New businesses and new clients are created through leads that must be carefully cultivated, nurtured, and finally, capitalized. Potential leads and their information must be managed in an organized manner for them to grow into useful returns. However, to ensure that important leads are efficiently utilized, they must be streamlined into the sales pipeline.
Sales leads originate from various sources. They may come from websites, a seminar, trade shows, direct mailings, or word of mouth. Entering each sales lead into a spreadsheet may be time consuming, difficult to share, and difficult to track. In these cases, a sales lead management tool will eliminate the need for manual entry of data, and the lead information can be updated directly. It will also provide information about how the lead is being captured.
Assess those capture avenues
A sales lead management tool not only provides information about methods of lead capturing, but also provides tracking and analyzing of the lead generation methods. This will help to determine the required changes in the marketing, the required advertising for improvements, and the avenues that may be most effective.
Route your leads
Leads are important and must be followed up and nurtured carefully. Therefore, leads must be assigned to sales representatives with adequate experience and knowledge. The sales lead must be paired with the appropriate sales rep in a timely manner. A sales lead management tool helps in the assigning and customization of the distribution of leads to the appropriate sales representatives.
Qualify your leads
Leads must be qualified according to the standards and methods defined by the organization. For uniform methods of standard follow-up and follow through, a lead management tool can ensure that potential sales leads are converted into sales.
Score your leads
In addition to tracking lead information and qualifying the leads, a method to score the potential of the leads must also be explored. Because some leads have a greater potential to be converted into sales, determining leads that are better qualified than others is a crucial step in the sales process. A lead management tool can help to assess the potential viability of leads, together with their quality.
Maintain the history of your leads
The sales lead management tool is invaluable when maintaining favorable relationships with potential customers. It helps to track history and interactions among various leads. By using this information, sales reps can plan their actions, assess whether the sales process is working smoothly, and determine the optimal approach to convert potential leads into sales.
Nurture those leads
Not all leads will be ready to sign a sale within the first meeting. Most leads require careful nurturing, along with the tracking interactions. Multiple interactions with a lead may be required before it can be converted into a potential sale. As the leads move through the process of sales, progress is facilitated by the feedback and tracking interactions that are provided by the sales lead management tool.
Mack Stan is currently working in the sphere of CRM as consultant for CRM system and software.
Featured “CRM” image courtesy of infusionsoft.
