Running a business is no easy task, and one of the biggest challenges that business owners face is getting enough leads to keep their sales team busy. Without a steady stream of leads, the sales pipeline can run dry, leading to stress and frustration for business owners who are trying to keep their bottom line intact. The constant pressure to find new customers and close deals can be overwhelming, especially when there are so many other aspects of running a business that require attention.
However, there are strategies that business owners can employ to overcome these challenges. By implementing effective lead nurturing tactics, businesses can build relationships with potential customers, address their concerns, and guide them through the sales process. Maintaining these relationships is crucial, as data shows that companies that excel at lead nurturing generate more sales-ready leads at a lower cost. With the right lead nurturing strategy and the use of tools and resources, business owners can keep their sales pipeline full and ensure the success of their business.
Strategically nurturing leads is a key part of successful lead management. This is an area many businesses struggle with and often leads to a loss of trust that could be there for potential customers. According to Invesp, a shocking 80 percent of new leads never convert into sales. This is why data-backed lead nurturing tactics make all the difference.
In our experience, we often see businesses missing out on opportunities that are already at their doorstep. Many times, businesses aren’t using all of their resources to connect with the contacts that are already in their database. These are the customers that have already been engaged and have come to the business. Rather than only seeking out new customers, it’s time to focus on the ones already there and engage them further.
There are many ways lead nurturing has already proven to work. Let’s look at how it works and the common tactics behind it.
What Is Lead Nurturing and Why Is It Important?
Lead nurturing is taking the time to build relationships with potential customers throughout their journey of working with you. This means offering support and helping address their concerns along the way. This helps build relationships with them and offers answers to their questions throughout their journey.
There is not one set way of lead nurturing. Lead nurturing could mean email nurturing, social media retargeting, display retargeting, search retargeting, and more. Identifying lead statuses during the sales process is important to create the most efficient channels for lead nurturing in your B2B marketing strategies.
Finding an appropriate lead nurturing strategy is important for several reasons. It allows you to do five main things:
Generate higher-quality leads |
Increase average order value (AOV) |
Reduce customer acquisition cost |
Create more loyal customers |
Establish industry authority |
As stated above, data suggests that 80% of new leads never convert into sales. That same data suggests companies that excel at lead nurturing generate 50% more sales-ready leads at a 33% lower cost. It is important to maintain these relationships with potential customers and make sure your business makes the best of every opportunity possible.
Furthermore, data suggests some other benefits to having a strong lead nurturing plan:
- Nurtured leads make 47% more purchases than non-nurtured leads
- Lead nurturing emails have a 4-10 times better response rate than stand-alone blast emails
- 51% of email marketers say email segmentation is the most effective way to deliver a personalized lead-nurturing experience
Tactics for Lead Nurturing Strategies
There are several tactics that can be used when creating lead nurturing strategies. Some tactics for lead nurturing strategies include:
Email drip campaigns
Email drip campaigns are ideal for jogging buyers minds about your businesses offers, which they have recently seen. These campaigns can be a variety of things. It can be reminders about items in an abandoned cart, newsletters, or just simple follow-up emails. All of these remind the client that you are still there and there is still time for them to take action.
Retargeting campaigns
If a buyer leaves without closing the deal, retargeting campaigns will help break that hesitation. After a potential customer leaves your website empty-handed, it is important not to let them forget. Retargeting campaigns are designed to remind them of what they left behind so they may revisit, rethink, and take action. This also comes in a range of ways, including digital TV, AdRoll/retargeting banners, social media, direct mail, and more.
Smart content/personalized content
As technology grows, so do your options for lead nurturing. To make content even more specific to potential buyers, you can try smart or personalized content. This content will be updated specific to the user viewing it. This more personalized touch will ensure the content being viewed is more specifically what the potential customer is looking for and increases their desire to revisit. This type of content is usually about technology to figure out what the buyer feels they need and it often directly addresses an issue that has already been on their mind.
One-on-one interactions
A pattern you may have noticed with the tools above is that buyers often respond the best to more personally targeted campaigns. This more personal approach can be taken a step further. One other strategy is one-on-one interactions. These include sequences, sales or follow-up calls, sales outreach, and more. The point of this tactic is to give the potential client a more human interaction, making a more personal connection the old-fashioned way, while allowing businesses to make more direct connections and get a better idea of what the customer wants .
Essential Tools and Resources to Make Nurturing Easier
A lot of work goes into lead nurturing. The good news is it doesn’t all have to be done manually. There are many tools and resources available to make this process easier, including:
- Automation for timely follow-up. This, for example, can be automating email responses, allowing your team to have more time to focus on other important things, like custom quotes or having other, more personal interactions.
- Customer Journey Mapping for understanding. This creates a visual for how best to help buyers and what issues to address to best fit their interests. This also allows you to see the buyers through each of their stages of the buying process, offering a better understanding of what they are working through.
- Multi-channel nurturing for maximizing reach. Remember to not just focus on one channel, such as only using email. Utilize lead nurturing on multiple channels, including text, call, and social media.
- Lead scoring for organization. Assign values to each lead you get. This will help organize and keep priorities in order. This will also help sales and marketing teams prioritize leads, respond to them appropriately, and encourage those leads to become customers.
- Personalization for optimized content. Making content as specific to the target audience as possible will increase their likelihood of interest.
- List segmentation for better campaign results. These strategies will help you increase open and click rates by segmenting your email-marketing list. This will allow you to narrow down those on your list and send out more relevant messages to that specific person. This will make the target person more likely to be interested.
Why Lead Nurturing Could Reshape Your Business
Adding an effective lead nurturing strategy doesn't have to be difficult. A lot of the information you need is likely already within your existing database. Nurturing those users can be a valuable addition to your B2B marketing strategies. This will help you generate more sales and expand opportunities.
As you build better relationships with your potential clients, you are ensuring you’re making the best of the resources you already have. This includes ensuring that you are providing potential clients with valuable content and finding new ways to make sure they are staying engaged with the content you are providing. Utilizing the correct tools will help you close these deals and maximize profits.
Inbound marketing, where content is directly focused on the interests of the potential customer, empowers manufacturers to attract customers. Using the correct marketing strategy can lead to improved lead flows, the creation of personalized content for prospective customers or distributors, and tracking everything in one place for a clear return on investment.
Increase your sales using the resources you already have.
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