I know I blogged on this just a few weeks ago, but seriously, given the time of the year this is a topic worth revisiting.

The New Year period can be sluggish and stressful for many businesses. Staff holidays and shutdown time can take a big toll on company finances, so it’s always critical to get back to business-as-usual as quickly as possible.

With your sales team back in the office and feeling invigorated after a break, there couldn’t be a better time to have a pile of appointments ready and waiting for them to attend. Or a 100% accurate and complete list of prospects to start off your first lead gen campaign for 2018.

Dust off your data, now!

Many of our clients provide us data which has, to be honest, seen better days. For example:

Existing client and prospects lists that haven’t been consistently loved and maintained. People change jobs, businesses move, expand or even stop trading. If you did an audit on your CRM today, how accurate do you think your data will be?
Purchased lists. OK, we know you paid good money for this, but how long ago? And was it a ‘good’ list to start with? Does it have the right contacts, are the companies the right size and sector to make great prospects? If the data is full of holes you need to make a hard call – will your investment ever pay off, or should you walk away and start afresh?

While I may sound like a broken record when I talk about data, it truly is the star on the top of the Christmas tree, (or the Central Otago cherry on top of the trifle). It’s just likely that it needs a good polish up before it pays off!

Existing lists

This is a great example of how to do it right!

We maintain a fund-raising list for one of our not-for-profit clients. When we run the telemarketing component of their annual corporate sponsorship campaign, they realise a $15 return for every $1 they spend with us.

That makes them very happy. And our team love working with clean, up-to-date lists.

We’re not wasting precious campaign time on cleaning up their database. When we start calling it’s all business – and it’s paid off big time for them and the New Zealanders they support.

Purchased lists

List buying is an art.

There are plenty of options, and the quality of information ranges dramatically from one source to another. (Tip: Only use highly reputable list procurement companies who invest in maintaining their data – that way you get a higher ROI. We can help you with this).

If you’re unsure about whether it’s worth pouring more money into a list you’ve purchased, spend an hour doing random calls to check on the quality of the data. This will give you an overview of how much work is required to get the list to a useable standard before committing to using it. You may decide to dump the data, but that’s a decision better made at the beginning of the process than the end.

Quick tip

Don’t put off dealing with your data until after Christmas, do it now.

Start 2018 as you plan to continue, with a strong pipeline well fueled with accurate data. While you may not be keen to work over the traditional Christmas holiday period, we are – and experience has taught us that the people we call at this time are more relaxed and chatty. We have better conversations with them, which leads to better 2018 pipelines for you.

lisa@hotleads.co.nz

November 22, 2017/by

How can you turn lead gen ‘speed-dating’ into a lasting relationship?

Blog posts, Lead generation, Telemarketing

We’ve all seen it happen. Your best friend is newly single, and they embark on all sorts of knee-jerk strategies to quickly find a new beau.

And we see businesses do it all the time too. They run a short-term lead gen campaign to find an instant solution for a current problem.

For example, there’s the ‘I’ve been keeping myself so busy redecorating my new apartment-for-one, that now everything is done, I don’t have anything to look forward to’ problem (aka: “I’ve been so busy doing ongoing work that I took my eye off the ball – and we have nothing new in the pipeline”).

And the ‘I’ve spent all this money on expensive tickets, a designer outfit and a stretch limo but I don’t have a date!’ moment (aka: “We’re running an event, but hardly anyone has accepted our invitation, and we urgently need to round up more attendees to make all the money we invested worthwhile”).

Then there’s the all too common ‘I’ve kept myself so wrapped up in a whirlwind of work-sports-family that I haven’t made room for my old friends, let alone let anyone new in my life’ scenario (aka: “help! I’ve been so focussed on just one client that I’ve neglected my loyal clients and don’t have any prospects lined up”).

And of course, there is always the ‘hey stranger, do you know anyone who would like to go out with me on a blind date?’ challenge (aka: “I’m new in town. How do I meet new clients and establish credibility and profile?”).

