Posts Tagged ‘allegra marketing and print’
Sales Leads: Revitalizing Dormant Accounts, Part 2
You put a lot of effort into developing a lead generation strategy - you create a survey, you follow up, you nurture - it’s perfect. Yet some prospects don’t respond or get left behind, creating a dormant sales lead.
How can I revitalize dormant accounts?
When it comes to revitalizing a dormant account, you must first understand why they didn’t come back in the first place. Was it because they forgot about your company? Or was it 
because they bought something and never came back? Once you understand the reason for dormancy, you can start a new conversation.
If the dormant sales lead hasn’t heard from you or your company in quite some time, it might be a good idea for another introduction. This can be done through any medium - phone call, email, direct mail, etc. Your goal is to get that lead to remember why they came to you in the first place and to see that your products and services could still be of use to them.
Now, if the dormant sales lead is someone that already paid for products and/or services, your conversation may be a bit different. Instead of starting out with “Hey, remember me?” your conversation will more likely be about making sure their purchase worked out and can you interest them in this new or related product? This is called cross-selling.
Cross-selling is basically an attempt to offer additional, complimentary solutions to a client that has already made a purchase. Cross-selling has helped some businesses increase their revenues by 25% just by revitalizing dormant accounts. When you employ cross-selling to unlock the creativity of your sales and marketing teams and involve the client in defining how they see you contributing to their business, you are bringing your dormant accounts back to life.
For more information about revitalizing dormant accounts, contact Allegra Marketing & Print.
Sales Leads: How to Revitalize Dormant Accounts, Part 1
You put a lot of effort into developing a lead generation strategy - you create a survey, you follow up, you nurture - it’s perfect. Yet some prospects don’t respond or get left behind, creating a dormant sales lead.
A common concern among sales managers and business owners alike is the cultivation and handling of sales leads. One of the biggest issues with leads is that over 50% simply sit and await a call to action. Lead generation campaigns cost time and money to every organization! It is unconscionable that so much time goes into generating leads and the accounts are left sitting there, dormant.
What causes sales lead to become dormant?
Most accounts go dormant because they don’t know what to do. Let’s say that you generated a sales lead on your website through a contact form. You followed up with an email and a phone call, but neither of them was ever returned. Did you follow up again? Or did you let the lead slip away? In this case, it may have been your lack of persistence that caused the account to go dormant and possibly forget about your business altogether.
Now, let’s say that you generated another sales lead on your website, followed up and made the sale. End of story, right? No! You could be missing out on future sales opportunities if you let this one sit. This particular lead completed the sales cycle and the account was allowed to become dormant, when in actuality, they could be a prime candidate for buying other products and services from you.
These are two great examples of why some accounts become dormant. In our next post, we’ll address how to revitalize dormant accounts.
For more information about revitalizing dormant accounts, contact Allegra Marketing & Print.
Niche Marketing Strategy Developed by Allegra Marketing & Print Provides Innovative Solution for Girl Scouts AZ
Allegra Marketing & Print, a leading marketing company in Scottsdale, AZ, has been providing innovative marketing services and products to clients since 1982. Allegra Marketing & Print takes the time to learn about every aspect of their clients’ businesses, including those with a need for niche marketing strategies. One such client, a regional charter of a national organization, Girl Scouts AZ (Arizona Cactus-Pine Council) has experienced significant results.
The Arizona Cactus-Pine Council is one of more than 100 other councils across the nation chartered by Girl Scouts of the USA. Their challenge centered on niche marketing and the target audience was Girl Scout Alumni. The goal was to connect with the memories and emotion of former Girl Scouts in an effort to get them re-engaged, and ultimately to donate to support today’s Girl Scouts. However, it was clear from research that what was important to women varied based on their age.
“Working with the Girls Scouts of Arizona Cactus-Pine was a great challenge for us,” said Ted Raymond, Vice President of Allegra Marketing & Print. “Putting together a good niche marketing campaign for them was something that required a tremendous amount of creativity and the ability to connect with their target audience on an emotional level.”
