Latest from the Intellegentia Blog

Lead Nurturing is a fundamental must-have for successful inbound marketing. Statistics show that only 56% of B2B organizations verify valid business leads before they are passed to Sales. (MarketingSherpa)

In the sales and marketing world, there are few issues that get more attention than at what point a lead becomes 'sales ready' and therefore be passed on to sales and when a lead should stay with marketing and be nurtured.

Gleanster Research estimates that 50% of leads who are qualified to buy are not ready to purchase immediately. If you call these leads up to try and hurry them along the buying process you will most likely lose them.  So what to do with those that are not ready to purchase immediately?  

Lead nurturing is all about understanding the nuances of your leads’ needs and providing them with relevant content at the right time. Getting these details right and being more scientific with your lead nurturing will help you to align your sales and marketing teams, make your sales teams happier as they receive better quality leads and improve ROI from your marketing efforts.

Take a look at some common lead nurturing mistakes to avoid:

There is no denying that social media plays a critical part in the marketing mix but are you using it for lead generation?

Many marketers do struggle with measuring ROI on social and some businesses still view social media simply as a tool for customer engagement and brand promotion, but it really is much more than that.

Social media can easily be leveraged by B2B marketers for a steady source of leads.  Here are some essential tips to get you started with lead generation for social media:

You can spend a considerable amount of time thinking about lead generation with a strong emphasis on the generation part – and many companies do. Unfortunately with such a focus on generating leads, when are you going to spend the time actually thinking about converting those leads into sales?

The cold, bottom line is sales form the success of a business so generating leads for the sake of generating leads doesn’t create revenue. You need to shift your focus to how you can make the most of your leads and, in turn, maximise the opportunity and conversion to a sale.

How well do you know your customers? What are their greatest business challenges? What drives them? What challenges do they face on a daily basis?

If you do not know the answers to these questions, it is time you did some research.

The buyer personas you use as the foundation of your marketing efforts – i.e. the fictionalised representations of your ideal customers – should answer all of these questions, and you should know your customer inside out before they have even initiated contact with you.