Filtering out time-wasters and other non-leads (lead generation process)

Which of the following statements is true?

1. The Internet is a wonderful way to generate leads
2. The Internet is a terrible way to generate leads

Actually, they're both true. As soon as you implement lead generation on a website you'll find you get good leads and non-leads.

A good lead is a person with a genuine interest in your product or service.

A non-lead is a person with a genuine interest in selling his/her product or service to you. In other words, a non-lead is a leech looking to free-load off the back of your own marketing efforts.

The trick is to implement a lead generation system that eliminates non-leads up-front so you don't waste your time dealing with him/her. Here's how it's done...

• Introduce extra steps to your lead generation process
• Fully automate your lead generation process

Introduce Extra Steps

A non-lead hoping to turn you into a lead has the same problem you do – a finite amount of time. S/he will only jump through so many hoops before s/he starts looking for easier targets.

Introducing extra steps to your own lead generation process has a non-lead expend more effort without requiring any extra work on your part (once the changes are in place). This has the flow-on effect of ensuring that only the best leads reach you because people who are only mildly interested (i.e. outside the target market) will also be eliminated by the process.

Automate Lead Generation

Every part of your lead generation process should be automated. The time you save through automation quickly pays for itself – especially if you have a multi-step lead process designed to eliminate non-leads and those outside the target market.

Consider that most online lead generation follows this format...

• Offer a prospect information the target market wants
• Asks the prospect to enter his/her email address and click a button
• Verify the email address
• Send the information

A non-lead will happily fill out the form, receive the verification email and use the sending address to spam you forever more.

You can prevent this by sending the verification email from an email account set to automatically delete any email received to it. The problem with this approach is you'll miss enquiries from genuine prospects. Given this is a lead generation effort, do you really want to miss genuine enquiries?

A question worth asking yourself is why you're using email at this point anyway? Especially when you consider the following...

• Most free information sent in this manner is never read (i.e. they lost interest between requesting and receiving the information)
• Some people won't receive the verification email and will either attempt to contact you for help (i.e. take up a lot of your time), or will simply forget all about it (i.e. a wasted opportunity)

What if you displayed the information immediately? In other words a teaser page offers free information and clicking a 'Show me' button on that page reveals the promised information immediately.

With this approach everybody gets to see the promised information with no delivery failures. Even better – more people will read or watch it because there is no delay.

Of course the revealed information is merely the second step in the process. The information must deliver value in and of itself. But it has a more important job to do from your perspective. It must culminate in a further call to action.

This further call to action should promise a logical next step. And that next step has to be something a genuine prospect can't resist. You should then offer to deliver this next step for some token sum of money (e.g. $3.25).

Why charge for this next step? Because it will eliminate most non-leads. And it forces a genuine prospect to consider whether the degree of his/her interest at this point in time. If s/he is very interested that person will pay a token sum and take the next step.

As you'd expect, this approach results in fewer leads. The leads you get will be of much higher quality and you'll have far less running around to do.

A smart lead generator will introduce a negative option at this point. A negative option is an alternative for people unwilling to pay money for the next step. For example, you might offer a free subscription to your email newsletter.

Most of the people who take this option are in your target market and it's worth keeping in touch with them. While they're not ready to commit immediately, each time they receive your newsletter you get another chance to convert.

Here's an example of how this type of a multi-step process might work...

Jane is a personal trainer looking for people to join her kettlebell class. She starts with an ad in Google AdWords that offers to help people lose 4 kilograms in 4 weeks.

That ad links to a teaser page that explains how a 4-week kettlebell program and diet will ensure a person loses 4 kilograms in 4 weeks. The teaser page ends by offering her 4-week programme for free. All the user has to do is click the 'Lose 4 Kilos Now' button.

Anyone that clicks this button gets the programme immediately. Jane's programme includes an online video, exercise photos, a 4-week workout plan, recipes and explanatory text. The explanatory text makes several points...