Allegra Marketing & Print came up with a multi-channel cross media niche marketing campaign that divided Girl Scout Alumni into four personas based on the calendar years in which they had been involved as scouts. The first component of the campaign was a variable data direct mail piece, unique for each persona, and featured prominent women of the community that had been Girl Scouts. The campaign theme, “Support the Sash,” was sent to an Alumni list of approximately 3,100 people. The mailing called for recipients to visit a “personalized involvement site.”
The second component of the campaign was an email blast that arrived on the same day as the direct mail piece. The third component was an integrated web strategy that included the “personalized involvement site,” a social media component and a traditional website. All recipients were asked to respond to the involvement site where they were asked to make a donation to help “Support the Sash.”
The fourth component of the niche marketing campaign was a reciprocal link strategy to join a Facebook Cause Page and/or follow Support the Sash on Twitter. This was developed to begin creating an online community in an environment that would encourage ongoing donations.
“A leading challenge of fundraising in Girl Scouts is effectively engaging and cultivating the large number of Girl Scout alumni whose affiliation ranges from lifelong passion to warm memories of being a Brownie. After 20 years of direct mail, volunteer-intensive campaigns and events with limited success, I believe we have finally developed a program that blends high touch and cutting-edge high tech,” stated Mary Lee Hoffman, CFRE and Senior Associate for Advancement with Girl Scouts-Arizona Cactus-Pine Council, Inc.
The multi-channel cross media niche marketing campaign was a success. The total response rate achieved was nearly 8%, and 20% of all who responded, donated as well. The targeted approach managed to increase the average donation from $50 up to $225 per donor. In addition, the social media component helped to drive 800 Twitter followers, 500 new members of the Facebook Cause Page and potential future donors.
Building a Lead Nurturing Strategy, Part 2
Savvy organizations are beginning to automate lead nurturing for complex sales. This process often includes some type of integration with a CRM (customer relationship management software). By leveraging client data, a marketer can create both rules-based and event-based triggers that will communicate with a client. This automated communication can be in the form of print, email, text messages or any number of other web based channels.
One example might be in a lead generation/lead nurturing campaign that includes several of these touch points. Perhaps your campaign will start with a direct mail piece to a prospect that drives them back to a personalized web site where they can take a short survey to determine where they are in the buying cycle. If they are ready to buy now, the lead can be routed to a sales person. But if they will not be in the market for another six months, a series of communications can keep the prospect engaged until they are ready to purchase. This may include channels like a monthly e-newsletter, a two touch direct mail campaign targeted to their area of interest, or electronic invites to a webinar.
A typical lead nurturing strategy should include a lot of different ways to communicate with prospects - a series of letters, emails, voicemails, case studies, success stories, articles, events, white papers, webinars, videos - anything that might be meaningful and informative to your potential customers. Whatever you choose to send to your prospects should be relevant, thought-provoking and consistent. The strategy you use and the frequency with which you send it will depend on your sales process and the buying cycle of the prospect.
The key to success in this process is to have an automated approach to the process. By creating these “triggers” that are based on how the prospect interacts with your marketing efforts you can eliminate the need for a lot of involvement from your sales and marketing teams, freeing up valuable time and resources. By implementing a lead nurturing strategy, your lead generation strategy will realize more qualified leads and build a much more predictable and sustainable sales pipeline. A lost prospect is a lost opportunity. Any one of the prospects that come to your website could be your next biggest client!
For more information about building a lead nurturing strategy, contact Allegra Marketing & Print.
Building a Lead Nurturing Strategy, Part 1
One of the biggest marketing issues in the business-to-business (B2B) space is that clients often have a long and very complex sales cycle. That’s why it is critical to build a good lead nurturing strategy. This article will provide you with information about creating a successful lead nurturing strategy that why and how to turn leads into qualified buyers.
