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Why Your Company Is Chasing Too Many Bad Sales Leads

January 20, 2022 by Jessy Troy Leave a Comment

Many companies don’t do enough upfront work to qualify their new sales leads. They simply pass every single sales lead through to the sales team, even if the prospect is nowhere near ready to buy or is even a good fit for what the company sells.

According to statistics cited by HubSpot, 61 percent of B2B companies send all of their business leads directly to sales, even though only 27 percent of those leads will be qualified to count as “serious buyers.” Having too many unqualified sales leads wastes the time of the sales team and causes the company to miss out on legitimate sales opportunities. When your salespeople are bombarded with low-quality leads that aren’t a good fit for your product or service, they’re going to miss the chance to talk with prospects who are legitimately good sales opportunities.

If your company is chasing bad sales leads, the following strategies will help you better qualify your inbound sales inquiries upfront:

Create Content that Drives Sales

In B2B content creators have always keep their target DMU (decision making unit) in mind. Have you been doing the same when creating content for B2C?

Text Optimizer is a great intent optimization tool that helps you create content that meets your customers’ needs and expectations.

Text Optimizer lets you optimize content for intent

Ask Lead-Qualifying Questions

Not all sales leads are the same, so why would your company want to treat them all the same? After all, every single prospect is unique; they all have different problems and pain points and budgetary concerns, and they all have unique business needs that your solution has to address. But if your company is simply passing every sales lead along to the sales team without even asking any questions, you’re missing a big chance to learn more about the prospect.

Asking questions to qualify the sales leads is a simple step that you can take to start prioritizing and ranking your sales leads. By asking sales-related exploratory questions, you are starting to build trust and build a relationship, and you’re learning more about the larger picture of the customer’s business challenges.

Asking questions also helps you do “lead scoring” to rank your sales leads based on how likely they are to buy. This is somewhat of an inexact process, but with time, you’ll get better at deciphering the subtle clues and behaviors of prospects to see which ones are genuinely interested and which ones are just calling around to do research or get price quotes. Use an online form builder that gives you flexibility to verify your contact prior to registering is as a leader.

Ask Open-Ended Questions

Asking lead-qualifying questions is a subtle process that requires some skill and savvy. For example, you don’t want to be too direct or aggressive by asking questions such as, “Do you have a budget for this purchase?” or “Are you definitely in the market for a new solution?” or “Are you looking to buy sometime soon?” These questions tend to create sales pressure and make the prospect feel defensive.

Instead of putting the customer under pressure, start by asking open-ended questions that get them to talk about their overall business situation. For example, you could ask, “What challenges are you experiencing with your current solution?” This helps get the customer to open up a bit and share their frustrations that are causing them to seek a new vendor. Or you could ask, “How is your current solution impacting your overall business processes?” This is a great question, because it helps you analyze the overall picture at the prospect’s business and evaluate how urgently they might be looking to make a purchase decision.

Every lead-qualifying question is your chance to hear more from the customer. Get them to open up about their business challenges, and then really listen to what they say.

Follow Up By Phone

Other companies make the mistake of relying too much on automated systems. For example, when you get new inbound sales inquiries via your website or online advertising, you might have an automated email reply or online intake form that asks the prospect some questions about what they’re looking to buy. These automated tools can be helpful, but you can’t rely on a fully automated lead qualification process.

Instead, call people back. Get on the phone and have a detailed conversation that allows for the “human element” of relationship building and establishing trust. Even with the great technology we have today, you still need to get on the phone and talk with your customers.

Why? For one thing, the buyers who are most urgently looking to make a decision want to hear back from your company immediately, and from a real person. Motivated buyers are probably contacting several of your competitors, and according to HubSpot’s cited statistics, 35-50 percent of sales go to the vendor who responds first.

Some prospects are never going to be the right fit for what you sell, and not everyone is a “good” customer. But with better inbound lead qualification processes – one that includes asking good questions, sorting and ranking the sales leads and following up quickly – your company can turn more of your sales leads into big sales.

Filed Under: Marketing /Sales / Social Media

6 Tips for Preventing Social Media Burnout

December 13, 2021 by Jessy Troy Leave a Comment

Without sounding terribly over-dramatic, social media burnout is a real thing – and something we should be watching out for.

