Leads, prospects, opportunities, oh my!
If lead generation seems out of your hands and you're at the mercy of 3rd party lead generators, OR if you think you have this whole lead generation thing licked, you need to listen to this episode.
This is the first of several episodes that take you through becoming a lead-generating powerhouse. We'll talk about the magic that happens when generating leads is done well, identifying common problems, the three keys to determine if your lead generation system is working well or not, and what to do to improve.
Leads, prospects, opportunities, oh my!
If lead generation seems out of your hands and you're at the mercy of 3rd party lead generators, OR if you think you have this whole lead generation thing licked, you need to listen to this episode.
This is the first of several episodes that take you through becoming a lead-generating powerhouse. We'll talk about the magic that happens when generating leads is done well, identifying common problems, the three keys to determine if your lead generation system is working well or not, and what to do to improve.
The goal of this program is to simplify marketing for small businesses. Small businesses don't have the time, money or patience to mess around. My name is kale, Gwen, and I'm here to put things in perspective to provide you with free marketing advice and small doses that are easy to absorb and apply. I'll tell fun stories, interview some amazing experts, provide easy to execute howtos and answer your questions all here on totally hyped in feed spots. Top 25 must follow small business marketing podcasts on the web. So lead generation has always been all the rage and I have participated wholeheartedly in a promoting that rage and be, um, selling services to, uh, meet the need of that rage. And, um, quite frankly, I'm super excited to move ahead in 2022 with an eye on just helping companies generate leads, lead generation is, you know, it, it's the thing that everybody understands certainly about like why you market, why you advertise. Um, certainly not the only reason to market and advertise, but, uh, I think it is the, um, the simplest way that people can understand the results of marketing and advertise. So I think they point to it. And I think that when they think of lead generation, I think most companies would say top of our list of things that we want to get done now, in order to get leads, you still gotta do all the marketing stuff. So, uh, what we're talking about in the next several episodes about lead generation is going to be kind of cutting to the chase. The idea that if we can put a good system together that we're gonna generate good quality leads. And one of the first things I wanna address is, uh, what is a lead? Uh, I think that there's a lot of confusion about it. If you use, uh, customer relations management software like Salesforce or hub bot, things like that, you're, there's a lot of terminology around leads, you know, uh, leads, prospects opportunities. Oh, my, um, is lead just to contact is a lead just to contact. I, I, in my world, you don't have a lead unless it's a qualified lead. And let's talk about that a little bit qualified lead in my book is somebody who at least has a high likelihood of doing business or buying from you, right? I mean, at the end of the day, uh, if it, if you have some information on somebody and they're never gonna do business with you, all you have is some contact inform. You do not have a lead, a lead. In my opinion, is somebody worth communicating with, because there's a higher likelihood that they're gonna do business with you buy a product like yours or your service. Um, they may buy competitors. They, you know, they might get cold on you. Um, they might change your mind. They might not actually make a purchase. Um, but a lead in my opinion is got some qualifications to it to begin with. I don't think you can call it a lead otherwise, and I'm not, you know, I understand that, you know, systems like Salesforce and HubSpot and what have you, they have this, just these, um, differing terminologies simply because it helps explain kind of the workflow of their softwares. So, uh, in my opinion, every, if it's a lead, there's some quality to it. There's, um, an aspect of qualified, um, to a lead. That means that, uh, they, they have some understanding of what it is you're selling now. Collecting leads that are qualified is a far different prospect than huh. And I just, did you see how, what I do right there didn't even know I was gonna use prospect right there, but yet I just used terminology that confused as people collecting leads that are qualified is a different task than is just simply collecting leads. Now, what I mean by this is if you ever have been to a trade show, for example, and people have a fishbowl at their booth, and you could drop your business card in there, um, or you can register to win their big prize, which might be like an iPad or a TV. I've seen, um, trips, uh, a number of different things, uh, that is collecting contact information.