A quick fix

While I am being a bit tongue-in-cheek, using a professional lead generation service is a great way to quickly get your message out there and get fast results (think of us as your speed-dating gurus). And of course, the more defined and refined the list of prospects, and the more targeted your messaging and offer, the better outcome your campaign will have. We’ll have you run off your feet with new dates in no time at all.

But we can add even more value by helping you take it that bit further. For example, over the last few years, we’ve worked with the Cerebral Palsy Society of New Zealand to help them raise engagement and sponsorship for their Steptember annual fundraiser. After the first campaign, back in 2015, we rounded up so many ‘dates’ that the project was deemed a complete success. The lead gen budget for 2016 was increased, and we used the 2015 list of prospects and clients to drive even more sponsorship revenue. By taking a more strategic view of dating, and applying contact continuity, the Society was able to revisit old suitors on good terms and happily re-engage with them.

It’s all about timing

You see, just because someone doesn’t want to date you right now, it doesn’t mean they won’t reconsider you further down the track when their circumstances change. Especially when you show that you’re interested, serious, persistent and committed – and have something attractive to offer. That sort of behaviour impresses.

A short-term lead gen campaign is a stepping stone to a long-term relationship if your contacts are nurtured, loved and talked to at regular intervals. By having a team who do nothing but help your prospects (or neglected clients) feel the love, you build a pipeline of new and exciting possibilities, rather than leave behind a trail of broken hearts and missed opportunities.

November 13, 2017/by

Is running an in-house lead gen team costing you more than you think?

Blog posts, CRM, Lead generation, Telemarketing

We get it. It’s tempting to bring your lead generation activities under the one in-house umbrella to help drive down expenses and maintain control. But before you race out and start recruiting, there are two things you should consider:

1. What is the actual cost of having internal resources that you pay week in, week out?

2. What is the measurable value of building up an in-house lead generation team?

Cost – an internal resource vs. outsourced resource $ checklist

The table below identifies all those costs that are easy to forget about. It’s never just about salaries. Anyway, do the math for yourself.

INTERNAL RESOURCE	IN-HOUSE COST (PA)	OUTSOURCED RESOURCE
Recruitment costs, including training, and initial downtime until resource is up to speed	$	None. Included in hourly rate.
Benefits load (average of 17% of salary)	$	None. Included in hourly rate.
Facilities – rent, power, furniture, internet, kitchen, and bathroom, cleaning, etc	$	None. Included in hourly rate
Training and certification	$	None. Included in hourly rate
Management overhead – including time taken by managers and sales teams to coach and improve the performance of team members (often at the cost of other sales opportunities)/td>	$	None. Included in hourly rate
Hardware – phone, computer, monitors, etc	$	None. Included in hourly rate
Software licensing – CRM, productivity software, telephone system	$	None. Included in hourly rate
Sick leave and company healthcare schemes	$	None. Included in hourly rate
Paid parental leave	$	None. Included in hourly rate
Annual holidays and paid public holidays	$	None. Included in hourly rate
TOTAL COST PER YEAR	$	None. Included in hourly rate
TOTAL COST DIVIDED BY 2000 WORKING HOURS A YEAR	$ PER HOUR	$ PER HOUR

Once you’ve run through this checklist, we’re pretty confident that you’ll find running an in-house team is going to cost you more.

You may be paying for 2000 hours of lead generation activity a year, but can you guarantee that each and every hour is spent on driving sales and nothing else? What if only 75-80% of those hours are productive? How does that impact your cost of sale and bottom line?

But focussing on just costs can be misleading.

Let’s talk about value

Value isn’t about cost. It’s about the return on investment (ROI) you get for all the hard work that goes into building a successful, motivated and high-performing team who generate consistent and predictable telesales results.

It’s about the times between campaigns when there’s not a smooth transition to the next project, and your team is sitting around, trying to look busy and keep morale up. And the wasted hours you’re paying for when they aren’t working.