Lead nurturing is the process of building a relationship with a prospect by initiating dialog that helps to move qualified prospects that are not yet sales-ready, regardless of budget, authority or timing through the sales pipeline. Building a lead nurturing strategy is basically about maintaining consistent and meaningful communication with viable prospects until they are ready to buy. How do you nurture leads and keep your company at the top of their mind when they’re finally ready to buy?
Unfortunately, many businesses find that their sales and marketing teams are at odds about the quality of leads produced by their lead generation efforts, and lack a defined lead nurturing process. All too often, the lead is a quality prospect, but they have been identified at a time when they are not ready to buy. Apply too much pressure and the lead will simply move on to another company that makes them feel more comfortable. Apply too little pressure and the lead will forget about your company altogether. That’s where lead nurturing comes in. Qualified leads that are not yet ready to buy need to be nurtured, much like a farmer nurtures their crop. When the lead is “ripe” it can be passed to a sales person to “harvest” the sale.
For more information about building a lead nurturing strategy, contact Allegra Marketing & Print.
Nurturing Leads for Better Sales Success, Part 2
What is lead nurturing?
Lead nurturing is basically about consistent and meaningful communication with viable prospects until they are ready to buy. Lead nurturing is the process of building a relationship with a prospect by initiating dialog that helps to move qualified prospects that are not yet sales-ready, regardless of budget, authority or timing through the sales pipeline.
You see, in order to effectively nurture a lead, they must know who you are, what you do and why they should buy from you. They may gain that information from your website, but you have to keep in mind that they are probably visiting at least 10 other websites for the same (or better) information. By nurturing leads, you can keep your company at the top of the prospect’s mind, give them more information and build a relationship based on trust. Lead nurturing is not about “following-up” every few months to find out if a prospect is “ready to buy yet.”
How to nurture leads?
A typical lead nurturing strategy should include a lot of different ways to communicate with prospects - a series of letters, emails, voicemails, case studies, success stories, articles, events, white papers, webinars, videos - anything that might be meaningful and informative to your potential customers. Whatever you choose to send to your prospects should be relevant, thought-provoking and consistent. The strategy you use and the frequency with which you send it will depend on your sales process and the buying cycle of the prospect.
Why nurture leads?
Lead nurturing will help your company yield more sales-ready leads, gain higher close ratios and shorten your average sales cycles. By implementing a lead nurturing strategy, your lead generation strategy will realize more qualified leads and build a much more predictable and sustainable sales pipeline. A lost prospect is a lost opportunity. Any one of the prospects that come to your website could be your next biggest client!
For more information about nurturing leads for better sales success, contact Allegra Marketing & Print.
Nurturing Leads for Better Sales Success, Part 1
Did you know that most of the prospects generated on your website are not yet ready to talk to a sales person? In fact, most of them are searching for information and are soft leads at best. This article will provide you with information about creating a successful lead generation strategy that includes nurturing leads and turning them into qualified buyers.
Increasing lead generation success is a top priority for nearly half of marketers in the U.S. Many marketers generate leads through forms or surveys on their respective websites and unfortunately, up to 95% of those prospects are not yet ready to talk with a sales rep, according to research by Brian Carroll, renowned lead-gen author.
The truth of the matter is that many of your website visitors are just looking for information about your products, your services, your brand or your industry. Perhaps you have an offer of some kind tied to your lead qualification survey and the prospect is simply trying to take advantage of the offer. Either way, as a marketer or sales rep, you’re stuck with a soft lead at best and it’s hard to know where to go from there.
Well, you should keep in mind that those same prospects could end up buying from you (or your competitors) down the road. The challenge is hanging onto them and using a process called “lead nurturing” until they’re ready to buy.
For more information about nurturing leads for better sales success, contact Allegra Marketing & Print.