<laugh> unless of course you're giving away unless you sell trips or TVs or iPads, right? Like at the end of the day, that's just, I've got a bunch of names in a bowl. Uh, and they happen to be at a trade show where the topic was of common interest, but that's really about it. You know, at the end of the day, they might just, I, you know what, I could really use the TV. I hope I'm the winner. And I don't give a crap about what you sell. Those are just names. Now, if what you're giving away, uh, for example, let's just do the easy, right? Like if you're giving away a high end, big screen TV and you are in the high end, big screen TV business, then you could assume that everybody who put their name in to win that thing is at least interested in high end big screen TVs. That to me is some qualification to the name that goes in there. And so to me, that that just immediately, that's better than, you know, a software company giving away. Uh, let's say a trip, right? Like the trip is very attractive and people are going to like you and people are really gonna wanna pay attention to you and people will notice you, but the person who's putting their name in for that trip, there's nothing to say that there's any interest in your software. So again, I think that, you know, the idea of just collecting names is different than collecting leads because in my world, a lead has some qualified to it. It is a qualified lead, in my opinion, otherwise don't bother you're bothering them. You know, when you call them up to follow up, um, you're making more work for yourself. It's kind of just stupid. So at the end of the day, you know, the process to collect good qualifi leads is different than just collecting people's information. The thing about really good lead generation when it's done well, this is something you really need to focus on. It's like magic. You actually get fewer leads to manage and you get more sales at is a good lead generation system. If you're getting a hundred leads, for example, and five of them convert, how different would it be for you to get 25 leads in which five convert, right? At the end of the day, you had to go through 75 more leads to get to the five that converted. Then you did with a better lead generation system that generated 25 leads in which five converted. So that these are kind of the things that you have to consider. Uh, if you don't feel like you're getting the leads that you expect, you have to consider like you, first of all, you might not have a benchmark. You not, you might not even be able to say that I, you know, one lead generation source gives me this many leads and this many conversions and I have three others and they all, you know, have their own variances. If you don't have multiple lead generators out there, it's kind of hard. And you have to at least have a benchmark that this is where I'm at right now. How can I do now? I'm gonna tell you that I've done a lot of work with assisted living communities, senior living. Um, and I've done a lot of work with car dealers in my day. And they both have very interesting scenarios. Um, car dealers, uh, have these third party resources, uh, and as whoever you are you're, if you've ever bought a car, you you're gonna be familiar with them. Car gurus is one. Autotrader is another one cars.com. Now someone might say, well, tho those aren't lead generators. Those are places where I can go and look at inventories, but they are generators. In fact, if you ever schedule a test drive through that, you've just con you've just been a lead. And, uh, you've just, you know, signed up and, and you've now become the target of a salesperson to sell you the vehicle in which you, uh, signed up to either get to know more information about, or to test drive, uh, assisted living. They have a thing called a place for mom. And if you go there to look for assisted living communities where your mom might live, it's a directory of assisted living communities. And if you find one that you like, and you either call the phone number on there, or you fill out a form on there, you are now a lead, uh, through a place for mom for that community. Uh, if you've ever gone and ordered flowers, uh, through 1-800-FLOWERS, for example, that is also a lead generation system of, for florist. And so a lot of those types of industries have multiples of these lead generation, um, third party resources. And especially in the car business, you can look at car gurus, you can look at Autotrader, you can look@car.com and they're gonna all be different. And this is somewhat helpful in a way, uh, car dealers probably hate, uh, that they're all different and that they have to, oh, this one gives me a ton of leads, but hardly any converts, man. This one gives me just, I mean, it's a flood of leads and lots of'em convert. And, uh, they all have kind of their own different purpose. And I think a lot of car dealers might actually miss this point. Um, but if you were to set your sales up, so of that, you use this resource for this type of car and this type of customer and that resource for this type of car and that type of customer you'd be wildly better off because right now you probably look at things like Autotrader and say, Hey, yeah, they send me a fair number of leads. It's, it's hard to get those leads to convert. You look at car gurus and a lot of time that might feel like they convert more. Um, but what you might also realize is, is that is driven by, by changes in your inventory. So you might lower a price on a car and then get a bunch of leads because you lowered the price. Uh, cars.com is kind of the slow, steady resource that, uh, doesn't generate a ton of leads, but it generates good leads. And so the problem is they all cost a whole bunch of money<laugh> and you gotta feel like, well, I'm, I don't wanna lose the leads. Uh, and I, and so you wind up paying for'em a place for mom in the assisted living industry is a huge expense. If