• A medical assessment is essential before starting an exercise programme
• The diet information is general. More effective results can be had with a personalised diet plan
• The kettlebell exercises are general. A more effective programme can be had by attending a class
• Any diet and exercise programme works best when done as part of a group (mutual support, have fun, enjoy each other's company)

These points culminate in an opportunity to make a clear offer – for just $3.25 Jane will allow the prospect to attend her kettlebell class. The prospect will receive a medical and fitness assessment, diet recommendations based on his/her medical and fitness needs, and the opportunity to experience the kettlebell class first hand

This is a pretty good deal - isn't it? Most people in the target market are likely to take up the offer. From Jane's perspective, she gets a whole lot more than a name and an email address. Jane gets to meet the prospect face-to-face. And the prospect gets to meet her and see how good she is first hand.

The approach also serves to enhance Jane's credibility. This reduces the perceived risk in the mind of prospect by removing substantial doubt.

It's important to understand why a token payment is required. Asking the prospect to hand over money (e.g. via PayPal) forces him/her to decide whether or not s/he is serious about the product or service on offer. As a result, any leads that result from this process are considerably more likely to go ahead and buy.

If my example doesn't apply directly to your situation (e.g. you're not selling an exercise class) you'll have to adapt the approach to meet your own needs.

You're welcome to explain your particular marketing situation via a comment, and ask me for ideas on how you might adapt the above to suit your own multi-step process.

If your site isn't generating leads check your offer

Most of the people I see on a day-to-day basis are obsessed with traffic. All they want are more visitors to their site. I hardly ever meet somebody who understands that getting visitors to a website is the easy part.

The real challenge is trying to turn a visitor into a lead. A lead is a person who is ready to say 'yes'. The question is 'yes' to what?

Consider what you're asking visitors to your website to say 'yes' to? In many cases, the copy on a website doesn't ask visitors to say 'yes' to anything. This happens when the copy on a site...

• Talks about products and services
• Talks about the company and how great it is
• Talks about features and benefits

What most web copy doesn't do is make the visitor an offer. Take a look at the following example...

Since 2000 our entertainers have performed at hundreds of wedding receptions all over the UK, Europe and the world. We've performed at...some of the most wonderful wedding locations and venues around the globe, ranging from...fairytale castles to grand reception rooms...

This copy invests several paragraphs in making absolutely sure nobody can miss the fact the company has performed all over the world, and in some of the best venues. It does this in paragraph 2 of the site's home page (the wrong place to establish credibility with a potential client).

At no point does the copy on this web page make the visitor an offer. It simply invites the visitor to click a link and fill out a contact form. That alone makes it better than 80% of business sites out there.

But what specifically is the company offering to its target market? The product might be wedding reception entertainment, but is that what Brides or Parents set out to buy? Not in this company's well-heeled target market they don't.

What's missing from the copy is the following...

• A true flavour of the product on offer. I've experienced their entertainment first hand, and know this copy falls far short of providing a even the smallest taste of what they have to offer a bride and groom
• Some specific reason to call the company

The true heart of any lead generation offer lies in this last point. It's the offer that gives a potential client a reason to contact your company.

It's important to understand that an offer is not a sale. It only needs to get a potential client to phone you, or fill out a form and ask you to phone him/her back. Here's an example of how the above company might construct an offer to their target market...

Which of the following would you like your guests to remember when they think about your wedding reception?

[ ] How stunning you looked
[ ] How tasty the food was
[ ] How much fun they had
[ ] The unexpected surprise you spring on them

Wouldn't you love to catch your guests off-guard, and spring a massive surprise on them. One they'll love and talk about for years?

That's what we do. Our wedding reception entertainment is unique, and designed specifically to catch your guests off guard (in a good way). Imagine the look on their faces when it happens. Every eye in the room will turn to you, to see how you're reacting.

Even better, the very nature of our performance immediately has everybody engaged. Before long, your guests will find themselves laughing, clapping and cheering. Within minutes, everybody will find themselves up on their feet and dancing!

The nature of the surprise, and the party that follows, is tailored to your specific requirements (i.e. it's built around you and your husband/wife). So we need to talk about it together, and create something perfect just for you.

Simply fill out the form and tell us when you want us to phone back.

The difference between the two is obvious, isn't it? In this case, the offer is somewhat subdued. It's appropriate for the target market (the product isn't designed for the budget conscious). Instead of talking about how great the company is, the copy focuses on how the product relates to the bride or groom (e.g. Every eye in the room will turn to you to see how you're reacting).

