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5 Ways to Drive Improvements in Lead Nurturing Campaigns

JoeSmithBy Joe Smith, EVP,  Corporate Sales and Marketing, Invenio Marketing Solutions

Lead nurture programs are key to keeping a company’s pipeline in motion. For nurture programs to be successful, businesses need to ensure there are ongoing, targeted communications that build relationships and effectively provide information of interest and value.

There are five ways businesses can drive improvements in lead nurturing campaigns to boost conversions and increase revenue.   

  1. Capture and validate key data to identify, understand and prioritize leads.  Increasing lead intelligence on an ongoing basis ensures finely targeted/relevant communications with a higher likelihood to deliver results. The more information captured on a lead’s readiness (budget, authority, need and timing or BANT), interests (articles, webcasts, etc.) and communication preferences (phone calls, emails, etc.), the easier nurturing programs become. Ways to capture and validate lead data include: online forms, phone communications and web site analytics.
     
  2. Execute multi-touch campaigns and non-transaction based relationship building initiatives regularly. Staying top of mind with qualified, but not sales-ready leads, ensures a place in the running if/when they are ready to take the next step. Executing multi-touch, non-transaction based communications aimed at developing thought-leadership and strengthening relationships, will provide a way to communicate key messages in a no-pressure format. Multi-touch campaigns can be executed using a variety of mediums, including: phone communications, emails and direct mail.
     
  3. Respond to every inquiry promptly; quickly qualify and address appropriately. There is a small window of increased opportunity immediately following a leads inquiry. To better the odds of a future sale, it important that follow up takes place within an hour at maximum (five minutes or less is ideal). Engaging in a live conversation will help accurately address their needs, answer any immediate questions and identify the appropriate next steps.
     
  4. Trigger communications based on key actions. The actions a lead takes, whether in direct response to a nurture campaign or on their own timeline, provide a great deal of insight. To create meaningful and timely nurture communications it is important to accurately identify when key actions are taken (web site visits, white paper downloads, webinar registrations, etc.) and trigger relevant communications customized to the lead based on those behaviors.  
      
  5. Track, measure and report on campaign success and gain insight into top performers. Nurture campaigns are an ongoing process and can be continuously refined to increase results. To do this, it is important to gather and analyze campaign performance results on a regular basis to better understand which campaigns are top performers, and which should be restructured.


With marketing oversaturation, it is important that lead nurturing communications remain relevant and timely.  They should be executed on an ongoing basis, contain content and offers of interest and be delivered via the most welcomed outlet in order to reduce list depreciation and increase pipeline conversions. 

Often times, businesses do not have the technology, lead intelligence or bandwidth to effectively implement nurture campaigns regularly. When this is the case, lead nurture campaigns tend to take a huge hit, missing the mark with the targeted audience and delivering less than desired results. To be effective and keep the pipeline in motion, it is important to ensure lead nurture campaigns are being executed at all times, whether implemented internally or outsourced, as a program with gaps rarely does the trick.

Joe Smith is the Executive Vice President of Corporate Sales and Marketing at Invenio Marketing Solutions. Joe has more than 25 years experience driving sales and marketing operations and is passionate about helping companies uncover revenue opportunities, build prospect databases and hone sales and marketing efforts to increase revenues while shortening sales cycle lengths.