someone signs a contract with an assisted living community, through a place for mom, it costs that assisted living community, a ton of money, a ton. So at any rate, if you have that kind of a system in place, you need to really analyze which resources doing what for you. And, you know, you have to get all the way down. You have to be good enough to look at like type of service. What type of, uh, product am I selling through each of these things? Um, you know, which one has the more qualified leads coming through. There's a number of factors you have to look at and then determine where to invest. Uh, just suffice to say that if you have a number of different lead generating systems, uh, especially third parties that you need to analyze, which one's giving you, which type of leads and what type of sales you're getting from those leads and what type of conversion rates are you getting. And then when you start to kind of mash all that together, you start to paint a picture of, again, where do I wanna invest? If you can't find a lead generation system out there that works for you and your consumer, then the next thing that you can do is build your own. And what do I mean by that? Well, you don't even need money and you don't even need time really? At the end of the day, we've all seen them, right? There's all kinds of lead generation systems out there that we've seen that are virtually free. There's also some that, I mean, you kind of set'em and forget'em so it doesn't require a ton of your time, but here's the reality. We've all seen these things, right. And maybe you don't realize that you're seeing them, but if you've ever been to, to a mall and there's a car there that you can sign up to win, that's a lead generator. And I'm sure that, um, you know, somebody's probably saying, well, duh, I know that, but the car that's there, the very specific type model is there for a reason it's rarely ever gonna be a Lamborghini. It's, you know, it's not everybody's dream car. That's a tough lead, right? Like everyone would like to win that$250,000 car. So, you know, that's not necessarily indicative that, um, these are good qualified leads for people that wanna buy Lamborghini. So the car is typically gonna be, uh, more mass appeal or more of an appeal for the type of customer they typically have and do well with. Um, but it make no mistake about it. When you put your name in that to win a, a vehicle, uh, I've seen, you know, ATVs, boats, uh, all these things, those are lead generators. Um, I'll give you another example of a lead generator that doesn't really cost much. Now, granted you have to, you have to rent the space in the mall and what have you, you do have to do that. You have to get permission, but I mean, as far as things go, that one doesn't require much of your time might cost you a few hundred bucks a month to, to have a vehicle there. Um, but like, let's make no mistake about it. These generators don't have to be giveaways. I, I use those because they're super obvious and everybody's seen them, but they don't have to be, um, I, and here's one that we've all seen and probably participated in the white paper download, right? Like, and I've seen this done really well, and I've seen it done really poorly, the really good ones. I mean, I have gotten white papers that, uh, after going through the white paper, I'm like, I need to solve this problem for myself. How, I mean, how I, what is the system that they're using to do this? I gotta have it. That's a good lead generator. That is a good white paper that takes the, the person who's downloaded the white paper and read it, uh, down the exact right path to say that here's the problem that you are having. And here's the solution and, and hear how to buy it. So that that's when it's done well, when it's not done well, it's sort of like, well, I just need a lead generator out there. So I'm gonna just put some content out there, be loosely related to my thing, but I think everybody wants this information. So I'm gonna put it out there and get'em to download it. And either a, nobody downloads it or B uh, lots of people download it, but you don't get any re leads from it. Nobody there's never gonna be a conversion there. Um, so make sure that, and we'll cover this at the end, but I mean, and make sure that you're, you are tightly tied to what it is that you are, you're trying to sell when you're doing even a white paper download. Uh, recently I did a really cool thing for a client. Um, they have this big annual event and there's a couple different audiences that go to this event. And so you have to, you know, market and advertise to more than one audience. And one of the audiences is, is rather difficult to get after and get them to convert. And what we wound up doing is having secondary events and the secondary events were much more consumable and much more, um, every day, like everybody could do it. And, and, but if you were interested in these other events, there is no way you wouldn't be interested in the events, the ones where there's more money involved and the ones where, um, you know, they probably didn't even know existed before. So this gave us a great opportunity to, to have an event where everybody was interested in. And man, did we get the signups hundreds of signups in minutes? Uh, it was fantastic. Uh, and at the end of the day, uh, those people are now kind of a captive audience during that event for us to say, Hey, there is this thing coming up this summer, make