Whether you’re using social media for work or for pleasure: it’s likely that it takes up a hefty chunk of your day. There is a limit to how much information we can process – and by flooding our brains with photos of our friends’ dinners, lists of celebrities that look like cats, advice to get us thinner doing ‘this one thing’…

It can get exhausting.

Literally. We can get cognitively overloaded from too much information, resulting in decision fatigue – which in turn, can have dramatic impact on our willpower.

So is Facebook driving you to eat that pack of cookies? May be… either way, many of us could benefit from taking a step back from our social media routine before burnout sets in.

Here are six tips for preventing social media burnout:

1) Niche down

If you can niche down with your target market, you can do the same with your social media followers. If there is one platform that is more popular with your ideal audience – go there, and take a breather from the others.

This ‘pick one’ strategy can be tough at first (good old FOMO) but it’s amazing what happens if you switch your focus to only one platform.

It doesn’t mean you have to stick to that one platform forever either – it might be a week or a month – and if things aren’t working, you can always switch your focus.

2) Consider your likes

No – not thumbs up likes. What do you – for real – like? If you’re a highly visual type, stick with Pinterest and Instagram.

If you enjoy writing, get behind Facebook and Linkedin. If you prefer quick, snackable bites of content – Twitter’s your platform. If you like being in front of the camera – get on Periscope.

3) Set SMART goals

You likely have come across the ‘SMART’ goal acronym before – a checklist to make sure your goals are: Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Timely.

When applied to social media, you can set a goal (such as X number of followers by X date) and have something to work towards. When this is your only focus, you can stop stressing about all the other distractions. A solid social media marketing service can help you set up your goals and monitoring.

4) Schedule on/off time

It’s easy to say ‘I’ll take a break’ but how many times do we end up foregoing that break for just another 10 minutes of scrolling through our feed?

By having scheduled time to be online, you are more likely to make the most out of your session. If you’re working towards your SMART goal, this will be a huge benefit.

There are lots of apps that can help you stick to your schedule. I love Self Control (Mac OS X) for it’s simplicity, and Rescue Time is another great way to monitor your time spent online. There are a few great WordPress plugins for your business to get more effecient.

5) Automate

If you aren’t already using a scheduling app to automate your posts – get on it! Whether it’s Buffer, Hootsuite, Edgar – it’s a great way to get the bulk of the content you want to share sorted in one go.

It prevents the infamous rabbit-hole effect. You know: we go on social media to share one thing and then… 45 minutes have passed and our eyes have glazed over.

Taking an hour or two out to schedule a week’s worth of content also allows you to specify the best time to reach your audience are online.

6) Outsource

Finally, if you’re ready to take a break altogether from your social accounts, consider hiring someone to help you out. I wouldn’t recommend that for all of your posts – your audience are still going to want to hear your voice – and that isn’t easy for a freelancer to replicate!

But for scheduling shared posts and researching content, a freelancer from Upwork or Fiverr is a great investment.

Conclusion

If social media is feeling like a chore, or you’re not convinced your time is being spent well perusing your feeds; it could be worth taking a break. If you put into practice these tips, it should be an easy transition. Happy social media holiday!

Image source: Pixabay

Filed Under: Marketing /Sales / Social Media

Agile Marketing Is Perfect On Twitter

September 7, 2021 by Jessy Troy Leave a Comment

Twitter gives businesses a unique marketing advantage compared to other social media platforms. Internet marketers who know what they are doing love the agility that Twitter provides.

I’m pertaining to the unique culture that only Twitter currently has. You see with Twitter, businesses can post multiple posts in a day without experiencing too many negative responses to it. It’s the norm in that exceptional community. Try doing that on Facebook and you will lose your fans or followers faster than you can delete your posts.

However, not all is able to take advantage of this wonderful culture. It requires a certain creativity because being to blunt and spontaneous without direction doesn’t do brands any good. Because you should know that branding and advertising go side by side. Hence, to make your posts fit your brand and still retain that agility we are talking about, you need to have plan.

Below are some of the best responses we got from the most influential Twitter marketers on how to proceed with this planning.

Plan for Specific Moments

I know it’s impossible to try and foresee events that hasn’t materialized yet. Nevertheless, what you can do is to tailor tweets that go well with events that will surely occur in the near future.

I’m talking about planning for events that are bound to happen like upcoming movies, Hollywood gossip, etc.… Doing this allows you tweet really quick responses to popular events.

