Latest News
In need of a 2015 lead generation plan? Consider a refresher
Lead generation strategies seem to change every week. Depending on a company's primary market, whether it's business-to-business or business-to-customer, there is a wide variety of ways to connect with new potential customers. With 2014 coming to a close, the following year provides marketers with another opportunity to refine lead generation practices that are doing well - but not great - and implement different tactics to get the phone ringing or generate greater foot traffic online and in stores.
What does lead generation currently look like for many organizations?
Customers are generally channel agnostic, meaning they're not using a single way to interact with businesses. This situation has led to what's become known as multichannel marketing. Customers can discover a brand, product or service through a variety of outlets, including social networks, direct mail, email, blogs and search engines.
Each of these can play a role in lead generation, and, according to a recent study from Ascend2, many companies need help. The "Lead Generation Strategy Survey" demonstrated that most marketers need to not only increase the number of leads they get, but more importantly the quality. The majority - 66 percent - of respondents to the study indicated their current strategy is somewhat successful, while 21 percent said it was not successful at all. That leaves a small piece of the pie that expresses the existing lead gen tactics are paying off.
Why are so many marketers struggling?
More than one-third indicated their primary obstacle is a lack of quality data regarding customer lists. Increasingly, targeted marketing campaigns require a depth of data previously unavailable without going through cumbersome manual processes to collect and aggregate it. However, CRM software and other marketing automation tools allow companies to collect substantial consumer information without much manual effort. Still, the quality of data requires additional steps, including validation and verification, which adds another layer of complexity and technology.
Other major obstacles include lacking an effective strategy and not having the ability or resources to create content for lead generation purposes. Without question, any attempt at lead generation must take several considerations into account. For instance, think about customers' needs, their research patterns, their preferred channels and how they make decisions. These may be difficult to consider with prospects who have just begun to express interest in a company, but marketers can reference how existing clients behave to get an idea of what new customers want.
Revisit direct mail
Although there may not be anything new under the sun, many of the lead generation channels that businesses use can often be improved upon. Here are a few ideas that direct mail marketers need to revisit or pay more careful attention to in the coming year:
The keys for an effective direct mail campaign correlate to strong demographic information, including accurate names and addresses. While these are seemingly straightforward aspects of any marketing campaign, too many direct mail promotions either include incorrect customer names or are undeliverable because of bad addresses.
Address validation and verification software solve these issues by ensuring contact information is both correct and up to date. Any ingenious design will be undercut by mail that's returned to the sender. At the same time, American Printer suggested developing a staggered approach, meaning each mail item builds on the previous one. So, the first mailer may introduce the brand and include a call to action to increase engagement rates and engage the customer. Following pieces can provide more information about a specific product or service. Business 2 Community highlighted the fact that direct mail doesn't get caught in spam filters like email, so it's more likely that it will leave an impression on the recipient.