sure you're paying attention. We're going to, uh, everybody who's registered, isn't gonna get more information on it. And, uh, it, it just, it couldn't have gone better, but it was a, a similar event that was leading up to a bigger event, but you can also do informational events that would then lead to people, potentially buying services and what have you. Um, but it, to me, it really, there's an infinite number of things that one can do to generate leads. Uh, it really is just limited by your imagination. Um, configurators are another one, you know, you don't, it doesn't have to be an event. It doesn't have to be a download. It doesn't have to be a giveaway. Uh, I've helped companies build configurators, uh, for all kinds of different things, you know, build out a room, uh, was one that pick out a color of a thing. Uh, the thing that you might be most, uh, familiar with is, uh, if you've ever been to a car manufacturer website and you've built your own car, customized your car, you're gonna buy the, you know, the Ford, whatever, and you go in and you change the wheels, you change the color, you change the interior, you step up the engine, you do all of those things, all the safety features and what have you. Um, that's a configurator and those are, you know, at the end of the day, certainly there are a tool for the consumer, but they, the point of them is to generate a lead for the local dealer. You know, if you request a quote at the end of that, or you wanna ask a question or find a local dealer, that's a lead, you're a lead, but it's super tied to, uh, the fact that you wanna buy a car, if you're gonna go. Yeah, I used to do it during the reset when I was broke is broke. Uh, I didn't even know what money looked like during the recession. And, um, I I'd go out and build, you know, the, the most expensive Mercedes-Benz and, you know, but at the end of the day, I wasn't gonna be a good lead for that. But I mean, the tools were great for a consumer, right? Well, by the time I'm outta the recession, I do need a car. And I, then I went to a much more reasonable, uh, manufacturer as far as cost was concerned and, uh, built my, my next vehicle there. Um, so at the end of the day, those configurators, yes, they're great tools for consumers, uh, and even dreamers like me when I had no money and wanted a very expensive car. Uh, it, it, it works out great. Um, because I get what I want out of it, you know, the very specific vehicle, I get to know more about the vehicle, like what options are available and then I'm likely going to become a lead. So there's three keys to determining whether your lead generation operation is working or not. And the first one we're gonna talk about is a little dicey. Um, because I think that if you're a manager, an operator, an owner, you're gonna hate what I'm about to say. Uh, but it's just true. So we're gonna say it anyway, conversion rate. Um, I think that everyone assumes conversion should be quite high. Um, the average consumer rate across 14 different industries is 3.9%. Now I will agree with the managers, operators, and owners that that sucks. And I think that the state of lead is actually somewhat poor. So those are, you know, those are numbers that are indicative of kind of an entire industry doing poorly. Anyway, however, uh, you, aren't probably gonna get 90% conversion rates and things like that. Now, a lot of companies will say, okay, I get these leads, but when I get'em to this point, then I convert almost all of them. That's again, that's a little bit different because it's not the initial lead. Uh, but yeah, there, uh, there are certainly gonna be qualifications that as you move them down, the, the path, uh, you know, those are gonna convert at a higher rate. Um, and so you might wanna aim your lead generators at bringing them to that point. The other thing you can look at to determine, and, and so about conversion rate, let, just back up for a second, it's very difficult, uh, for me to just say point blank, that you should be here. Uh, there's varying numbers for varying conversion rates for varying industries. But I would say that, I mean, if you're hitting 10%, you're doing pretty well. You're hitting 20%. You're outpacing everyone. Uh, if you're in the five to 3% range, you're pretty average. Uh, but I think that every company could be in the 20% range. Um, I think that it really just, and it takes time sometimes, and it takes a lot of thinking and a lot of strategy, uh, but I think every company should be there. That's, that's what I would at least shoot or, um, you know, in cases like we've done with this client, you know, just recently, uh, the conversion rates were much higher than that, but, uh, it, it does depend, uh, it, it really does. And there's, you know, depending on the, uh, the risk involved in the sale, that's also, you know, if you're buying a home, the conversion rate, it's probably gonna be different than if you're buying an oil change, for example. So at some level, a lot of things have to be taken into consideration there, but, um, let me just say that I, I, I'm just venting guess that everybody could do better, uh, noticeable variations in the type of lead or source of the lead is another thing you should look at to determine whether your operation, your lead generation operation is doing well. Um, and so we talked about like the auto trailer trader the car gurus, the, uh, the, the varying cars.com. Um, if you have multiple lead generation sources and one's