People simply wouldn’t know that you’ve already made it witty and consistent with your branding; and that you’re just waiting for the right day to arrive. Other than people thinking that you’re impressive, they would surely think of it as worthy of a follow.

Use this advanced ad maker to create awesome graphics to use in your tweets.

Ad maker

Create A Content Calendar

Every large company I know has this. Small businesses on the other hand are more tedious to adopt. This tip is in connection with the first point. What you want to do is to create a content way in advance for events that would obviously take place along the year. Celebrations like Christmas, Labor Day, black Friday and most of the holidays should be on that calendar.

Don’t forget to adjust your landing page to match each particular campaign you are running on Twitter. This site offers a variety of online form templates to create seasonal CTAs and customize your landing page.

You should already be thinking about the perfect tweets that should generate more followers hopping into your company on those dates. What’s best about it is that since some of the events are far into the future that you have plenty of time to keep perfecting them.

Review What Your Competitors Have Been Up To

In this case, it is likewise true that experience is the best teacher. It’s best if you’ll look at some of the most popular tweets that went around during special days of the year.

Most likely, you’ll find the best ones from your competitors since you’re in the same niche. Their tweets will automatically apply to your business. However, you also have to be mindful not to copy the tweet so closely. There are lot of meticulous eyes on Twitter.

Stay alert!

All that planning will go down the drain if you’re not quick enough. Remember that no matter how witty your tweets are, they wouldn’t do much difference if you are late on the scene.

It will only get burrowed in the millions of tweets users do each day.

Image by Lerey Eric from Pixabay

Filed Under: Marketing /Sales / Social Media

Why Influencer Marketing Is More Important Now Than Ever Before

August 28, 2020 by Guest Author Leave a Comment

By Kayla Matthews (Guest Author)

The concept of influencer marketing is far from new. In fact, modern influencer marketing dates back to 1920 when Coco Chanel became one of the most transformative influencers on fashion. However, this branding strategy didn’t experience a rise in popularity until the late 1990s and early 2000s as bloggers and content creators grew in number. 

Now, brands are connecting with popular social media influencers on any and every platform in a rather successful attempt to promote their services and products. As more people flock to social media, especially in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, brands will likely invest even more in this marketing strategy. For influencers, the future is bright, to say the least.  

People Hate Ads

Advertisements have been bombarding consumers for years. From commercials on TV to billboards to ads on Facebook and Instagram, brands are vying for your attention. Meanwhile, most consumers are actively blocking these ads or completely ignoring them, even when the algorithm uses a person’s browsing history to target them and pique their interest. These traditional ads simply don’t work like they used to. Why you might ask? Consumers don’t trust brands that self-promote and they’re tired of all the noise. 

Enter the Influencer

Then, influencers entered the scene. Popular people — like Kim Kardashian and Donald Millner— with huge social media followings began to partner with both small and large brands to promote their products. This marketing strategy proved quite effective since followers viewed their recommendation as authentic and trustworthy. On Twitter, nearly 40% of users report purchasing a product because of an influencer and 60% of YouTube subscribers would follow the advice of their favorite creator. Evidently, influencer marketing is working. 

Even those without huge followings, like TikToker Lauren Godwin and beauty Instagrammer Daniel Jewels, boast an impressive engagement rate and frequently partner with brands. While some most enter these partnerships as a way to make money, many are choosy about which products they endorse. After all, they want the brands they tout to be trustworthy and legitimate so as not to tarnish their reputation and lose followers. 

COVID-19 and Online Engagement

The coronavirus has changed influencer marketing in huge ways. When the pandemic first hit America, ad budgets decreased and, with them, the financial compensation to many influencers. However, since then, budgets have increased and some are making even more off promotional posts than ever before. This increase is largely due to the rise in social media consumption during shelter-in-place orders and quarantine. 

Since the pandemic, web browsing has risen by 70% and social media engagement has increased by 61%. Of course, this level of online interaction has lent itself well to influencer marketing. Content creators have more time to increase their output, connect with followers and experiment with new platforms while followers now have the opportunity to engage more than ever. Consequently, many ad agencies and brands are investing more in this effective marketing strategy. 

