As sales reps approach their monthly, quarterly, or yearly quota, they can’t afford to waste time on leads who aren’t ready to close. Unfortunately, this means that leads often fall prey to neglect if they’re not sales-ready, and will turn toward your competitors when it’s time to make a purchasing decision.
The end of the quarter or year is when sales and marketing can really shine. By setting up programs to nurture leads over time, marketing can really enable sales reps to focus on the leads that are most likely to turn into a closed deal.
But marketing can’t do it all. Sometimes, sales reps need to rely on handy sales hacks to get their deals to close — sales hacks that can help them bring cold leads back from the dead, speed up their follow-ups, and more.
Let’s follow the stories of two sales reps as they encounter a few common sales scenarios, and see which marketing automation hacks they choose to employ to overcome roadblocks on their way to quota (for a look at our full list of these sales hacks, check out our new e-book, Five Hacks to Dominate Your Quota This Quarter).
Scenario 1. Amy revives an inactive lead.
A few months ago, Amy made contact with a lead that initially seemed promising — but as of late, her lead hasn’t been responding to emails, answering phone calls, or reciprocating any of her attempts to get in touch. Heck, according to the prospect activity history in Amy’s marketing automation tool, he hasn’t even been opening any of her emails! Only a few months into their relationship, and Amy has hit a dead end.
Ever the optimist, Amy wants to keep following up — but the end of the quarter is quickly approaching, and she has to worry about hitting her number. She decides that it’s time to pass this lead back over to marketing. With the click of a button in her CRM, she adds her lead to a lead nurturing campaign titled “Inactive – Needs Nurture.”
As soon as Amy’s lead is added to this list, the lead is enrolled in a targeted nurturing program within their marketing automation tool. This nurturing campaign will attempt to re-engage inactive leads using special, personalized marketing content. Every so often, the lead will receive a marketing message from Amy’s company with a compelling blog post, fun infographic, or other piece of interactive content. As soon as the lead engages with one of these emails, Amy will receive an immediate notification — via her CRM or real-time sales application — so she can reach out and get the selling process back on track.
Lead nurturing emails receive a 4-10x higher response rate than standalone email blasts. (DemandGen Report) Tweet This.
Scenario 2. Monica secures the demo with a quick follow-up.
Monica hasn’t heard from Jared, one of her prospects, in a few months. But she isn’t worried — the “Inactive Lead” nurture track she placed him on is keeping her company top of mind.
As Monica is checking her email one day, a notification pops up in real time to let her know that Jared is looking at her pricing page. She quickly clicks over to her CRM to view his activity history, and notices a few content downloads from recent drip emails also on the list. Since he was just viewing the pricing page, he probably has a free moment to talk. Monica picks up the phone to call him while her product is still on his mind.
She’s in luck! When Jared answers, Monica says that she just wanted to check in to see whether the last piece of content she sent over had been helpful. Since she noticed that he’d been downloading additional content on marketing analytics, she tactfully works that topic into their conversation too. At the end of the conversation, Jared agrees to to have a second call the following week to go over Monica’s product in more detail. Just like that, she’s in.
With just a few simple clicks and a little help from their marketing teams, Monica and Amy are well on their way to smashing their quotas. Real-time notifications and lead nurturing programs from their marketing automation tool make it easy to focus on the right leads without neglecting the ones who aren’t ready to buy, meaning that no lead gets left behind.
If you’d like more sales hacks, check out the full e-book by clicking on the banner below, complete with abbreviated game plans for each sales scenario!