working out better than another, you know, you might want to, first of all, you should absolutely look at it yourself, but sometimes it might take a fresh set of eyes to take everything into consideration. And, um, not just play favorites because over time, like every car dealer that I've ever known, when you look at the lead generation resources that they have, they all about one or two of them. And a lot of times it's the same ones, but they won't get rid of'em because they do generate something. And one dealer might love this one while another dealer hates that one. And sometimes that's personal preference. Sometimes it's just that, you know, one company has, uh, an inventory that works better for one system than the other. And what have you, uh, but you do have to take a look at the variations in the type of lead generation re sources that you have and determine what's working and what's not. And then you really have to get in and figure out why that's, what's gonna help you improve this one works because of this, this one isn't working because of that. Well, how can we get the one that's not working to work better and, and take some of those qualities of the ones that are working well and move them into other areas. And let's not forget that the ones that are working well probably could work better. What can we do for that? How can we make that happen? Another problem that, uh, a lot of people face, uh, that you, you really kind of have to take a look at when you, when you're looking at your lead generation operation, uh, are, are they being seen? And if they're being seen a lot and not used, that's a whole other issue. That's very common. I have this thing out there, you know, a hundred thousand people saw it over the last two weeks. I got two leads. Well, if, again, if you're selling a huge ticket item, that that might actually be pretty good. If you are selling a trinket, that probably really sucks, especially if it's a trinket that has a huge audience. So you do have to really take into consideration where your lead generators are. Are you at the mall with a fishbowl? Are you at a trade show? Are you online? Are you networking? You know, we're, are you getting your leads from which ones are working? That's I mean, you really have to kind of take those things into consideration and then start to modify your systems so that it exploits the good things and, and rids yourself of the bad. Now, here are the top three things you can do to improve lead generation, always give them a great value or a great reason to provide that information. And when I say that it needs to be closely related. So those are your two top things have great value and incentive. And number two is make sure that that value or incentive is tightly associated with what you're trying to sell. Those are the two biggies. Number three is a little bit more difficult, cuz you can't always do it. You don't always have control. You might not have the budget, but make sure your lead generators are highly visible. That's not always going to be on your website. Your website might have horrible traffic, uh, Google, uh, in their paid ads. You can get leads right from there. They don't have to go to your website. They don't have to go anywhere. They can actually fill out forms in their search results or in the ads that are displayed things that you absolutely have to take a look at, but you wanna make sure that your lead generators are, are visible by the right people. Now, in the next episode of this, we're gonna take a look at building the perfect lead generating beast. So among other things, we're gonna take a look, look at, uh, the genius that goes into making the incentive or value matter without making it feel like it's a prelude to spam. You know, a lot of people, uh, are very wary to download the white paper cuz they know it's coming<laugh> and I've, those are the ones that are done poorly. The next thing that I, I made a note of for the next episode was providing the exact right type of value. And when I say that, that kind of just goes back to the idea that the value that you're providing, the incentive that you're providing for them to give you their information is likely to mean that they're going to or are interested in or are, you know, future buyers of your or service or product. It doesn't have to be yours, but they might just be in the market for whatever it is that you're selling. They might not buy from you, but they're in the market to buy your product or type of product or service and then gathering the perfect amount of information is the other big thing that we'll look at in that next episode, this is a huge point in a lot of people don't realize it, the bigger, the form, the bigger, the value and incentive you need to give for them to fill out that form, the smaller, the form, the easier it is for people to fill out and the more people that will fill it out. But there's a likelihood that you might not have super actionable information. And, and I can tell you right now that you should opt on the side of a smaller form every single time, take a listen to the next episode as it comes out. Thanks for listening. And I'll talk to you soon. Thanks for listening to totally hyped. We're listed in feed spots. Top 25, must follow small business marketing podcasts on the web, looking for more at episodes or to follow us on social or are you looking to get your marketing together? Go to totally hype.com/connect until we meet again. My name is kale Gwen.