How to Generate Good Leads

Do you market a complex product or service? For instance, long term care insurance and annuities are complex products. It can be a lengthy process to present the need for these products, as well as explain the details of the products themselves. Or, do you sell an expensive product or service? For instance, buying an aircraft, passive solar system, or a piece of medical technology is a big investment.

A complex or expensive product usually means a longer sales cycle. Marketing in the business-to-business space means careful targeting is needed. Direct mail is a valuable tool to help find and nurture good leads.

When leads are well qualified, it improves the sales process. Your salespeople can spend their time doing what they do best – selling – instead of cold calling and tracking down their own leads.

To obtain qualified leads, a lead generation program should follow a few simple rules.

1. Consider your list.
While marketers will argue percentages, we can all agree that the list is a critical component of any direct mail campaign. Make sure your mailing list is reaching the kind of businesses or individuals who will buy your product or service. To beef up your database, you can buy a list of company names in a targeted industry. To build your own good leads, you can attend trade shows, seminars, and industry events to gather new prospects.

2. Develop your offer.
Many lead generation mailings forget to make the offer clear. Typically, the offer in lead generation is not your product or service. It's something to entice the reader to respond so that you can capture their information. For instance, prospects respond for a free booklet, special report, brochure, sell sheet, or free Demo. Sometimes you may want to push for a meeting with the prospect. Be sure you offer something in return. For example, "We will analyze your current power needs and make recommendations that can save you money."

3. Hone your creative package.
Be strong on benefits. Make sure prospects understand the need that your product or service can fulfill. Unless you have an extremely attractive price, you should typically avoid price in the lead generation and let your sales staff introduce it later.

4. Less is more.
In lead generation, sometimes it's better to give less information. Tease the prospect to want to know more. Give them a reason to respond to your mailing. For instance, could prospects save money? Can you make their job easier? Help them grow their business? Your goal is to quickly entice them to respond to your offer.

5. Encourage response.
Make sure prospects know how to respond. Say it often. Include up to two ways to respond – mail, phone, email, or on your website. Provide a business reply card or envelope to make it easy to drop a response in the mail. Or supply a toll-free number that is answered by a real person.

6. Take advantage of your website.
Your company's website can play a valuable role in lead generation. Your prospects may need more information before they are ready to respond to your mailing. A micro-site or landing page can be customized to correspond with your direct mail efforts, provide more details about your offer, and encourage prospects to respond online. You can create a response form online to collect these leads, fulfill your offer, and quickly pass the leads on to your sales staff.

So, you've sent out lead generation mailings, and you have leads for the sales staff. Direct mail's job is done, right? Actually, it's just the beginning. Now it's time to "nurture" those leads. See my blog "The Power of Good Collateral Materials" to learn more about turning your leads into sales.

What I've Learned From Old Navy

As direct marketers, we can learn a lot from retailers. In particular, retailers offer some excellent examples of how to conduct truly integrated direct marketing programs. By integrated, I mean, combining direct mail, email, Web, and other forms of media to create a seamless message, offer, and brand image for customers and prospects.

We can borrow from retail and use it in other industries, such as financial services and insurance. Let me give you an example. I do a lot of shopping with Old Navy (including Gap and Piperlime), Kohls, Bath and Body Works, as well as other major retailers. They all send me special coupons and discount offers in the mail. Then, they send me emails that emphasize those same offers and link me directly to their Websites. They encourage me to shop in their stores or online and receive the same fantastic offers.

Now, let's imagine we're creating a direct marketing campaign for an insurance company to promote an educational insurance seminar. We can integrate our marketing efforts to create a cohesive, more impactful message.

First, we send a direct mail postcard about the seminar with date, time, and location information and encourage recipients to respond and reserve their space. We give readers the option of calling an 800 number to respond or logging on to a Personalized URL or "PURL."

The PURL is a personalized web address, such as www.insurancecompany.com/johnsmith, and links the reader to a landing page that is personalized with their name and information. The PURL also looks and sounds like the postcard - unifying the message and offer.

Next, we follow up with an email a week or so later. The email contains the same information about the seminar, provides all the specifics, and encourages response. Again, we give the 800 number as well as the PURL address.

Now, you may be thinking this all sounds great, but that program involves substantial customization. Plus, every time we have a new seminar, we will need to reprint everything with the new location and seminar specifics.

Let's take this scenario a step further. If you used a direct marketing on-demand system, you could set up templates for each of the three materials you would use - direct mail, email, and PURL - and then simply switch out variable information each time. With a few clicks on the computer, you can send out a highly integrated campaign in a matter of minutes, compared to weeks with a traditional direct marketing workflow.

For more information about the benefits of direct marketing on-demand, check out a blog I wrote called "Are You Ready to Go On-Demand?"

We can borrow direct marketing techniques and practices from other industries, apply them to our business, and make them even better. With a tough economy and higher costs, it's more important than ever to stretch our marketing dollars and make the greatest impact.

By combining direct mail, email, Web, and on-demand marketing, we can make it even easier and more compelling for customers and prospects to respond.