The Future of Influencer Marketing and How to Get Involved

As the pandemic drags on and social media continues to surge in popularity, it’s likely brands will invest even more in influencer marketing. Thus, since celebrities and macro-influencers can only rep a few brands without losing engagement, companies will likely begin partnering with more micro-influencers and those with only a few hundred followers. 

If you’re one of these creators who has a smaller, dedicated following, it may be time to seek out a partnership with one or two of your favorite brands. Odds are your audience will love them, too and you might be able to make a commission from affiliate links and posts. Begin by creating genuine relationships with your followers. Then, reach out to brands and explore new platforms, sharing your for different products and services wherever you go.

About the Author: Kayla Matthews writes about communication and workplace productivity on her blog, Productivity Theory. Her work has also appeared on Talent Culture, MakeUseOf, The Muse and Fast Company.

Photo by Laura Chouette on Unsplash

Filed Under: Marketing /Sales / Social Media

7 Mistakes to Avoid in Digital Marketing

May 14, 2020 by Guest Author Leave a Comment

By Michael Deane

Digital marketing can be tough and not getting the desired results can happen even to the most experienced marketers. The digital landscape is constantly changing and evolving, and you need to keep up to date with the best digital marketing practices at all times.

Digital marketing blunders can have a detrimental effect on your business and your finances. Lack of results in driving traffic, lead conversions, and sales happen when your digital marketing strategy is inadequate.

Let’s review the seven most common and biggest digital marketing mistakes you need to avoid if you want to promote your business and help it thrive.

1. Failing to Set Realistic Goals

Setting unrealistic goals is one of the common mistakes when it comes to this strategy. It is not rare for digital marketers to overestimate the potential of their digital efforts and to expect all their prospects to convert into sales, which is highly unrealistic.

Another downside of this way of thinking is having doubts about the benefits of digital marketing.

It is best to set clear goals you can achieve in the short, medium, and long-run with this strategy. To do so, it’s a good idea to observe past trends and the experiences of similar businesses operating in your industry.

Also, it is crucial to set specific and measurable goals since that will allow you to better track your digital marketing efforts.

2. Not Knowing Your Target Audience

The first step when developing a digital marketing strategy is taking the time to get to know and understand your target audience.

Without this information, you risk losing money since you can only make assumptions about who you’re promoting your company to. When you know who your ideal customer is as well as who your buyer personas are, you can create content that will resonate with their problems and interests.

Learn as much as possible about your target market and establish a connection with those who are most likely to be interested in your offer, instead of trying to sell your products or services to random individuals.

To research your target audience, start with identifying who your current customers are. Social media analytics can provide in-depth information about this.

Creating buyer personas is one of the best ways to better understand your audience. When you know their needs, preferences, and pain points, you can generate amazing content that will attract them to your brand.

3. Failing to Respond Promptly to Your Customers’ Inquiries

When you manage multiple channels and have to manually respond to customer interactions, it can become overwhelming or even impossible. On the other hand, failing to respond to your audience’s inquiries promptly can have dire consequences for your business.

Responsiveness and excellent customer service are critical in today’s market, regardless of the industry.

The solution to this is chatbot technology. It can help you engage with your customers in real-time and lead to better business results.

When you choose the right chatbots for your business, you can enhance customers’ experience, satisfy their needs, and answer their questions 24/7 without having to put them on hold. This will reflect in your profit since more leads will turn into sales with access to the right information at hand.

Conversational chatbots can save your business money since you won’t have to hire additional customer reps, while the conversations can be designed to use your brand’s particular tone. A call deflection bot is another example of how this technology can keep you from wasting precious resources, leaving your human agents free to engage with more complicated scenarios.

4. Engaging in Black Hat Methods

Those eager to get a quick increase in traffic or to rank higher on Google may resort to unsafe marketing practices. If you make that mistake and engage in any type of cheating techniques, it may cost you a lot.

Avoid using any type of black hat methods, that is, dishonest and cheating practices, since they will most probably lead to penalties by Google. Instead of boosting the performance of your website by trying to trick search engines, opt for ethical methods.

Safe marketing strategies will require more work and patience. Still, they will also build your brand a good reputation and deliver better results in the long run, without any unpleasant consequences.

5. Settling for Paid Advertising Only

Pay-per-click marketing can indeed earn quick traffic and sales, but it is not the only digital marketing tactic that can generate revenue.

Also, it can get expensive, since it can take some time to see the long-term results.

