The goal of any business is to make sales and grow its customer base. For online businesses, this process is quite difficult. Businesses use SEO, PPC, Email and Social media marketing to create new leads. But then they struggle to gain the real output – Sales.
It’s hard to make potential customers buy products or services from a website. Especially if the customer is visiting the site for the first time. In fact, 79% of the leadsleave your site without buying a thing.
So how can you increase the possibility of converting leads into sales?
Here are some tips that you’ll find helpful.
1. Avoid using voicemail to attend customers’ calls
Customers hate voicemail. They also hate to be on hold. If your website has a phone number (which it should), then make sure you always have someone to attend the calls.
People receiving calls for your business must be efficient and have clear idea regarding your products and services. It’ll be better if they are sales experts. Or they should at least have a rudimentary knowledge of marketing.
2. Qualify the lead before reaching out
It’s a waste of time and resources if your sales team reach out to a lead who isn’t ready to buy (i.e. not qualified). As your business gets bigger, you’ll see a lot of the leads are visitors who won’t buy no matter how hard you try. It’s crucial to focus your efforts on the real potential customers. According to a report by Gleanster Research, only 25% leads are legitimate and advance to sale.
There are different metrics to figure out the prospect of a lead. A qualified lead is someone who visits your site often, has filled up forms or verified their details.
If a lead requests a quote and has correct contact information then he/she has a real interest in your products. There is a better chance of closing the sale in these cases.
3. Don’t keep your leads waiting
Every qualified lead is a prospective customer. Your sales team should get in touch with them as soon as possible. 90% leads go cold after an hour (MIT Research).
Redirecting customer emails to individual members of the sales team is a bad idea. A more efficient process will be to use a centralised email system that every team member has access to. This will ensure every customer inquiries get addressed as fast as possible. You can also try using a CRM software.
4. Create winning quotes and proposals
Suppose your business has great products and services. And you have gained enough qualified leads. Yet you may not have as much conversion as you would expect if you don’t craft your proposals well.
A new lead has no first-hand idea about how your products or services are. You must build the initial trust and give good reasons to do business with you. You must explain why your products are great and justify your prices.
More often than not, a winning proposal is what seals the deal. It should educate your buyers how your products are going to solve their problems and explain exactly how your service will work, step by step.
5. Make an offer that none can refuse
Put yourself in the shoes of your customers. Why would someone buy products or services from you?
Customers have a wide variety of choices available to them. To stand out from the crowd you must convince them why doing business with you is the most beneficial.
Coming up with a compelling offer may seem difficult at first. Here are some key points to remember:
Always describe which particular problem or need your products/services will address.
If possible, give a step by step description of how your products/services work to solve that problem.
Present compelling arguments about the advantages of buying your products/services. But don’t present a direct comparison between you and your competitors.
Explain why doing business with you will be a pleasant experience for the customer. Describe how hassle-free the whole process is (and make it so).
People like to buy but they don’t like to be sold to. So, always maintain an authoritative tone that customers can trust.
In short, make an offer so irresistible that it will feel foolish to avoid, but don’t go too over the top in doing that.
So these were my top 5 tips for converting online leads into actual customers. Of course, there are many other aspects of lead conversion that we didn’t cover. Share your thoughts with us by leaving your comments below.
This post is part of our contributor series. It is written and published independently of TNW.
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