Or the effort of ramping up your full-time and part-time resource recruitment programme to tackle an extensive long or short-term campaign, and the expense and heartbreak of downsizing your team if you change sales strategies.

And then there’s the boredom factor. While you may find your own company and products endlessly fascinating, focussing endlessly on the same subject can be exhausting for staff, and burnout in these circumstances tends to be high. The results of burnout include increased absenteeism, waning commitment, falling productivity and effectiveness, more conflict with co-workers, and even disruptive behaviour. It’s not surprising that recruitment is a constant activity for some companies!

In a nutshell

We recruit, train and manage lead generation professionals, so you don’t have to.

Due to the variety of projects we undertake, our people are continually learning, so they remained challenged and interested – and stay longer. We provide real economies of scale, so you can run a campaign that spans weeks months, or even years without increasing your own staff overheads.

And most importantly – we make every dollar count. If you pay us for 2000 hours of effort a year, that’s exactly what you get.

lisa@hotleads.co.nz

October 30, 2017/by

The top 3 golden rules of data

Blog posts, CRM, Lead generation

As a sales, marketing and lead generation professional, I’ve learned that there are three golden rules to gaining qualified leads and creating a reliable sales pipeline.

And they all relate to data.

WHO is the relevant decision maker? What’s their direct dial or mobile number, and email address?
WHERE is the decision maker located? Are they in the region your reps cover, and is that address correct?
WHAT industry are they in? And are they the right fit?

These three rules all seem common-sense, so why do so many companies struggle with them?

Why is keeping your database current so important?

Keeping your CRM data up-to-date is critical to your business for two reasons.

Once a lead is converted to a sale, do you have the information you need to retain and nurture the relationship throughout the client lifecycle? When your salesperson follows up on contracts which are falling due for renewal, to upsell or make a courtesy call, do they find that their client, in fact, moved premises three years ago, and they had no idea?
The sales prospects in your CRM are the lifeblood of your business. Is the information you have current? Is the contact the right one, and is the business accurately profiled as an opportunity, so no sales call is wasted call?

Check out your own database

We’re given incorrect or obsolete data to work with, day in, day out. In fact, we’ve been supplied with lists where at least 30% (yes, 30%!) of the phone numbers are wrong. That means that nearly every third call is chewing up time and effort that you’re paying for.

Here’s a little exercise for you.

Export a file from your ‘current’ CRM/ERP into Excel and sort it by region, contact name, phone number, job title, email etc. Now, hands up if you find blank address fields, emails missing characters, job titles misspelled, random capitalisation of contacts’ names or even people that you know for yourself have left, or worse, passed on.

One tiny little error in a database can make it impossible to find a client in your CRM without using multiple filters and random search phrases. Out-of-date data is an exercise in wasted time for everyone concerned.

So how do you keep it up to date?

The usual suspects

Your salespeople? Well, let’s be honest and say that most salespeople are focussed on the sale, and not on keeping your CRM up to date. They have KPIs to meet, bonuses to achieve, a career to build and a family to feed. So, count them out.

And Google is not your friend. I know plenty of businesses rely on Google to populate their databases. Big mistake. The entire premise of Google is reliant on companies maintaining and updating their own details. But as a lead generation expert, I can tell you this is pretty rare (and I dare you to jump onto Google right now and check your own details!).

Who you gonna call?

Leave your sales team to do what they do best. When it comes to building and maintaining accurate data for lead generation, customer service, customer retention, and decision maker relevance, turn to the experts.

Quick tip: There’s no better time than right now to give your database some love, so you can maximise its business value in the New Year!

lisa@hotleads.co.nz

October 24, 2017/by

Bad telemarketing vs intelligent lead generation

Blog posts, Lead generation, Telemarketing

We know that ‘telemarketing’ has a bad rep.