The offer is very subtle in this case. It offers to provide the service of creating something unique with the bride and/or groom. To do that the visitor and the company have to talk.

SEO Case Study - Pension Cash

The term pension cash attracts around 8,000 searches/month here in the UK. It's a lucrative term at the moment, due to an upcoming deadline that pushes up the age a UK resident can withdraw tax-free money from their pension.

Independent Financial Advisers 1stFF asked me if I could get them to the top of Google, so they could reach people interested in withdrawing pension cash. 1stFF CEO Yash Tosar is especially concerned about people who like the idea of tax-free money, and didn't understand the implications of simply helping themselves.

In other words, he's on a mission to save UK pension-holders from themselves (and a certain kind of financial adviser).

So I started the process, and had a look at whether or not anybody in the UK was actually using Google to find out about withdrawing cash from their pension. They are, and the aforementioned term 'pension cash' is the term we settled on (i.e. tight focus).

The company's main site had a few issues in SEO terms, and we opted to set up a separate sub-domain that included the main keyword phrase. In this case: pension-cash.1stff.com.

This wasn't necessary for SEO purposes, but for something else the site has to do (lead generation). I wanted to implement something special (not yet live) that wasn't possible on the company's main site. This required a special CMS that has advanced tracking and lead generation features built in.

Of course, in SEO terms it doesn't hurt to have a domain that includes your main keyword phrase. Having said that, it's initially easier to push an older site up Google's results pages.

I've literally just removed the robots.txt file that tells Google not to index the site, and added it to my Google webmaster account. As I write this, the site should appear in Google's index sometime over the next 2-5 days.

To help Google index the site correctly (i.e. the way I want it to), I've done the following...

• Selected a specific keyword phrase for each of the main pages
• Included the keyword phrase in the title of each page
• Included the keyword phrase in the headline (h1 tag) of each page
• Included the keyword phrase in the meta keyword list and description tags
  
• Used a keyword density tool to ensure the main keyword phrase appears in sufficient quantity, and that the meta keyword tag contains useful words from the page's content (versus a pointless wish-list)
  
• Used internal contextual links to reinforce the main keyword phrase I want associated with the site's main pages
• Established 5 external inbound contextual links to reinforce the main keyword phrase I want associated with the site's homepage (pension cash)

As the term pension cash attracts over 8,000 searches/month in the UK, this won't be enough to get the site into the top 3. Especially as Google will deem it to be a brand new site. I'll have to establish more external inbound contextual links, and add more content to the site over time.

Never-the-less, the site is starting off on the right foot.

68 Lead Generation, Social Media Marketing, SEO, Copy Writing and Web Marketing Articles

This article marketing page contains 68 original articles (by me) about Internet marketing, copywriting, lead generation, search engine optimization and social media marketing.

Here's a sample of the topics on offer...

• Is there SEO value in Social Bookmarking?
• How to charge more for your product or service
• How to overcome human inertia in lead generation
• Get more sales from ad copy
• Press Release tips
• Online marketing with social media
• Lead generation's deadly sins
• The power of 'you' in online advertising

Click through, have a look around, and bookmark the page.

Target Marketing - The Critical Success Factor

Every now and then I'll meet somebody with a fairly low opinion of marketing. Such people seem to love nothing more than sharing their cock-eyed view of the world.

Recently I had the 'good' fortune to be trapped with just such a person. He proceeded to tell me that targeting was a load of rubbish. His particular approach to marketing is as follows...

• My product is marketed at everybody
• I don't want to risk losing a sale by excluding someone
• If they're alive and have money in their pocket, they're in my target market

This person is certain he's never made a profit on any advertising he's ever bought. Naturally, he blames the advertising rather than himself. Naturally, he has no data to back up his claims. And naturally he thinks marketing is a scam.

What's interesting to me about this person is how his comments about target marketing illustrate why his advertising efforts have failed.

His unwillingness to consider the purpose of a target market is the very thing that makes his advertising ineffective. The plain fact is, ad copy can't be powerful if it isn't written with its intended audience in mind.

The things you need to say to get a 50 year old excited about your product are different to those needed when talking to teens.

Knowing who your target market is makes life much easier. Here's a list of everything it can tell you...

