5 tips to convert your leads into Sales

As a marketing agency that focuses on helping businesses grow, the most

common request we get is to help businesses with their lead generation. 
Unfortunately, many business owners still believe that all they have to do is
build a website and the customers will come pouring in. But in today's online
world, it is a lot more complicated than that.
Ever-changing technology, increased competition and sophisticated buyers
have made it much more challenging for businesses to achieve the results
they are looking for.
Why? Because it isn't just about generating leads. It is also about
converting those leads into sales.
We often find that  businesses focus all their attention on getting more and
more leads, but they neglect the sales process.
Case in point...
We had a new client that insisted that all they needed was help generating
leads, because they had an 80% closing ratio. 
While we questioned their optimistic figures, we were confident that we could
make a difference for them by creating a steady stream of leads, and
combined with a reasonable closing ratio (maybe half of what they said), we
could hit a home run for their business.
But as we soon to found out, their lead to sales ratio was much lower than any
of us thought. It was actually closer to 12%, and this led us back to the
drawing board to help them improve their processes.
While our client was correct that they had a lead generating issue, we also
found out that they had a sales process issue as well.
This was an issue that was just as important to correct.
You see, getting a lead is one thing, but turning an opportunity into a sale is
quite another. And as our client soon found out, having a website that is a
lead generating machine without having a well-defined sales process
can lead to wasted opportunities and money flying out of the door.

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 If this sounds familiar to you, here are 5
tips to help you convert more leads into sales:
1. Get Their Attention
2. Track Your Results
3. Follow Up
4. Focus On Solving Problems
5. Understand Your Competition
Now let's delve into what to do with these.
 

Tip #1 - Get Their Attention

Many businesses focus all of their attention on getting visitors to their website.
But visitor numbers can create a false sense of optimism about how great
things are going.
While it is true that you have to get people to your website in order to have a
chance of turning them into a lead, if you don't capture their attention in the
first six seconds and they leave your website, you have wasted that
opportunity to get a lead.
Customers want to know that you understand their problem or
challenge, and that you have a solution to help them. Have you ever gone
to a website looking for something, gotten there and realized that this website
didn't offer what you were looking for, so you left? That is what your visitors
will do if your messaging doesn't resonate with them.
So, how do you capture their attention? Offer something of value.
Customers are looking for solutions. Offer an eBook, a White Paper, a
checklist or an infographic...something that is of value to them and helps
them. In return for them being able to download your offer for free, you can

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ask for their name and email. The important point to remember is that you are
trying to help. If you ask for too much, they won't download your offer.
Once they download your information, you have a lead that you can
follow up with. 
You can learn more about getting their attention on our article, What is
Inbound Marketing?
 

Tip #2 - Track Your Results

 
Entrepreneurs by nature are an optimistic bunch, and sometimes they need a
dose of reality.  Without a proper mechanism to track business results, it is

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easy to operate by feelings.  If you are never aware of the “TRUE” results,
it’s easy to operate in “Fantasy Land.”
This can be disastrous to your business!
Upon hearing that our client closed at an 80% rate, our first reaction
was “Yeah Right!!”  Having dealt with this type of optimism before, we knew
as we dug into the actual results we would probably find a lower closing ratio.
But, we never suspected that the gap between our client’s reality and the
actuality would be a whopping 68%.
Our first recommendation was to get our client on HubSpot’s all-in-one sales
and marketing platform and CRM system. By giving our client access to
sales and marketing metrics through HubSpot, we could show our client the
reality of their situation – a 12% closing ratio. As the leads increased, which
occurred quickly, it became obvious that there was a problem closing sales.
Armed with a true measurement of effectiveness, this allowed us to pinpoint
issues with their sales process, and ultimately help our client develop
new sales prospects AND capitalize on those opportunities.

Tip #3 - Follow Up

Common sense tells us that the quicker that a lead is contacted, the better
chance of turning that lead into a sale.  Many companies do not have a well-
coordinated process to handle leads that come in from the internet.
Surveys show that in today's market, you may have to reach out an average
of 9 times before you get a response. In fact, we actually have a 15-step
process of following up on leads.
Another lead response survey performed by the Harvard Business Review
indicated that in general B2B leads receive extremely slow response times
from sales teams.  Here are some of the shocking results from the study.

 The average first response time of B2B companies to their leads was 42
hours
 Only 37% of companies responded to their leads within an hour
 16% of companies responded within one to 24 hours
 24% of companies took more than 24 hours
 23% of the companies never responded at all

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The first and last statistics jump out at me. 42 hours average response
time for a lead, and 23% of companies not responding at all. Yikes!!
Thankfully for my client, the issue was SLOW response time, and not NO
response time.  We were easily able to put systems into place to increase
response time, and saw results improve quickly.
 

Tip #4 – Focus on Solving Problems

 
In the old days, consumers relied on a salesperson for information on
products and services.
Not anymore.
Here is a shocking stat:
"Prospects are spending more time doing independent research and obtaining
info from peers and other third party sources. According to an Accenture
study, 94% of B2B buyers conduct online research at some point in the
buying process." (Source: Salesforce)
Customers are more educated than ever and are very resistant to the “HARD
SELL.”  
Make sure that your sales team avoids the hard sell and instead focus
on solving problems.
Don’t launch into a pitch about your product.  Particularly with online leads,
the customer has already expressed interest in a product or service. A more
effective approach is to open your conversation with a quick introduction,
explain that you are following up to their request for contact and ask “How
Can I Help.”
Then, most importantly, stay quiet and LISTEN.

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Many of your qualifying questions will be answered and the customer will tell
you exactly what issues they are having. You will then be in a greater position
to recommend the APPROPRIATE solution for their problem, not what you
want to sell them.
Take that approach and watch your conversions increase.

Tip #5 – Understand Your Competition

 
For our client, the biggest issue affecting his closing ratio was his competition.
He was in a highly competitive industry that was somewhat price sensitive.
As we know, cost is generally a major factor in the sales process, but
not the only factor. For our client, whose products were priced marginally
higher, we realized that overcoming price objections was one glaring reason
that they were losing out on business.
One of the primary benefits that we provided was a thorough understanding of
our client’s competition through a competitor analysis that we performed at the
beginning of our engagement.  
Most consumers won’t make a purchase before performing at least a
rudimentary comparison among providers.  Understanding price sensitivity as
an objection, we were able to compare their products to competing products
and found some major quality differences that favored our client.
The sales team was armed with this information and were able to overcome
this objection. As a result, the conversion rates went up.
 

Additional Tips
 Qualify Your Leads First - Make sure that you qualify your prospects
up front, before you spend too much time with someone that isn't your
ideal customer.
 Keep Leads Warm - Follow up consistently, your leads don't get cold.
 Monitor Your Sales Pipeline - Monitoring your pipeline consistently
keeps your prospects fresh in you mind and keeps them moving
towards a close.

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What do these tips have in common?
They all require a FOCUS on building a better business.  It is easy for
companies to sometimes fall into a rut and accept the status quo.  
For our client, they really had no clue what their true business metrics were
because outside of their gross income, which had been stagnant and
declining for years, they really thought they were doing a good job of closing
the leads they were getting.
So, why should I hire a marketing agency for my small business? 
 As outsiders, we could look at their business with a fresh perspective, and
implement business ideas that truly improved the bottom line. 
Investing in online marketing is crucial for any business going forward, but
generating leads without closing them destroys the return on investment.
Take a moment to look at your operations and see if any of these tips will help
you improve your bottom line.
 

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OLIVIA WALLS
Olivia is the Co-Owner and VP of Sales for InTouch. She loves getting to know and connecting with
people.

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