Tips for Lead Nurturing and Closing Deals as a Small Business

When we move out of the brick & mortar stores into the digitally developed space, we see many brands emerging with a significant online presence investing their efforts in marketing to get clients and leads. Lead generation will help businesses generate leads, but that is not enough. For converting them into paying customers, lead nurturing is the way.

The highlighted job of any marketer is to flood the organization's sales funnel with potential leads.

But do you ever verify whether all your marketing efforts are in vain?

Getting online traffic is not enough to sustain the ever-evolving market.

"You are out of business if you don't have a prospect." – Zig Zigler

Lead generation is tricky, but converting leads into prospects and clients is thornier. Though with some useful lead nurturing tips, businesses can achieve this target.

What is Lead Nurturing?

Have you ever witnessed a company converting all the leads into customers?

It feels like speaking into the void. According to research, a maximum of 15-20% of leads are usually converted into customers; to get an accurate ratio, you can use this formula to calculate your LCR.

                                                                   No. of Sales Qualified Leads

Lead-to-Customer Conversion Rate = ___________________      X 100

                                                                     Total No. of Qualified Leads  

Have you ever wondered what makes that 15% get your services or product??

Lead nurturing involves consistently putting effort into converting your leads into paying customers. Lead nurturing focuses on effectively engaging the leads to understand their requirements, offering relevant solutions, and convincing them to go ahead in the sales funnel.

For every lead nurturing strategy, comprehending customers' requirements is crucial. Moreover, companies can ensure customer satisfaction by keeping communication channels open and frequent.

Lead and Lead Generation Process

Before diving deep into lead nurturing, let's know what leads and lead generation processes are.

Many industry leaders say a company can only survive by getting potential leads and following an effective lead-generation strategy. Let's simplify both terms:

Leads: Website visitors keenly interested in your brand or its services but have yet to convert into customers are considered leads. Marketing and sales teams follow various out-of-the-box techniques to generate over-the-top leads for their company. The number of leads defines the popularity of your services and the efficacy of your marketing strategies.

Lead Generation: Lead generation is improving website traffic, number of visitors, and form submissions through inbound marketing strategies. This emphasizes the content marketing strategies to create content representing the brand's value. Lead generation involves creating brand awareness following multiple tactics, capturing potential leads, engaging with leads, creating highly-engaging content, and more.

Effective Lead Nurturing Tips for Businesses

As market experts say, a company may fall into the market soon if it fails to get potential prospects. If you want to turn those potential customers into loyal clients, the key lies in lead nurturing. Let's explore some of the productive lead nurturing tips to improve LCR.

Here are some of the effective lead-generation strategies to optimize your sales funnel:

1) Generate Targeted Content

As a marketing and sales head, I believe no strategy will deliver efficacious results without good-quality content. Within my organization, I focus on delivering content based on different user personas, targeting their specific needs that well-explains my company values and how it offers solutions to user needs.

The success of your efforts to cultivate relationships with your audience through marketing campaigns heavily depends on the caliber of the content you provide. You may gain your leads if your content is relevant and timely. Understand the customer needs and unique buyer persona, and then create content revolving around their needs based on their interests, goals, and more. Integrate a sales and marketing tool into your process to understand user behavior in the best way possible.

2) Implement Omnichannel Nurturing

The conventional lead nurturing strategy primarily involved setting up a simple email drip campaign that would send out generic emails to a list of prospects. But as the customer becomes more selective and tech-savvy, marketers must look for multiple ways to reach them.

Email nurturing alone would never be able to generate the required results. As a result, marketers have begun implementing multi-channel lead nurturing tactics.

It combines marketing automation, email marketing, social media nurturing, paid ads, direct outreach, and optimized website content. Because so many tactics are involved, you must ensure that your sales and marketing teams are well-aligned and working cohesively to execute this properly.

3) Lead Scoring Strategy

Lead scoring is a way to rank prospects based on various factors and identify the most-promising leads based on perceived values defined by the organization. Lead scoring is the most straightforward way to identify

between the really-not-interested prospects and keenly interested leads. In this technique, you assign numerical values to your leads depending on website browsing behaviors, conversion events, or even social media interactions. Prioritize your efforts based on the lead scores and identify which leads need to be nurtured more and which are not worth the significant effort.