• Where to advertise:
  If your target market consists of single parents, you can use Google to find the sites they already visit
• How to write copy:
  If your market is young urban teens in the UK, it's useful to write the way they speak
• What to offer:
  Once you know where they hang out online, you can observe what they're interested in. This research will help you construct a powerful offer
• How to set the price:
  Find out what they're already buying, and price accordingly
• Affiliate opportunities:
  In your online travels you'll come across plenty of sites that market complimentary products. Touch base, and discuss joint-marketing opportunities. Twitter can help you find and build these types of relationship
• Social media:
  Some target markets are very active in certain social media. This can help put you in touch with your market, and is an excellent way to observe your market and gain a deep understand of what motivates them
• Lead generation:
  Lead generation only works when you have powerful copy and a compelling offer. Without a clearly defined target market, lead generation will fail (as will direct sales)

The importance of target marketing can't be overstated. Every marketing activity ought to flow from target market. When the audience is well defined, and properly understood, everything seems obvious and simply falls into place.

SEO is useless without lead generation

Search engine optimisation, pay per click advertising, social media marketing and other activity designed to send people to your web site is completely useless without lead generation or online selling. Here's why...

1. Lead generation converts the mild and unproductive interest of a casual visitor into a serious business enquiry (i.e. a person prepared to receive more information, take a phone call, or meet with you)
   
2. Online selling converts a casual visitor into a client

Without a dedicated lead generation process or online selling system set up and working on your site, your visitors will look around for a few minutes and then move on. You will be left with no way of contacting these people, and will probably never hear from them again.

In other words, without a lead generation process and/or online selling system - your marketing activity is wasted (as is the money you spent).

Generating leads and/or sales isn't something that happens automatically. People don't wake up thinking 'I want to be somebody else's lead today'. The lead generation process has to be planned in advanced, implemented correctly, and refined over time through testing and analysis of past results.

The same is true of an online sales system. From time-to-time, a sale might fall into your lap. Most times, it requires serious effort on your part. That's why a shopping cart isn't enough.

An in-depth look at the lead generation process

Lead generation is one of those things that everybody thinks they know, but few understand in depth. Now there's an article that covers the entire lead generation process from start to finish. I recommend you take a look.

In particular, it's worth pondering the concept of lead generation as a virtuous circle. That's probably the last thing people think about when contemplating lead generation, yet it's easily its most powerful aspect.

The life-blood of SEO, Internet and social media marketing

Leads are the life-blood of every business. Without leads there can be no sales.

Lead generation is the process of deliberately setting out to find people who are interested in your product or service, and ready to say 'yes' to one of the following...

• More information
  
• A phone call from you to them
• An appointment with you

That's lead generation. So what's is Internet lead generation?

Internet lead generation uses the web to find people ready to say 'yes'. It also takes advantage of the nature of the web to improve the overall lead generation process. The main way it achieves this is through automation. In particular, a web site can...

• Ask questions and make decisions based on the answer
• Link to external content where required
• Provide additional content to support lead conversion (e.g. video testimonials)
• Track and measure absolutely everything - automatically
• Produce real-time reports on demand
• Send visitors to your landing page (in many ways the Internet is your list - see this Twitter page for an example)
• Follow up leads automatically
• Respond in real time (e.g. instant fulfilment of digital products and services)
• Integrate with traditional offline lead generation activity

If you're starting to get the feeling the web offers you lead generation on steroids, you're absolutely right.

The Internet offers lead generators so much more than we ever had before. Direct marketing has never been as powerful as it is now. If you're not using the full array of Internet marketing and social media tools to promote your business, you're missing out.

Lead generation at its most basic

Internet lead generation can get very complex, and I decided to distil it down to its most basic elements. When you do this, it turns out there are only 4 things you absolutely must do in online lead generation. They are...

1. Get a person to visit a landing page
2. Explain why talking to you is in that person's best interests
3. Ask the person to become a lead
4. Follow up

Each of these steps can have dozens more refinements. For example, step 2 is a whole lot easier if you've thought about your target market, what they're looking for, and why they might want to talk to you (i.e. how you can help the people who visit your landing page).

Despite this, the fact remains that lead generation is a fairly simple process. In my opinion, removing the refinements will help a beginner understand what they specifically have to do to generate prospects.