If you use only paid advertisements, you may miss other more effective digital marketing strategies. Spending on paid advertising is recommended if your goal is to generate more visibility for your brand.

If the organic visits to your website are increasing with time, then it is best if you invest in other aspects like generating outstanding content and improving the design of the landing pages.

6. Not Promoting Your Website Efficiently

With more than 1.5 billion websites online, your target audience is not likely to stumble upon your site unless you do your best to promote it well. Without people coming to your website, no sales will be made.

Promoting your website will increase its visibility and result in reaching new customers.

To get more traffic, invest in SEO, SEM, and creating engaging and informative content. Another significant ranking factor besides exceptional content is backlinking. This tactic relies on earning links on reputable and trustworthy websites, as they practically vouch for relevance and credibility.

Implementing effective link building strategies can help rank your pages higher and ultimately bring you more traffic and conversions.

Turning to paid ads on search engines and social media is also a great way to promote your business.

7. Not Using Social Media Properly

Posting content on social media channels isn’t sufficient in helping your business convert more leads and gain profit. Again, it’s the engagement with the right people that makes all the difference.

Your social media marketing efforts need to be focused on your target audience. Otherwise, you will be wasting your time and money.

This means you need to communicate with your customers via platforms they use the most and develop high-quality content that will appeal to them.

Facebook recently stated that it would encourage meaningful interaction between people. In other words, there will be less “salesy” content and advertising on their users’ news feed. This means that your safest bet is to create valuable content that engages your audience and connects your brand with your followers.

Posts that educate, inspire, or entertain are more likely to get your customers to take a specific action. Responding to comments encourages engagement too.

Social media, content marketing, and SEO are great digital marketing strategies that can be as effective as paid advertisements if done properly. The mistakes that we discussed can hinder your growth significantly, so be careful.

 

Author Bio:

Michael Deane has been working in marketing for almost a decade and has worked with a huge range of clients, which has made him knowledgeable on many different subjects. He has recently rediscovered a passion for writing and hopes to make it a daily habit. You can read more of Michael’s work at Qeedle.

Photo by Diego PH on Unsplash

Filed Under: Marketing /Sales / Social Media Tagged With: digital marketing strategy

Do Your Employees Have All the Tools to Sell?

February 5, 2020 by Thomas Leave a Comment

No matter what your brand has to offer the public, it is key your employees have all the needed tools to sell.

Sure, if you run a one-person operation, then worrying what employees have is rather moot.

That said many business owners do have employees under them. As a result, it is important that they know what their workers need to be successful with consumers.

So, do your employees have all the tools to sell?

What Might You Be Lacking?

In looking at what your workers may need to make selling to the public easier, consider the following:

  1. Technology – They may have need for sales commission software. That is to best track results when working to sell. So, be sure your employees have the necessary tools. Speaking of such software, does your company have it now? If not, it would be well worth your time to look to add it to your office. The right software makes it much easier to track who is doing what when it comes to sales. Keep in mind that happy and organized employees tend to be better ones. As such, knowing the software you offer them is tracking all it should will make things run smoother. Also be sure if you have employees traveling for you that they have access to the right tech items. This makes it easier for them to not only stay in touch with you and clients they meet, but also record what they do for you.
  2. Experience – There is only one way for employees to get experience selling to the public and that is doing it. That said be sure to train your employees the right way from day one. Bad selling techniques can doom an employee early on within your company. He or she has a much better chance of succeeding (as does your business) when they have been trained right. Do not assume when they come to you with sales experience that the experience they have meshes with you.
  3. Marketing and Advertising – It makes it easier for your employees to sell when folks know you. As a result, are you doing all you can to promote your brand through smart marketing and advertising? That will go a long way in making it easier for your workers to form a bond with consumers. When a consumer knows about your brand, he or she can be easier to approach. That is of course unless they take issue with your brand in the first place.
  4. Confidence – Finally, do you instill confidence in your team? Sure, work can get tough at times. You might even raise your voice a time or two. That said providing support to your employees means more than resources. Show them you support them as both workers and people. Such support can go a long way in increasing the chances of a sale.

As you review what your employees have to make sales, anything you need to do different?

About the Author: Dave Thomas covers business topics online.

 

Filed Under: Marketing /Sales / Social Media, Tools Tagged With: business, sales, software

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