4) Consistent & Timely Follow Ups

Although the benefits of immediate follow-up calls are evident, many organizations still need to act promptly. While automated lead nurturing helps reach large groups of prospects, a timely follow-up email or phone call remains the most effective way to convert inbound leads into qualified sales opportunities. This is because the likelihood of converting a lead into a sales opportunity significantly increases when the lead is contacted immediately after a website conversion.

Making a well-planned call to an inbound lead, timed appropriately, proves more effective than a high volume of cold calling. By understanding the prospect's recent browsing behavior and having sufficient information about their organization and role, you can tailor your approach and increase the chances of success.

5) Create Personalized Emails

Every customer has a different mindset while scrolling through your website; analyzing the customer requirements through an effective lead generation tool with session recording or a visitor's journey feature is vital. Follow up with the leads with personalized email content around their needs and the desired solution.

Spamming leads with mass-produced content will mark a negative impression on your brand, whereas creating personalized content for promising leads will convert them into paying customers.

"Nurtured leads are more likely to close 47% higher valued deal than non-nurtured leads."

6) Conduct Surveys/Polls for Engagement

To keep a strong connection with your potential customers, it's crucial to understand their needs fully. Conducting a survey among your leads is the best way to analyze their requirements and optimize your strategy accordingly. Based on the survey data, you can create specific solutions for them.

The Significance of Lead Nurturing

While the ultimate objective of lead nurturing is to drive sales, it encompasses a range of other crucial advantages. Here are some benefits of lead nurturing:

A. Introduction to Prospects

Lead nurturing serves as an effective means to educate potential customers about your company's products and services. Unlike a landing page, which may have space limitations, lead nurturing allows you to provide a comprehensive understanding of your offerings, showcasing who you are and how you can cater to their needs.

B. Establishing Trust

By demonstrating an understanding of prospects' pain points or offering them valuable insights, lead nurturing enables you to connect with your audience and gain their trust. Sharing your knowledge conveys that your relationship extends beyond mere sales, emphasizing your commitment to equipping them with the necessary tools and information.

C. Thought Leadership

By creating thoughtful and relevant content, lead nurturing enhances your reputation and positions you as a leader in your industry. You establish yourself as a trusted source of information and solutions by consistently providing valuable insights and expertise.

D. Maintaining Recall

Regular communication with prospects ensures you remain in their memory. Being top of mind becomes particularly advantageous when they require your products or services, as they are more likely to turn to you due to the ongoing relationship you have nurtured.

E. Strengthening Sales Strategies

Lead nurturing presents an opportunity to target future customers who may need more time to be ready for purchase. By nurturing these prospects, you can guide them through the sales funnel, increasing the likelihood of conversion in the long run.

F. Lowering Customer Acquisition Costs

Lead generation allows for the implementation of cost-effective methods to attract customers. By reducing marketing expenses, you can improve your customer acquisition costs (CAC), resulting in a more efficient allocation of resources.

G. Driving Sales Growth

Lead nurturing transforms prospects into higher-quality leads. According to research from Marketing Sherpa, nurtured leads make purchases that are 47% larger than non-nurtured leads. Consequently, implementing effective lead nurturing strategies directly contributes to increased sales revenue.

Conclusion

In summary, nurturing your leads goes beyond the goal of sales conversion. It facilitates the introduction of your company to prospects, builds trust and credibility, establishes thought leadership, maintains brand recall, optimizes sales strategies, reduces customer acquisition costs, and ultimately drives sales growth. Prioritizing lead nurturing is vital for long-term business success.

FAQs for Lead Nurturing

Q: What is an example of lead nurturing?

An example of lead nurturing is sending personalized email campaigns to a specific group of leads based on their behavior and interests. For instance, if a lead has shown interest in a particular product or service, you can send them targeted emails with relevant content and offers to move them further down the sales funnel.

Q: What is the goal of lead nurturing?

The goal of lead nurturing is to build a relationship with your leads, educate them about your products or services, and guide them through the buying journey. By providing relevant and valuable information at each stage of the funnel, you can establish trust and credibility with your leads, ultimately converting them into loyal customers.

Q: Can lead nurturing help drive sales growth for businesses?

Yes, lead nurturing can help drive business sales growth by increasing conversion rates and reducing the sales cycle. By nurturing your leads with targeted and personalized content, you can keep them engaged and interested in your products or services and move them closer to purchasing. This can result in higher sales, increased revenue, and better ROI for your business.