Weeding out the unsuitable

An important element in lead generation, is weeding out people you don't want to talk to. This may sound harsh, but it's actually in the interests of both parties. For example, it's worth dissuading and/or eliminating people who...

• Can't afford your product
• Are still looking around and aren't yet ready to buy
• Aren't looking for your specific version of a product
• Are in direct competition with you and on the hunt for information
• Couldn't make up their mind if their life depended on it (i.e. ditherers)

The lead generation process should identify such people, and given them the opportunity to opt out of the process. The methods for achieving this are...

• The language used in the copy (e.g. 'are you ready' versus 'would you like')
• Multi-page lead generation copy providing natural places to opt out
• Using questions to qualify and direct the prospect to the most suitable next stage
• Providing the prospect with a good reason to answer questions that allow the system to eliminate the unsuitable before they're invited to contact you

The purpose of this approach isn't to be cold-hearted. It's to ensure your lead generation system frees you up to see people ready to talk seriously about your product or service. It ensures you maximise your time, and invest it in genuine customers.

The Problem with Selling in Lead Generation

Lead generation is part of the sales process, but it's not selling. It's a little like petrol. Petrol is an essential component in the car, but it's not the car.

This may seem self-evident, yet I see plenty of evidence that a large number of people don't fully understand this distinction. The most common error I see in lead generation copy is an attempt to sell the product or service to someone who isn't yet trying to buy.

Let's take a look at lead generation from the lead's perspective. What is s/he trying to achieve? It's almost certainly going to be one or more of the following...

• Information
• Price comparison
• Understand the product, service or market
• Find the right seller
• Find the best price or deal
• Find the right social benefit

A lead isn't yet ready to buy. They may well be ready to talk (i.e. become a lead), but are unlikely to do so until they understand why it's worth talking to you.

Your lead generation campaign has only one job to do - it must focus on selling the value of talking to you.

What is it that you're selling in lead generation?

I get to see a lot of different lead generation campaigns, spanning the entire spectrum from highly successful to abject failure.

When it comes to failed campaigns, there's one thing I see over and over again. The copy tries to sell the product. This has it focus on the product's features and/or benefits, rather than securing a response from the prospect.

Lead generation is not about selling a product or service. It's about selling the value of talking to you.

This is a key piece of the puzzle when it comes to understanding what needs to be said in lead generation copy. And what has to happen to produce qualified leads from your marketing efforts. In particular, your promotion will have to...

• Establish your credibility
• Build trust in you
• Demonstrate your expertise with respect to the product or service
  
• Explain how talking to you saves time, money or otherwise delivers benefits

This approach produces entirely different copy, because it's about generating a desire to get in touch with you. What's interesting about such an approach, is it makes the eventual sale much easier.

How to turn a 'No' into a 'Yes' - lead generation technique

Lead generation is the art of finding people ready to say yes. Most of my working life is about finding ways to get my client's web site visitors to initiate a serious business enquiry. In other words, to become a lead because they want to.

But what of the people who aren't ready to say yes? Is there a way to turn a 'No' into a 'Yes'?

The answer lies in understanding what 'No' really means. It could mean any of the following...

• I'm a no for now, and a yes in future (i.e. not ready to commit today)
  
• I'm a definite no for this, but am interested in a related product or service
  
• I'm a yes, but don't have the money
• I was merely curious, and will never be interested in this or anything related to it
  

Of these 4 different types of 'no', the first 3 imply there is still potential to do business. This is why it's always worth giving a prospect the option to click 'No'. For example...

Are you ready to get an extra serious business enquiry/day from your site? Yes No

A person answering 'no' to this question could easily be too busy to do this today, or be ready to get started but feel they don't have the money, or may have arrived at the site looking for confirmed appointments rather than leads.

By offering the prospect a chance to say 'No', we give ourselves another bite at the cherry. If a person answers 'No' to the above question, we can then ask...

Would the following be more useful to you?
A reminder next month when I have time to look at this
A low-cost way to get started
I want confirmed appointments rather than leads
Help with something else

Whatever they click on, you can then address that specifically. For example, if they click the 'Confirmed Appointments' option you might talk about a service offered by a highly successful affiliate, and offer to refer them. Assuming you get paid a referral commission, you can still make money from this prospect.

