Lead Follow-up Best Practices

by | Jun 13, 2014 | CRM Management, Marketing Automation, Sales Coaching, Sales Tips, Salesforce | 0 comments

To further prove that timing really is everything, you need to make sure that you follow up on inbound leads quickly. How fast? The Harvard Business Review study found that follow-up phone calls made within five minutes of the lead filling out a form were 80% more likely to be successful than a follow-up phone call just five minutes later.

You need to act swiftly because your prospects are moving fast, too. If a prospect fills out a form on your site, you can bet you aren’t the only site they’ve visited today. That prospect has also probably visited (and maybe filled out forms on) all of your competitor’s sites as well. Promptly calling prospects will enable you to beat your competitors to the punch.

Be persistent.

If at first you don’t succeed… pick up the phone later in the week and try again. All of us miss or just aren’t able to take phone calls at different points throughout our week. Your prospects are no different. They are busy people, and you need to be persistent to give yourself the best chance to talk to them on the phone.

The Harvard Business Review study found that many sales reps only make one phone call to a lead, which is unfortunate, because it also found that sales reps should be making six attempts to contact a lead. The study found that the chance of contacting a lead with one phone call is less than 40%, while the chance of contacting a lead after the sixth phone call is 90%. Persistence pays off.

Provide value.

The first three tips are pretty cut and dry; this one takes more effort, experience, and skill. If you can provide value to your lead with your phone call, you’ll be more likely to have a successful call. To make sure that your reps are providing value, you need to have the right technology and the right training.

Technology

When your sales team follows up on leads, they should be able to see the pages on your site and marketing material the lead has interacted with and what path of actions led that lead to fill out a form to contact you.

Training

Your sales team needs to be trained and have the discipline to treat each lead as a unique person. After your rep looks at lead’s history of interaction with your website and marketing material, s/he should be able to hold a more well-informed conversation that lead. Instead of making a generic phone call, your rep should be prepared to address the lead’s interests and needs because of what s/he knows before even making a dial.

If you are looking to improve the quality of your follow-up phone calls, NuGrowth Solutions can help. To find out how, contact the NuGrowth team at 800-966-3051 or fill out a contact form and we will be in touch.