Are There Gaps in Your Lead Management Process?

The most effective B2B companies never let promising leads slip through the cracks, and a methodical lead management process is crucial to their success. But for many, seeing opportunities vanish is routine, and gaps in their lead management processes are frequently to blame. Ask yourself whether your team has problems with any of these mission-critical activities:

Lead generation strategies

There’s no one-size-fits-all solution for B2B lead generation, and every organization experiences varying levels of success from different tactics. That being said, there are some fundamental lead generation strategies that almost always result in more leads and more precise qualification. All involve direct communication with your leads, preferably through a targeted calling campaign.

Ultimately, picking up the phone and calling your target prospects works. Here are a couple of reasons why:

• You can ascertain who is a contact, who is a prospect and who is a lead. Do they have a critical business issue that your solution can resolve? Is there executive buy-in with the budgets attached? It’s difficult – if not impossible – to get answers to these questions if you’re not actively communicating.
• Talking to leads helps you uncover ways to add value. We’ve provided calling campaigns for years, and we’re constantly astounded by the things we learn through conversations with leads. The deeper you dig, the better prepared you will be to articulate and demonstrate how your solution can fix their critical business needs.

If you’re not utilizing calling campaigns, your are omitting one of the most effective lead generation strategies in existence and your sales results may suffer .

Qualification criteria

If you’ve ever experienced dissonance between marketing and sales – and who hasn’t, right? – lead qualification criteria might have been to blame. Marketing says, “Those leads were qualified!” Sales counters, “They don’t even have a budget!” And so on.

One of the most common lead management gaps is qualification criteria. What constitutes a qualified lead? Marketing and sales have got to be on the same page when it comes to lead qualification. Otherwise, they both risk wasting time and money trying to woo unlikely buyers.

Lead nurturing process

You know that feeling when you reach out to a lead several months after making initial contact only to discover they’ve already committed to a competitor’s solution? It’s a rotten feeling. You’re probably lamenting the fact that you have not reached out much sooner, but not having a well-crafted lead nurturing strategy oftentimes makes it difficult to stay on top of all of the leads a company has.

That problem plagues many companies and can throw a gigantic wrench in an otherwise functional lead management process. But designing an appropriate lead nurturing process that can keep your salespeople at your prospect’s front door is critical to a continued, vibrant sales pipeline.

Prospects are like fingerprints – no two are alike. Some are kicking tires, some are defining their needs, some are evaluating options and talking to vendors. So when you design a lead nurturing process, you must do it in a way that encompasses all prospects in the varying stages of the sales cycle.

Managing leads is tough, and reengineering your process to close these common gaps can be even tougher. At Intelemark, we know how to build a lead management process that generates demand among your target audience and fixes problems like lack of a lead nurturing and deficient lead qualification processes. Most importantly, when it is the right time to follow up, we do!

Contact us today to start discovering more leads that are ready to do business with your company!