The No. 1 reason SMB companies abandon their lead generation strategies is that they donāt believe they got results. Companies invest time and money, but when they look back on their sales results, they canāt attribute closed sales directly to campaigns. Marketing qualified leads arenāt a metric. Closed sales is the metric. But when the marketing qualified leads arenāt converting into the sales pipeline, there are no sales to close.
Why arenāt more marketing leads converting into sales opportunities?
If everyone knew the answer to that, sales pipelines would be fatter. Companies would close more net new business, sales reps would be richer, and business owners would be smiling all the way to the bank.
Why Marketing Leads Donāt Convert
In all seriousness, when your marketing leads arenāt converting, there are 5 reasons, and most are a result of how your sales team approaches your leads.
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There are no words.
This is the most common concern we hear from reps when we pass marketing qualified leads. āWhat do I say when I call?ā Because they didnāt make the first approach, salespeople are often fearful theyāll say the wrong thing. Unless itās an inbound lead that includes some information, reps donāt know how to start the conversation. The call feels exactly like a cold call to them.
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What follow-up?
Few contacts will answer on the first call. Many salespeople will make one attempt, maybe two, then give up. Reps expect that a contact who has clicked through and read their content, downloaded a checklist, or viewed a video, will be magically waiting for them to call. Thatās not the case and without a follow-up plan, the 90% of prospects who donāt answer the first call become dropped leads.
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Email.
Email has become the preferred prospecting approach for most salespeople. In their mind, an email is the equivalent to a call ā sometimes even better. With email, a prospect can reply quickly. Well, a prospect can hit ādeleteā even more quickly. Since most contacts still listen to at least part of a voicemail, calling leaves a more lasting impression.
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Target who?
When you design your campaign, you want to frame it around your ideal target market with a clear picture of the contact youāre approaching. Many times, this information isnāt communicated to Sales. When the salesperson receives their marketing qualified leads, they donāt know enough about the target market to have a meaningful conversation. Prospects donāt see any value in meeting and the lead doesnāt convert.
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Failure is the only option.
Marketing qualified leads get a bad rap from reps. If salespeople havenāt had success converting them in the past, when new ones come in the door, reps expect the leads to be bad and never pick up the phone to call. This is when you begin to hear how theyāve got too many other things to do and canāt you hire a telemarketer to call instead?
How to Convert Marketing Leads
You can overcome each of these challenges with some planning. Recognize that you or your reps may be reticent to follow up on marketing qualified leads, and develop a strategy to break past the concerns. Here are 5 ways you can convert a higher percentage of your marketing qualified leads.
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Plan the conversation.
Be sure youāve reviewed the campaign content and use it to plan what youāre going to say. Donāt expect that your prospect will remember a particular blog post or video. Instead, recognize that it was the topic of the campaign that the prospect cared about. Thatās what you want to lead with.
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Create a Bloodhound Follow-up strategy.
Thatās what we call it in our prospecting training! Know how many times youāre going to call, email, drop by, and reach out on LinkedIn before you give up. Then, donāt really give up. Throw the contact back in the campaign. If theyāre really interested, theyāll bubble up as a lead again.
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Ban emailing.
Okay, you canāt ban it because email should be part of your follow-up strategy, but break past the phone phobia and PICK UP THE PHONE. Make it a requirement to call every marketing qualified lead at least 3 times before throwing them back in the campaign. Depending on the type of campaign, you may decide you should keep calling until you reach a contact and have a conversation.
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Share the details.
You do great strategy work when you plan your lead generation campaign. Be sure your sales rep knows the target market and persona details. When we complete a lead generation strategy, we lead a company meeting to share it so the reps know who we are targeting and why. Not only does it improve their campaign follow-up, it changes how theyāre selling on a daily basis. Pull those details out of the drawer and use them.
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Change your perception.
Marketing qualified campaign leads are contacts who chose to click and read, view, download or attend something you sent them. They are not a guaranteed appointment. They are a show of interest. They allow you to call, learn a little more about the contact, and start a relationship. Maybe the prospect needs help right now, maybe not for a while. Approach these leads from the perspective that 10% of them will convert to an appointment. The rest are future opportunities. Thatās not failure. Thatās the sales job.
How To Increase MQL Conversions in a Recession
In times like a potential recession, prospecting and selling take more effort. Marketing must step up its efforts to generate the number of MQLs the sales team needs. Increase SEO. Strengthen your website messaging and publish more content. Run more email campaigns. Post more frequently on social media. Step up your digital advertising.
Expand your marketing to capture as many new contacts as possible. In a recession when fewer people may be searching, you have to be more visible to be found by those who are looking.
As part of the increased efforts, marketing also may loosen lead scoring. This will allow them to pass more leads to Sales in hopes that the reps will find some good opportunities hidden in them.
For a refresher on how MQLs and SQLs differ, read this article: The Important Difference Between MQLs and SQLs.
When you are facing uncertain times like a recession, add these strategies to your MQL follow-up to increase conversions.
1.Ā Ā Ā Ā Extend your Bloodhound Follow-up Strategy
Prospects may not be ready to engage. In a recession, interest is still there, but contacts are slower to accept appointments. Theyāre carefully considering their needs and balancing it with their budget.Ā This is when they need your help determining if itās important to address that problem now. Sales has to follow up with even more discipline to connect with them. Extend your Bloodhound Follow-up for MQLs to 3 weeks.
2.Ā Ā Ā Ā Engage with the prospect using multiple methods.
If a prospect isnāt responding to email and phone, reach out through LinkedIn. Start a nurturing conversation sharing an article or commenting on their posts. Consider sending a video email. Share an article in email. Sometimes seeing how hard youāre working at connecting will get a response even if your prospect isnāt prepared to schedule an appointment.
3.Ā Ā Ā Ā Confirm interest.
As you engage, confirm that the prospect is interested in the topics they seem to be paying attention to. It may be they are only doing some research. Or, it may be that theyāre interested, but donāt want to engage until they know they have budget. Knowing what led them to read, watch or download content from your campaign will help you determine when they may be ready to start in the sales process with you and what your right next step is.
4.Ā Ā Ā Ā Leave the prospect in your marketing campaigns.
If your prospect isnāt qualified to move into the sales process but is a potential future lead, leave them in your marketing campaigns. This will keep them warm until the time is right. Sure, you want to follow-up yourself, but during a recession there are more prospects warming than you may be able to call consistently. This ensures prospects donāt fall through the cracks.
Push Reps Past Their Complaints
Get your reps past all their complaints (theyāre really fears) about their marketing qualified leads and help them pick up the phone. The more conversations you have, the more appointments you set. The more appointments you set, the more new sales opportunities convert into your pipeline. Guess what happens if you have more opportunities in the pipeline? Yup. Eventually, you smile all the way to the bank.
If your sales team isnāt converting MQLs, call us and weāll help you diagnose the problem and put an action plan in place to solve it.
If marketing is struggling to deliver MQLs, contact us and letās work together to identify what needs to change. Weāll create a plan to increase your marketing qualified leads.
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