1. Top tips for successful
B2B lead generation via email
2. With your sales guys identify the type of lead
you’re looking for in advance.
Our experience suggests that involving the sales department at an early stage
in the planning of your lead generation activity gives executives a sense of
ownership of the leads you generate. They are more likely to follow up leads that
they think are good, and this really has a positive impact on conversion rates.
In this part of your planning, we’d encourage you to go beyond merely identifying the
job titles, company size and industry sector you’d expect a ‘good’ lead to represent.
We’d advise you to also identify the problems or challenges that good prospective
customers for your business tend to face. In our experience, these 'pain points'
(remote workers struggling to communicate effectively, anxiety about data security
threats etc.) are often your prospects' main motivation for buying a company's
services or solutions, and your product’s ability to resolve a prospect’s difficulties is
the origin of a prospect’s determination to purchase it.
Cast a wide net when selecting your targets.
In our experience, many significant B2B projects involve decision-makers
from multiple departments. Unlike direct mail or telemarketing, the marginal cost of
targeting an additional thousand contacts by email usually isn’t great. Using email
enables you to reach out to broader audiences of decision-makers without breaking
the bank.
3. Offer a best practice, top tips, model policy
guide or whitepaper to readers
An easy-to-understand, educative guide will act as bait for prospective customers,
attracting response and demonstrating your organisation’s expertise in its field.
Write a short, jargon-free message with a
strong, compelling call to action
Email is a ‘fast-food’ medium. Recipients open, read and decide whether to respond
to email messages in seconds. On opening, your message must instantly dissolve
into meaning. Use simple, clear language, keep it concise and be sure to end with an
irresistible call-to-action.
Make it easy for respondents to pass you
their contact details
The easier it is to respond, the more response you’ll receive. For example, emedia’s
RapidRequest solution enables respondents to exchange their contact details for
access to a business guide, whitepaper or information pack in just 2 mouse clicks.
Conversely a long or unclear response mechanism will sap a prospect’s interest in
your offering and – more importantly – give them a negative experience of interacting
with your company.
4. Ask respondents a few quick multiple choice
questions as they respond
This will help you assess the quality of each lead & also help your sales guys
prioritise follow-up with those most likely to buy. Moreover, these questions provide
an opportunity to open up 'cross-selling' opportunities by identifying a respondent's
interest in your other products and services.
Brief your sales teams clearly
Your sales team need to understand exactly where the leads came from and why
they meet the previously agreed definition of a ‘good’ lead. If you’ve already
secured their buy-in and they understand the source and objective of the original
campaign, they will quickly understand the opportunity presented by these leads.
Insist that leads are followed up quickly
It’s vital that leads are followed up while they’re still hot, so that the respondent’s demand for your products
can be met. Quick feedback from the follow-up can also be used to improve your other campaigns. Leaving
leads to cool before they’re called has a catastrophic effect on conversion rates, as prospects who fail to
remember responding quickly lose sight of their original interest in your solution.
5. Encourage your sales teams to be persistent
Senior business decision-makers are busy. It often takes more than a couple of calls to get through to them
and just because they don’t return calls doesn’t mean that they don’t have a real need for your company’s
products and services. Favourable answers to your qualifying questions should give your sales
encouragement to keep calling until they get through, but don’t underestimate your ability to keep them
feeling that a big order could easily come from the next call.
Do more of what works
With its low associated costs and clearly visible results, your email marketing should be out-performing the
traditional alternatives of direct mail, display advertising and telemarketing on a cost-per-lead basis.
If it isn’t, time to rethink your campaign. If it is, why not do some more?
Pioneers in business to business email marketing since 1999, emedia publish opt-in email bulletins
covering a range of market: Our opt-in email bulletins enable customers to acquire new business
by generating quality leads, driving traffic to websites and raising brand awareness.
Our experience in achieving the best results through content, message layout and timing is
unparalleled and we have built in technology infrastructure needed for businesses to successfully
communicate with hundreds of thousands of opted in subscribers.
emedia's innovative products have transformed electronic lead generation, achieving unrivalled
response rates across a wide variety of market sectors.