Allegra Marketing & Print, a leading marketing company in Scottsdale, AZ, has been providing innovative marketing services and products to clients since 1982. Allegra Marketing & Print takes the time to learn about every aspect of their clients’ businesses, including those with a complicated sales process. One such client, a locally-owned home remodeling business, Republic West, has experienced significant results.
Republic West specializes in energy efficient window and door replacement, cabinet refacing, complete home remodeling including kitchens, bathrooms, home offices, entertainment centers and room additions. The company’s vision is to create the best possible home improvement experience, before, during and after the completion of the project. Republic West is an operationally driven company that utilizes various disciplines, processes and procedures to help insure that it can deliver what is promised.
In early 2009, Republic West recognized that there were significant challenges in how their detailed sales process was being deployed and what marketing materials were being used. These challenges included: supporting articles that lacked focus and relevance, lack of consistency in branded materials between sales representatives, material with information that was not easily transferred to other decision makers not attending the sales presentation, and a disregard for Republic West’s sales process.
“When we were presented with the challenge of helping Republic West improve their sales and marketing processes, we knew that we had our work cut out for us,” said Ted Raymond, Vice President of Allegra Marketing & Print. “After the initial engagement, it was clear that there were at least three objectives that needed to be discovered before we could start to design their marketing collateral.”
Those objectives, he continued, included: fully comprehending Republic West’s sales process, identifying legacy collateral and understanding how the legacy collateral was being used in the field.
Allegra Marketing & Print developed the idea of condensing all sales material and supporting articles into one sophisticated comprehensive stand alone booklet. The new Republic West sales booklet would guide both the sales representative and the prospect through the company’s selling model. The same would be true for one decision-maker to be able to walk another key buying influence through the material. Several times throughout the design process Several members of Republic West’s sales team were engaged throughout the design process in order to gain early adoption.
“Allegra Marketing & Print took the time to learn about our company’s sales process and developed a unique piece of collateral to support our team,” stated Linda Zimmerman, co-owner of Republic West.
The new sales booklet has been in field use since May 2009. Republic West has abandoned other legacy sales collateral and relies solely on the sales booklet for presentations. Sales as a result of a single piece are hard to measure but newer, less seasoned sales representatives have experienced a higher closing ratio in the last three months. There is a significant cost saving by eliminating the need for support staff to reproduce articles and using expensive consumables.
Lead Generation: Qualifying Leads through Surveys, Part 2
For many businesses, lead generation starts with simple information, such as name, email address, and phone number. Unfortunately for some, the survey stops there. With lead generation surveys, however, you can qualify your leads and get much more information for your sales team. In addition to obtaining basic contact information, you can start to qualify your leads with targeted questions that will help you define where they are in your sales process.
When designing your survey, it’s best to keep your format very simple. Why? Well, the first reason is that most people shy away from completing a long questionnaire. If they are only asked a few questions on the page, your chances of receiving a complete survey are higher. A one-page questionnaire with a limited number of questions, really no more than 3 in addition to the basic contact information, is ideal. In some cases, there may be a need to collect more info and in this instance, a multi-phase approach should be used with a second survey deployed later in the process.
Remember to keep it simple - don’t let your leads abandon your survey. Two or three simple questions on the first page will allow your prospects to identify themselves. Even if they choose not to complete the survey, they can be funneled into a “soft” marketing campaign (i.e. a monthly newsletter). Those prospects that choose to complete the entire questionnaire will identify themselves as higher priority leads as they provide more targeted information.
One last thing, it is highly recommended to include some type of offer that gives the prospect an incentive to complete the survey. This will give you an even greater chance of capturing leads and lead to greater results. While not all people who complete the survey will be the right prospects right now, you’ll still get enough information for a soft lead - the offer is simply compensating them for the time that the sales person did not take to qualify them.
Surveys can be a powerful tool for qualifying leads if they’re done well. Identify your lead categories and design a multi-page process to increase better qualified prospects. By doing this, your sales team will become more efficient and successful.
For more information about lead generation and qualifying leads through surveys, contact Allegra Marketing & Print.