It conjures up visions of tightly-packed call centres with clinically symmetrical desks, and perfectly aligned dividers. It makes you think of automated dialling systems, and transient individuals who earn minimum wages and have little enthusiasm for the product or service their client has to offer. And it definitely says ‘paint by numbers’ telemarketing scripts.

I’ve got to say it. In these circumstances, the term ‘dynamic team’ is actually code for ‘high staff turnover’, rather than indicating a collective ability for fast thinking.

I call this the churn and burn mentality. Churning through call after call, hour after hour, day after day, as rapidly as possible to get through the numbers in the hope of gathering a few positive results, qualified or not. This type of calling is sadly a hit and miss process which just collects ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answers. It doesn’t add value for the client, and burns through data, rendering it useless for the future.

It’s not about numbers

We are all about fast, qualified results. Our absolute first tier goal is always to create as many ready-to-action leads for the client as possible in the allocated time. But as well as focusing on meeting our clients’ immediate lead generation objectives, we care about what’s in their pipeline a week, a month, or even a year down the line. And we do this by establishing if a ‘no’ really is a ‘no’.

Therein lies the difference between playing a numbers game with call centre people who don’t care (and aren’t in all honesty, paid enough to care), and engaging with a team of professional lead generation consultants.

You see, in a consultative situation, we don’t believe that ‘no’ means ‘no’.

More often than not, it means “not now”, and that is a hugely different answer. If your lead generation team, whether in-house or externally resourced, don’t pursue a ‘no’ with the same enthusiasm as a ‘yes’ they are essentially destroying the opportunity for a forward-looking pipeline. The value of the ‘no’s’ and the ‘not now’s’ is enormous for a client with vision. Our consultative approach delivers information about competitors, market awareness and above all the ‘when’ of it all.

Double your leads

Through simple, yet brief conversations (as opposed to scripted surveys), we establish a timeline of ‘when’ the prospect may be open to changing or upgrading their current product or service.

We generate immediate appointments, and by also capturing the ‘not yet’ prospects, provide another wave of appointments in the future which, when tracked and nurtured, often doubles the total number of leads generated in the initial campaign. So our clients get twice as much value from their investment in us, and from their data.

Consultation, not churn

After years in the business, I know that the success of lead generation isn’t to do with the volume of phone numbers dialled. It’s about the number of engaging conversations we have with decision makers. We’ve proven time and again that prospects respond more positively to an intelligent, non-threatening dialogue with an experienced sales and marketing consultant who is able to discuss their business with understanding and knowledge than they do to a “5-minute survey” from a script-reading call centre worker.

We believe that our value to you and your pipeline lies in our proven ability to generate instant ‘yes’ results, and our inability to take ‘no’ for an answer.

lisa@hotleads.co.nz

October 14, 2017/by

What’s the magic number for lead gen cold calls per day?

Blog posts, Cold calling, Lead generation, Telemarketing

The more, the better

There’s the ‘as many as possible’ crowd, who value quantity over quality. We’re talking 100-120 calls per day. And sure, that works, in its own way. But it’s hard work, and apart from a very few exceptional telemarketers, maintaining this call rate is an unrealistic and unsustainable goal unless you are working with an offshore telemarketing sweatshop. And do you seriously think your prospect can’t tell that they are being rushed through a script?

Calling by numbers

Then there’s the ‘based on my careful calculations’ group. This group follows a methodology where time is carefully broken down and allocated to research, talk time, scheduling, adding data to the CRM, scheduling meetings (if that’s the call objective), etc. I won’t bore you with the breakdown details, but this method generally calculates that a telesales person should make an average of 8 cold calls per hour, or around 60 calls a day. There’s nothing wrong with this approach, but it places the emphasis on getting through calls as a KPI, rather than getting a higher conversion rate.

Better, not more

Finally, we come to our philosophy which quite simply places the ‘quality of the call over the quantity.’ That’s not to say we don’t get through 50-70 calls a day (because we rock) – but it’s never done by sacrificing outcomes. More often than not, fewer phone calls means a higher level of engagement and longer, more in-depth conversations, equalling a better result. And that’s what we focus on.