If the lead asks for a reminder, you can implement the following system...

• Email a useful but short piece of information every 7 days (to keep your company fresh in their mind)
• Email the reminder notice on day 28
• Follow up with a call on day 29 to check they received the reminder notice

If the lead is interested in a low-cost way to get started, you might offer an easy-payment plan, or a cut-down version of the service at a lower cost.

In other words, by offering the option of saying 'No', you give yourself a second chance to convert the lead.

What are you really selling?

One of the great challenges in marketing is to work out what you're really selling. For example, I'm a professional lead generator. Technically, I could answer with any of the following...

• My years of experience in lead generation
  
• An approach that turns a site's visitors into leads
• A system that gets you serious business enquiries
  
• People ready to say 'yes'

They all amount to the same thing, yet that last one is far more compelling to most business people. The problem with the word 'lead' is that it's abstract in nature. What is a lead, exactly? Isn't that something detectives look for?

The phrase 'serious business enquiries' is certainly better, but too remote to have emotional impact. What my clients want to do is speak to people ready to say 'yes'. So that's what I offer in my business.

The same principle applies to any business. Clients never buy the product or service being sold. They buy the beneficial outcome of using that product. As soon as you have a handle of what your clients are buying, rather than what you're selling, you have the crucial ingredient necessary for successful lead generation.

You want me to generate leads for a sofa bed company?

One of my clients is an Interior Designer with her own sofa bed range. I've been asked to find a way to generate leads (i.e. serious business enquiries) from the visitors she gets to her web site.

I'm used to working for people who sell by appointment. My job is to find people ready to say yes. It might be yes to a phone call, or an appointment.

As a general rule, sofa beds aren't bought that way. Most people visit a showroom, and see if they like the look of the various sofabeds on display. They'll want to see it unfolded, test it for comfort, and get a feel for how it's going to work in their home. Faced with the prospect of buying it 'sight unseen', it seems unlikely we'll sell many direct from the site.

Why? Because of doubt. Doubt about...

• Whether or not the product is any good
• Whether or not it will work in the room
• Whether or not it's comforable
• Whether or not it will physically fit
• Whether or not the seller is trust-worthy
  

My client isn't an Internationally known furniture brand, or a recognised online retailer. Neither Ikea or Amazon have anything like the same battle with doubt on their hands.

So how does one go about eliminating doubt, and turning casual interest into a serious business enquiry? The answer lies in taking over the conversation the prospect is having in his/her head.

On arrival, visitors are asking themselves whether or not the site contains what they're looking for. My first job is to eliminate everybody not in the target market. I can do that by making it immediately obvious the site sells bespoke designer sofa beds, and nothing but sofa beds.

I can then take over the conversation by offering to help the visitor find the exact sofa bed they need. I'll use special software written for the purpose. It's not expensive, and simply asks the questions that have to be asked to help the prospect.

It presents the sofa bed that best matches the prospect's answers, and follows up with an offer to customise it to his/her fabric and colour tastes. The prospect is no longer thinking about whether to buy, and is instead thinking about their sofa bed.

Once the prospect has finished, the system will ask the prospect if the resulting sofa is what they're looking for? If they answer 'No', it gives the person a chance to start over.

If they answer 'yes', it will ask if they're ready for a free consultation with a professional Interior Designer to further ensure they've covered everything they need to get the perfect sofa bed. If they answer 'Yes', it collects their name, contact details and a best time to call.

In other words, that's how I'll run a lead generation campaign for a sofa bed designer.

Lead Generation Leverage

I use the word leverage in lead generation to refer to an additional persuasive element introduced after the offer, and before contact details are collected. It goes like this...

1. A problem experienced by the target market is raised. I offer to solve it instantly, right there on the site. That's the offer.
2. My lead generation system asks the questions necessary to deliver the solution. The resulting data tells me a lot about each prospect.
3. My system delivers the solution (usually information).
4. Sometimes the information is complex, and expert help is required. Sometimes the information calls for implementation, and either expert help is required, or the prospect is too busy to do it themselves. Sometimes the answers given in step 2 reveal something the prospect hasn't yet done. The system offers expert help from industry insiders (e.g. to find and book the perfect venue in the case of a person looking to book corporate entertainment for an upcoming venue).
5. If the prospect says 'yes' to this help, I then (and only then) ask for contact details and a best time to call.

