority marketing consultant and helps businesses across the UK, Europe, US and the Middle East. Sean's marketing services include direct mail, Internet marketing, sales copy, sales training, telemarketing, PR and strategic alliance marketing.