Are you getting hung up on call numbers?

Instead of concentrating on the number of outgoing calls, how about turning it around and looking at the number of quality leads generated as your defining metric?

When you’re setting up your campaign KPIs, start at the end of the process. Trying working backwards. Ask yourself what you need to provide in order to make your lead generation campaign more effective.

As part of the process, you will also extrapolate a feel for how many calls potentially need to be made (and therefore your list size), but that should be the upper limit if you ensure that:

Your list is the best it can be. How complete is it? How much time is going to be wasted finding phone numbers or tracking down the right contact? You may recall me saying in an earlier blog on databases that we’ve been provided with lists which are missing up to 30% of the contact phone numbers!
Your offer / product / solution resonates with your target market. Don’t waste time and money on talking to the wrong person, or making an offer which doesn’t fit your target market and their potential needs. Test and refine it if needs be, it’s well worth the small amount of extra effort and expense to guarantee better results.
Your supporting collateral is on the money. Do you have professionally prepared marketing material to support your campaign? Does it reinforce the campaign messaging, communicate the right depth of information to reassure the prospect, and provide them with a mechanism to take the offer further? If someone is too busy to talk, then sending out collateral by email (preferably) or even snail-mail is your second bite of the cherry. It can also measurably boost response rates. And while we’re at it, how’s your website looking? Does its messaging support the campaign, and do you have a landing page where you can allow prospects to ‘buy’ or , and for you to track where your leads have come from?

In a nutshell: There’s more to running a successful lead generation campaign than the number of calls you make. Think better, not more. We do.

October 13, 2017/by

Is Christmas really a dead period for new business prospecting? Think again.

Blog posts, CRM, Lead generation, Telemarketing

It’s only October, and frighteningly, I’ve spotted Christmas decorations and advertising going up already. I call this the ‘Christmas creep,’ as the season seems to start earlier every year.

For many retailers, Christmas shopping accounts for between 40-80% of their annual sales, so it’s all good news for them as their customers get hyped up to spend, spend and spend some more. But what if you don’t operate in the retail arena?

The danger of giving your sales pipeline a holiday!

A commitment to regular and consistent prospecting ensures that your sales pipeline never runs dry. People go on holidays; sales pipelines don’t!

Yet, I’m already starting to hear non-retail businesses dismissing the rest of the year as useless for lead generation and putting off what should be pre-Christmas projects until the New Year. It’s only October, folks!

Perhaps they are so busy leading up to Christmas that they think they don’t need to prospect? By effectively closing down their prospecting activities so early, it leaves a huge three-month hole in their sales pipeline, and can result in a massive, stressful scramble to try to catch up in the New Year.

It’s a dangerous practice to only look for new pipeline opportunities when sales are slow. By then, it’s too late. If sales are slow to start with, it’s because of weak prospecting, so you are only ever playing catch-up.

But enough about the sales pipeline slackers. This is what you need to know!

Let me tell you what do our sales savvy clients do over Christmas.

They focus on the future. Not just on the here and now, but on developing a consistent year-round spread of opportunities to support their businesses.
They stay engaged. They continue to prospect right up until the middle of December, so they have a head start over their competitors come the New Year.
They use the season for a reason. Our really clever clients combine using Christmas communications (think eCards) with telemarketing calls to update customer contact information, nurture prospects, or to plant the seeds for making contact in the New Year.
They utilise the ‘quiet’ time profitably. They use the real quiet Christmas period (the second week of December through to the second week of January) to work on their databases. They profile new prospects, and clean up and verify their data so that their lists are up-to-date and accurate, ready for calling/marketing in the New Year.
They take a well-deserved break. Their salespeople go on holiday and can kick back and relax, knowing they aren’t starting from ground-zero in the New Year.
They hit the New Year already running. Unlike those businesses who have given up by October, these clients have ready-to-go databases and campaigns. And those who have left it to the New Year to do even the basics of getting ready for another competitive year are eating their dust.

