You’ve done your research, you’ve gathered data, and you’ve created a great piece of content. More of your website visitors are converting into leads or sales and business seems to be great!
But that’s not enough.
Yes, leads are coming and some of them are turning into sales, but then what?
Nurture your leads who haven’t purchased yet.
According to Gleanster Research, 50% of leads are qualified but not yet ready to buy. 25% will not buy and the remaining 25% are immediate sales opportunities. What if you were able to close even half of the leads who were qualified, but not yet ready to buy? Can you imagine the impact it would have on your business? Lead nurturing is a powerful strategy that can grow your business. Nurture leads to keep your company at the top in their mind and keep working to build trust to eventually get them to convert into a sale.
Why Lead Nurturing is Important
Before we go into detail about what kind of lead nurturing you need to be doing, let’s chat about why it’s critical to your marketing strategy.
The more leads you generate, the better chances are of turning those leads into profit. However, sometimes those leads aren’t quite ready to bite the bullet and purchase your product. The goal is to make sure those leads choose your brand when it does come time for them to buy.
Perhaps your company has a 25% lead to sale closing rate. That means you are losing 75% of those leads you have generated. All that hard work building good content and creating your sales funnel for nothing. If you take the time and effort to cultivate those leads, not only will your closing rate increase, but you will immediately add to your profits.
Nurturing those people takes a clear strategy and goals for each type of lead that was generated. Let’s take a look at those 3 types of lead nurturing and how creating workflows for each type can help your lead generation turn into new customers.
1. Lead Nurturing for Old Leads
Older leads can get forgotten about or brushed under the rug as a lost cause. This could be because they decided to go with a competitor or they simply forgot about you! Reach out to those old leads that you haven’t heard from in a while and get back on their radar.
Look into your CRM, email history, and create a list of old leads so you’ll know who to reach out to.
The first think you need to do is remind the lead that you still exist. Get your company’s name and your product back out there for them to see. If they purchased from a competitor, show them features or benefits that you know your competitor lacks. Inform old leads how your service/product has improved and is better able to serve their needs. This can go a long way in establishing trust with an old lead and reengaging them.
If this old lead wasn’t ready to buy before, remind them that you’re on their side and how to ensure they’ll be completely satisfied by choosing your product. This is the time to sell yourself a bit.
The best way to do this is to create a specialized workflow for reengaging old leads. The most effective way to do this is to build a string of automated emails that will show the old leads what’s new and even offer them something free to reengage them. This could be an ebook, newsletter, or industry-specific information that will be valuable to them.
The more you can show that your product or service solves the prospect’s problem, the more likely that old lead will become a new customer.
Get the Secret We Used to Generate 440% More Leads for Our Client in Only 1 Month
2. Lead Nurturing for New Leads
It’s best to start nurturing your leads right away. It’ll be easier to build a connection with them so they trust your brand and become a customer instead of potentially choosing a competitor instead.
This new lead most likely came to your website and entered your sales funnel or downloaded your lead magnet (free giveaway, whitepaper, case study, etc.). In order to start nurturing them from the start, have this lead magnet flow into an automated email workflow.
Have your first email act as an introduction. This is your first impression, so make it strong. Introduce yourself and your company. Be transparent and list your business’s values and beliefs. Making a strong first impression with your believes and values will go a long way in building trust with these potential customers.
Your next email (a few days after the introduction email) should provide useful and relevant content about your company and your brand. Educate them about your process and why you offer the only viable solution to their problem. Answer their questions before they’re even asked. This will make the reader feel like their needs and desires are being accommodated and that they’ll be satisfied with your company.
After those 2 emails, your marketing message should “touch” your prospects about 5 more times before they will act upon your call-to-action or internalize your brand’s message. Ultimately, you are preparing the reader to do business with you.
So as to not inundate your audience with a ton of emails, those touches can happen in other ways; a networking event, a visual ad (physical or digital), social media posts, a phone call, or even just word-of-mouth by a friend or colleague. Using a variety of formats for these touches will help your audience become more comfortable with the idea of doing business with you, and therefore increasing your conversion rates and even more importantly, increasing your closing rates.
Plant the idea of using your product or service, and how it will improve their life and solve their problems. That idea will grow the more they see your marketing efforts in their daily life on social media or visual ads.
It is smart to have maybe the 6th or 7th touch be another email, where you can make your prospect really feel like you are giving them personalized attention. Have smart, strategic click-bait in this email – lead them to exactly what they need to get started: a questionnaire, a budget/package to select, or lead them to a landing page with all the information they are looking for without having to keep searching for answers.
3. Lead Nurturing Existing Customers
This is possibly the most important kind of lead nurturing you can do.
Mad Men fictional character and advertising director, Don Draper, sums it up in one sentence: “The day you sign a client is the day you start losing him.”
Once you have a customer, you should be constantly working to keep earning their loyalty and trust. This won’t happen if you touch base once in awhile or send them an email once a month. Keep them happy by continually educating them about your company, industry, and new products or services that you offer to help them accomplish their goal(s).
This doesn’t mean blasting them with emails trying to sell more. Quite the opposite, actually. You clearly already have their interest, so keeping them intrigued and engaged with your company is what you need to spend time doing. Send them information that will help them get the maximum value from your products, send thank you notes after they make a purchase, offer to help their business goals, and invite them to your company’s outreach events.
Your workflows for existing customers need to be handled a little differently from old leads or new leads. They’re already a customer, so what you need to focus on is keeping them engaged and encouraged. Your email strong doesn’t need to be as linear as the others previously mentioned, as long as you are offering them relevant and useful content and new solutions that can help them.
Let them know about things going on at your company, including new products (here’s where you can nurture a potential upsell!) and even new members of your staff. The more your existing customers feel included in what your company is doing on a regular basis, the more they’ll interact with your brand.
All customers appreciate feeling like they’re wanted, and lead nurturing will make that happen. Sending them helpful content, solutions to their problems, and keeping your company relevant to their lives will improve your chances of increasing your lead to sale closing rate high and increasing your profit. Having a brand that is trustworthy and reliable can do great things for your conversion rates and sales.
Get the Secret We Used to Generate 440% More Leads for Our Client in Only 1 Month
Written by: Jonathan
Jonathan is the CEO of PDR Web Solutions. He has worked with over 300 businesses internationally to help improve their lead generation and sales online.