Getting More Leads With “Blue Magic”
How To Get More Leads with “Blue Magic”
I have a confession…. I’m a salesman first and foremost. Love sales, love closing deals. But, I don’t like wasting my time!
I remember when I started out in my first sales job. I got a job working for a mortgage company as an outbound salesperson. The job consisted of calling people that had existing mortgages with our company and then convincing them to refinance into a better mortgage with us at a lower rate. Simple stuff, right? Not so simple. Here’s the thing. As a salesperson you’re swapping hours for dollars. So, if you spend your day calling business leads that weren’t very likely to convert your overall hourly pay rate could be pretty low.
The goal in sales is not more calls. It’s maximizing each minute of the day. You should be spending as much time on the phone “closing” as possible. Everything else you could be doing aside from locking down the deal will drastically reduce your hourly pay rate. I was calling “free” leads for the company and it was profitable for them but it surely was not profitable for me. I was making hundreds of calls to get just one person on the phone.
Ended up trashing my bosses outbound strategy and generating my own referrals. Worked half the time everyone else did and I was able to close the same, if not more business. I was maximizing my time, being hyper efficient, and making money. Referrals are by far the best leads you could get. Solid referrals will convert at 75% +. They are the purest form of “blue magic” out there.
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What’s “blue magic”? Read on….
When I started my own company a few years later I was very aware of what salespeople were dealing with. I was one and only salesperson at my company for the first 5 years. I only called “blue magic”. Had no boss telling me who to call, loved it, and didn’t have to call garbage any more.
The salesperson can make or break your company. They feed the machine. So, don’t feed the salesperson junk. Ever heard the term; Junk-in = Junk-out ? If I’m going to be calling leads, I want to make sure they are high quality leads. Yes, that’s “blue magic”. And yes, Frank Lucas a 60’s gangster from Harlem coined the term. See below…
A lot of companies focus on their cost per lead but I always preferred to produce the highest converting lead possible. By creating super high-converting sales leads you increase the operational efficiency of your sales team and put more money in their pockets while reducing the size of your staff. Your team is lean and mean. Less “Management”, higher paid salespeople and an overall better running, fun environment. It’s what I call good “SALESMAN KARMA”.
How do you get good quality leads?
When it comes to lead generation strategy, there are different ways to generate leads through different marketing efforts:
#1-Referral Program.
You should have a referral program and process that drives in referrals every single day automatically. You should be emailing, texting, mailing and keeping in contact with your existing book of business using every single platform possible. Spare no expense to ask for referrals. Give your clients a discount for referring you. Send them chocolates. Buy them bottles of wine. Do whatever it takes so your clients feel appreciated. As they should be. They are feeding your family. Typical conversion rate of referrals are 75%+.
#2-Google and Microsoft Search Ads.
This isn’t a banner ad, YouTube, or Facebook. It’s getting in front of the most motivated people on earth when they’re shopping for what you’ve got. People that are searching for what you have to offer will always convert at a higher rate. If you’re not running PPC ads in your business you’re losing money right now. If you could spend $1 every single day and someone will give you back $3 and you’re not doing it then you’re losing $2/day. That’s what most small businesses do. It’s insanity. Typical conversion rate of Search Ad leads are 20%+.
#3-Social Media Ads
Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat are some examples. You create a series or target audience of people that are hopefully the most likely to buy what you have to offer. You run ads in the form of a video, survey, picture or something else to engage them and they click, opt-in and then become a lead. Typically the cost of this type of lead will be half of what you pay for the google search lead, but the closing % is lower and sales cycle is longer. When running social ads you can create an absolutely insane volume of leads.
#4-Use videos creatively
Although video might seem more expensive than other types of marketing channels, trust me, it’s often more effective because people consume videos differently than they do text-based content like blog posts or articles where they skim through lots of information quickly and end up forgetting most of it anyway. Videos are more compelling and memorable than text-based content so they tend to get better recall and engagement rates over time, so consider using videos as one of your lead generation strategies to getting targeted leads.
#5-Write Blog Posts
The first way to get more leads is by writing a blog post. This can help you reach your target audience through content marketing. You can write about how your business started or what makes your company different. You can also write blog posts about industry advice or trends in the market.
#6-Inbound Marketing
Inbound marketing is a way to get more leads. It’s a change in thinking that emphasizes the importance of listening to potential customers and meeting their needs instead of talking at them. Inbound marketing incorporates lots of different marketing tactics like SEO, content marketing, social media platforms, PR, etc. Inbound marketing relies on great content that attracts users who are looking for information. Then these users will become website visitors and eventually customers.
To incorporate inbound marketing into your business, you need to understand what your ideal customer wants and then create content that addresses those needs. This content will be valuable for both visitors and potential customers alike. In this sense, inbound marketing works best when you know your target audience well enough to identify what they’re struggling with or craving: is it a new product? An industry expert? An article on how to make money doing X? You can meet their needs by creating helpful content or providing a service or product that solves what the problem is in an engaging way.
Wrap Up
This can overwhelm a sales person and actually drop overall sales production if these leads aren’t treated differently. If you’re running social ads and you’re producing a super high volume of leads I suggest putting them into a dialer system and dedicating someone to make those calls. Let them do just that all day. I call that position “opener”. Remember, you should be on the phone “closing sales” not just dialing for dollars. Closers get paid. So, let’s get our closers “blue magic”. If the social lead isn’t red hot when it comes into your CRM have someone warm it up via a dialer and then transfer that lead to your closer to lock it down. These leads typically convert at 10%+
Results vary ladies and gents. I can only speak from my own experience and the experience of my clients.
If you’re running a business please make your focus to produce as many high quality leads as possible for your team. If you’d like a little help with this shoot me an email at Nikitas@realtop.com. I’ll assist:)
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Nikitas Tsoukales, Blue Magic Aficianado
FAQs
What it means to generate leads?
A lead is a specific type of contact that marketers collect and use to acquire new customers. Leads are individuals who are interested in purchasing something, but have not yet taken action. In other words, generating leads for your business consists in dragging the attention of those individuals that might have the potential to turn into paying customers.
Who should generate leads?
It depends on the industry and the company. In general, however, I would recommend that salespeople generate leads. They must meet with potential customers and foster relationships that ultimately result in business acquisition. Thus, they should be responsible for generating leads.
What are the channels to generate leads?
There are many ways to generate new leads. Some of the most popular channels include social media, paid advertising, and content creation. Social media is a great way to connect with potential customers and gain valuable insight into their needs and interests. Paid advertising is another great way to reach a target audience directly and reach them with your message.
Finally, content creation is an effective way to share useful information with your target audience that they can benefit from. All of these channels are powerful tools that can help you build a strong foundation for your business that will result in success for years to come. There are so many possibilities for how you can generate leads, but the key is to have a clear vision for what you want your business to become and then begin working towards it. With hard work and dedication, anything is possible.