Get off to a cracking 2018

With some strategic planning and a highly motivated telemarketing team (that’s us) behind you, the ‘Christmas creep’ is a profitable time to prospect, update and nurture. Come holiday time, you can happily close your doors knowing that you are fully prepared for a flying sales start in the New Year.

lisa@hotleads.co.nz

October 9, 2017/by

How to terrify your salespeople in 1 easy step

Blog posts, Cold calling

Saying these two words will strike fear into the hearts of most salespeople: Cold. Calling.

I recently saw this tongue-in-cheek comment in another blog: What do you call a salesperson who will not cold call? An account executive.

To be fair, we’re not all created equal. By nature, we are extroverts or introverts, or we fall somewhere in-between. The best cold-callers are extroverted and task-focused. They don’t suffer from social rejection anxiety or procrastination. They persist, stay on track, and keep on smiling, day after day.

Born, not made

Telemarketing isn’t a skill that can be learned. If a salesperson isn’t hard-wired to cold call, all the training, incentives and threats in the world won’t change them.

And your prospective customers can spot a scared caller a mile off.

A salesperson who is not suited to cold calling will fumble a script, and become tongue-tied when not using one. And they sound like unwilling hostages to an offshore call centre. Despite all of their innate drive and face-to-face charm and charisma they won’t effectively engage, extract, entice, educate, empathise and convert on a telemarketing call. Ever.

I’ll do it tomorrow

Telemarketing is a task that’s all too easy to put off. Preference is given to writing proposals, catching up on expense claims, filtering lists looking for targets they may know in person (to reduce the anxiety of talking to a stranger), increasing numbers of coffee and toilet breaks, and shifting the ‘new customer prospecting’ days to later in the week. Or the week after that.

Here’s a typical scenario: “We have a sizeable organisation with an experienced team of sales consultants, who are excellent at scoping work and closing sales. However, procrastination runs rife when it comes to picking up the phones to make cold calls and finding qualified leads. Because of this, we have an inconsistent pipeline of opportunities, which makes it difficult to accurately measure sales forecasts.”

This is a common problem. But it doesn’t matter what your salesperson’s excuse is; the issue is real and impacts on the business’ bottom line.

The outsource solution

So, what’s a realistic and cost-effective approach to dealing with it?

Savvy business owners or managers will support their sales teams by eliminating or reducing cold calling functions. They will focus on keeping their salespeople directly in front of qualified leads, where they shine and demonstrate their true value to your business.

Outsourcing is an excellent way to create leads from cold calls (or can also be highly effective when combined with a sophisticated multi-channel strategy), and to bridge the gap between cold calls and warm leads. And it delivers a measurable return on investment when you choose the right partner and deploy the right strategies.

Lisa@hotleads.co.nz

Why talk to us?

We’re not inexperienced minimum-wages telemarketers from overseas. We’re New Zealanders with backgrounds in sales and management. Our experience enables us to talk to people within an organisation at any level. And we rarely use scripts; instead, we engage in intelligent conversation to deliver your message, extract information and achieve your objectives. We’re born telemarketing professionals.

October 3, 2017/by

Dust off your data, now!

Existing lists

Purchased lists

Quick tip

A quick fix

It’s all about timing

Cost – an internal resource vs. outsourced resource $ checklist

Let’s talk about value

In a nutshell

Why is keeping your database current so important?

Check out your own database

The usual suspects

Who you gonna call?

It’s not about numbers

Double your leads

Consultation, not churn

The more, the better

Calling by numbers

Better, not more

Are you getting hung up on call numbers?

The danger of giving your sales pipeline a holiday!

But enough about the sales pipeline slackers. This is what you need to know!

Get off to a cracking 2018

Born, not made

I’ll do it tomorrow

The outsource solution

Why talk to us?

Socials

Go To

Let’s talk

Get in touch. Let’s talk about helping you generate more leads.