According to Aberdeen Group, “It takes around 10 marketing-driven touches for a lead to convert from the top of the funnel into a paying customer.”
Getting website traffic and generating interest in your software or IT services simply isn’t enough ..if your focus is really to increase revenue.
You want to accelerate conversion of leads to customers. Lead nurturing is the way.
“Lead nurturing is the purposeful process of engaging a defined target group by providing relevant information at each stage of the buyer’s journey. You want to actively move the prospects you’ve created through your marketing and lead generation efforts, to the point where they become paying customers.” (Hubspot)
With effective lead nurturing, your technology, IT, and/or software company can keep leads interested in your product or service and drive more sales.
Source: HubSpot
So you may be wondering…
- What is the best way to nurture leads?
- How do I get started with lead nurturing?
- What do super successful marketers do differently?
If that is the case……time to tune in!
THE ULTIMATE GUIDE TO LEAD NURTURING FOR TECH COMPANIES
There’s a lot that goes into nurturing leads for your tech company. First, you need to know their interests, pain points, and preferred solutions so that you can create a personalised strategy that is tailored to their specific needs. This customer persona development is critical to any lead nurturing campaign. Then, you can build content around preferences of your customer personas to attract them. You should also use multiple channels of communication to reach your leads after they’ve visited your website or expressed some type of interest in your product or service.
Then, you can use a marketing automation platform to rank prospects based on how likely they are to convert. This will give you insight into the next actions to take.
For example, a lead has discovered your social post for software or IT service on social media. They visited your website and visited the pricing page or ‘about us’ page but they haven’t opted to fill the contact us form, or specific offer.
By assigning a numerical value to their behaviour, you can determine the best action to take, whether it’s to get a sales rep to directly follow up or use engaging content to nurture them down the funnel.
Overall, your lead nurturing process should have a specific goal, targeted to a specific audience, be personalised, and aligned with both sales and marketing.
Below are the steps you can take to get your lead nurturing campaign off the ground:
1. DETERMINE YOUR GOAL
Identifying the goal of your lead nurturing campaign is very important for determining the direction of your content and other lead magnet strategies. Do you want more people to download your software? Do you want more subscribers to your email newsletter?
2. IDENTIFY YOUR AUDIENCE
You can’t nurture leads if you don’t know their characteristics (i.e. demographics), behaviour patterns, motivations, goals, challenges, and ideal solutions. Creating buyer personas will do well to establish a target market so that you can personalise their experience. For example, let’s say that you sell software that helps marketers automate certain tasks such as sending emails, posting on social media, and other website actions. Your target audience could be marketing directors who want to spend as little as possible on marketing and make the most of their time.
3. CREATE PERSONALISED CONTENT AND TIMELY FOLLOW UPS
Lead nurturing is about nurturing leads to get them into the next stage of their buying journey. It’s also about contacting leads via different channels to provide value, education your company/software unique selling point (USP) to get converted.
Your USP is going to be what sets your business apart from your competition. Do you provide 24/7 chat support? Are you offering software to small and medium business? Your USP shows your potential customers what makes your software and services unique.
To keep prospects interested in your products and/or services, you should create educational, yet engaging content for each stage of the buyer’s journey. This content can help guide leads down the sales funnel and encourage them to keep engaging with your company.
Go Multi-channel: Four out of five marketers say their email open rates don’t exceed 20%.(Source: The State of B2B Lead Nurturing Survey, Oracle). It’s time to think beyond the inbox. So you should consider multi channel approach to lead nurturing, think outside the box and meet the audience where they are. Marketing automation, email marketing, social media, retargeting, dynamic website content and direct sales outreach are some of the examples.
Align Sales & Marketing Teams: To really nurture the lead effectively, you need to have your sales and marketing teams aligned fully. Sales Performance Optimization Study revealed, 89% of companies that aligned sales and marketing lead generation efforts reported measurable increases in the number of leads that turned to opportunities as a result of continuous nurturing (Source: Sales Performance Optimization Study)
Below are different forms of content you can create for your lead nurturing campaign:
Interactive landing pages:Create strategic landing pages with forms, great microcopy, and engaging imagery. Your call-to-action (CTA) should be clear and enticing. For example, you can get visitors to “Request more information”, “Download this free ebook”, or “Start a free trial”.
Webinars: Host webinars to educate potential leads about your products and services. This will not only help keep them interested in what your tech company has to offer, but it will position your company as a thought leader in your industry.
Videos: Creating videos is another great way to educate prospects about your software. You can create demos and instructional videos that show how to use your product. This allows potential customers to see what your product is like before they buy it. You can embed videos in your blog and social media posts, landing pages, or product pages to engage leads that aren’t yet ready to buy.
Blog and social posts: Software and other tech-y products can be difficult to use, especially for beginners. Creating informative blog posts that show how easy it is to use your product can help remove doubts about making a purchase. You can post on social media to connect with your target audience. Also, running social ads specifically targeted to users who have visited your website can keep them interested in your company and may help them move down the sales funnel to purchase.
Infographics: Easy-to-view infographics can illustrate key points and ideas in a fun, engaging way.
Emails: You can create an email newsletter that talks about the latest tech software and products. By sending out regular emails, you can remind leads about your products and services. Creating personalised emails is also important for nurturing leads. Be sure to include the first name of each lead you contact and include any relevant content they normally consume in your emails. To gather email addresses, you can create lead magnates like ebooks, white-papers, webinars, case studies, and more.
Timely Follow Ups: The odds of a lead entering the sales process, or becoming qualified, are 21 times greater when contacted within five minutes versus 30 minutes after an inbound lead converts on your website.
4. LEAD SCORING
The Lead Generation Marketing Effectiveness Study revealed, 68% of successful marketers cite lead scoring based on content and engagement as the most effective tactic for improving revenue contribution from lead nurturing. However according to Marketing Sherpa study, only 21% businesses use lead scoring!
You can score your leads based on content and engagement. A lead score represents the value a lead has to your company. This numerical value can be assigned to certain website behaviours, clicks, conversions, and social media engagement. The higher the score, the more likely the lead is to become a customer. With lead scoring, you can target the prospects who actually want to engage with your business.
Scoring helps your sales team make the most out of their time and focus only on the leads who are most likely to make a purchase.
Interested in starting lead nurturing for your B2B technology, IT Services or SAAS business to accelerate your growth? Have a chat with us today. We can help you nurture the cold visitors into sales ready leads that you can covert quickly and increase revenue!
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