Contrast this gentle approach with ham-fisted attempts to grab your email address the moment you arrive on a web site. The site owner has done nothing for you, and made no attempt to find out what you're looking for. And now s/he wants to add you to his/her email newsletter.

My approach applies leverage at exactly the right moment, by offering prospects access to expert help to complete a task that has to be done. Which is why it works so well.

Lead generation in a highly regulated market

One of my clients is an Independent Financial Advisor working here in the UK. His current focus is on Pensions, which is probably one of the most highly regulated products in the history of humankind.

As you can imagine, regulation tends to put a dampener on lead generation activity. My usual approach to writing ad copy isn't all that useful when there's a stern-looking Regulator peeking over my shoulder and tutting into his tea!

Lead generation in a highly regulated market requires extra care, and a lot of creative thinking. As it happens, I've been in this situation before. Between 1995 and 2000, I was the Direct Marketing Manager for a New Zealand investment company. A large portion of my time was dedicated to finding new ways through and around the quagmire of restrictions the government enjoyed imposing on the industry.

In this case, my client is interested in talking to people able to withdraw cash from their UK pension. Up to 25% can be withdrawn, tax free, if the pension holder is over 50. As you can imagine, this is quite an attractive proposition for people with sizeable sums of money.

But there are several potential problems these people face, and they're often not even aware of the fact. And where there's a problem, there's a way to generate leads.

The approach I've developed essentially obtains the prospects interest by pointing out these problems in the form of questions (the trick is to do so in a way the prospect understands).

Most people in the target market won't have thought about such things as the future tax implications of withdrawing 'tax free' pension cash, how their actions will affect their standard of living after retirement, or what they'll do with the remaining 75%.

This gives me a way in, and allows me to generate leads using a 'smart' application I wrote last year. The application asks a couple of questions, and presents a custom report back to the prospect with information that explains the nature of the problem s/he could face.

This information can be fairly sobering. It quickly becomes clear that expert advice is essential, to ensure the prospect makes the best decision given the facts at hand. As this realisation dawns, my client is in the right place at the right time to provide that advice. Add some lead generation magic to overcome human inertia, and he'll find himself with an ongoing stream of serious business enquiries.

The problem of human inertia

All sales and lead generation ad copy has one aim - to overcome human inertia and get the click, from submission, reply coupon, email, phone call or sale.

It isn't easy to overcome human inertia, and this article explains why (in some detail). It looks at the nature of the problem, and how to resolve it for your product or service. Very valuable information!

Twitter - The all new lead generation tool

No matter what your target market, there's a good chance you'll find it in Twitter. In fact, I think Twitter is an excellent lead generation tool. If you're not already using it, you should be. And if you are using it, here's what you have to do to turning into a lead generation tool...

• Focus the page on the market you're after
• Stopping posting pointless unfocussed 'tweets' such as 'I'm doing X'
  
• Post regular 'tweets' throughout the day
• Write 'tweets' that include specific keywords your target market is interested in
• Work on building pagerank for your Twitter page
  

Assuming you follow the above plan, you'll pick up new followers each time you post a new 'tweet'. Some posts should contain a useful tip, while others need to link to articles on third party sites. Ideally, the information being linked to will appear on one or more of your own sites.

Under this strategy, you're using Twitter as a way to generate traffic back to your web site(s). In effect, Twitter becomes either a lead generation tool for your business.

Qualifying Leads

Qualifying a lead is an essential part of the lead generation process. By weeding out people you don't want to talk to, you save time and make the best use of the resources available to you. Here are several ways to qualify prospects...

• Offer to answer a question only a qualified lead is likely to be interested in
• If the prospect needs to be able to afford the product, ask a question that summarizes the problem facing the lead and ask if s/he is prepared to pay your minimum price to solve it
• Construct an offer that is only attractive to people in the target market, and charge a token amount for it

These ideas are easy to implement, and do an excellent job at weeding out those people you don't want to talk to. More information about making lead generation easier.