What is the best way to reach your audience and create a relationship with them?

 

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Rather than providing their salespersons with leads, they have their own telemarketing department call each prospect, requalify them, and schedule appointments. Large national phone services such as National Marketshare can do this on a national basis, keeping track of sales performance, days off, routes and schedules. Typically sales representatives are given three or four such appointments; when there are more leads than sales representatives in a given area, more salespeople are recruited as quickly as possible. Where the reverse occurs, leads are given only to those with the best conversion records.

Such reports should be cross-tabulated by type of product, type of prospect, salesperson, or dealer, and by the initial promotion codes: mailing lists, media, etc. These reports are not historical curiosities.

 

They are blueprints for action, and it is essential that management respond by changing advertisements, schedules, products, or salespeople as necessary. The quality of leads can be fine-tuned like a stereo set. As the volume of leads goes up, the quality goes down, and vice versa. The slightest change in the advertisement or mailing piece can produce significant changes in lead quality, and so can changes in the type of publication, station, or mailing list used. It is very useful to know how to harden leads or soften them as required.

 

 

Require a stamp. Don't use a business reply card or envelope. Let the prospects buy the stamps—maybe even supply their own envelopes. Narrow the offer. Make it very relevant to the product or service you are selling. If more leads are needed, here's how you can loosen up the lead quality and permit more leads to come in from the same promotion expenditures: Tell less. Leave something to curiosity.

 

Computerize the response coupon. Fill in the names and addresses of the prospects. Give them less to do. Add convenience. Supply the stamp, the envelope, and maybe even a pencil. Give more. Add a gift or premium—maybe one that is valuable independently of the product offered. Charge less. Make it free, free, free. Ask less. The fewer questions, the better. Add a prize. A sweepstakes is the ultimate quality-softener. Don't forget that the medium also will have a material effect on lead quality.

 

The low-cost-per-lead publication or list may be composed of teenagers or others who send for everything. Study the source data and change mailing and media schedules to improve quality. Fine-tuning the media is just as important as fine-tuning the coupon copy. Mention price. Indicate what the product will cost. Mention sales call. Say someone will call. Tell more. Reveal more information about the product, including any potential negatives.

 

Ask for more information. Get the telephone number and the best hours to call. Find out how many employees the company has. Charge something. Even a token amount for a booklet or sample will smoke out the real deadbeats. Usually we are operating between the two extremes and adjusting the lead flow and quality to meet immediate needs in the marketplace and to satisfy the concerns of the sales organization.

 

One sure way to boost the number of responses is a contest or sweep-stakes. A prize of as little as $10,000 has been known to lift response.

 

Response Makers - Marketing Direct to Consumers