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A sip of Lead Generation

A sip of Lead Generation

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(Before the big gulp of Appointment Setting)

Would you quickly drink a cup of freshly brewed coffee without sipping on it first?

What if I ask you, is your brand ready for sales and marketing launch? If your answer is not a sure YES, then let’s discuss about Lead Generation for now and parking lot on Appointment Setting.

Lead Generation is basically the generation of a prospect’s interest into a product or service of a business. Common purposes for running a lead generation campaign maybe for list building, contact acquisition or sales leads. Below are some tips that will help you determine the readiness of your product or service for market consumers before you push for client meetings:

Gauge Interest Level

You know who your target consumers are but would you know how many of them would be interested in your product or service? How many of them are on the buying stage or maybe just evaluating? How much would they spend for the purchase or do they have the budget? How soon would they switch or upgrade?

But why do we have to comply with such pre-requisite action? Can’t we just go ahead and directly sell or offer to consumers? Such question makes sense, as the main objective of each business is to do so.

Collect the Data

Who are your target consumers? What product or system are they currently using or engaged with? Where or which target location would you prioritize to cater to? When are your prospects planning to buy – today, next quarter or 6 months from now? These question sets maybe are a few basic start points when getting information from your target consumers whom you would consider as possible buyers.  

You should acquire accurate statistical data as this should be a strong point of your comparison with the competitors’ brands. Get a full knowledge of their market scope, solution edge, and sales strategies as these are essential factors to consider before you do an official market launch.  

Roll out a survey

Survey is asking people, one or maybe series of questions in order to gather information. You may use tools and procedures via different media like telemarketing (profiling), the web (social media) or face to face interview in conducting a survey. The conclusion of the survey process will determine the readiness of your product or service to go live in the market or take further profiling activities.

Regardless which industry you are engaged with, the competence and readiness of your brand will impact the business’ marketing and advertising effectiveness, sales cycle, and cash investment returns. This means that your brand’s features and benefits should cater the needs of your target consumers to guarantee customer satisfaction. What they see and hear about your business offering must translate into a worthwhile experience. Media advertising may stir your prospect’s interest, but the proven experience that is testified by your consumers through word of mouth would be the most effective promotional medium.

B2B Appointment Setting Done Right in Singapore

B2B Appointment Setting Done Right in Singapore

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In Singapore, it is crucial for B2B companies to enhance their appointment setting efforts on top of improving their lead generation campaign. Consider the fact that most decision-makers in the island nation have sophisticated preferences as to the type of solutions they want to purchase.

When done right, appointment setters are able to hit their prospects and position them for a meeting with sales reps.

Here are some pointers to consider when speaking to a decision-maker, courtesy of QualityContactSolutions.com:

The Right B2B Appointment Setting Target List

B2B appointment setting is a tenuous balance between a numbers game and creating a work of art. A successful appointment setting program begins with developing the criteria for what types of businesses you want to target, what size of businesses you want to target and what level of decision-maker you want to target. A wrong list selection can doom the program from the start. An on-target list selection gives your program a running head start.

A Compelling Offer

Why would a business owner or manager want to accept the offer of an appointment? It’s the classic question of, “What’s in it for me?” WIIFM. Spend some time developing talking points that clearly answer this question and you’ll be on the right track. Again, the art of creating the program is in the answer to this question. It may also be beneficial to offer an incentive in exchange for the appointment. Try to make the incentive relevant to your business if possible (discount offer, free trial, etc.)

Professional and Memorable

Every good B2B sales representative knows how to engage the gatekeeper and their prospect in a professional and memorable phone conversation. It is important to make a positive impression and engage the prospect in such a way that they remember you and subsequently honor the set appointment when the time comes.

Keep Appointment Setting Records and Adjust

It is important to track every appointment and to document the results of each appointment. Feed these results back to the appointment setting team; enabling them to make adjustments to their approach. One of the primary goals is to minimize no-shows (Yes, there will be no-shows!) and increase back end sales rates.

Persistence

Most businesses do not have unlimited prospects within their target market. Once you’ve identified your top prospects, engage in a perpetual B2B appointment setting and lead nurturing program. By perpetual, we recommend calling your prospects and sending a postcard or other direct mail piece every 2-3 months. A “no” today could be a “yes” in a couple of months when their situation changes. Studies show that it takes an average of seven impressions with a prospect before they start to actively recognize who you are. The more competitive the market, the higher the number.

5 Key Steps towards Engaging Sales Appointments for Singaporean Companies

5 Key Steps Towards Engaging Sales Appointments for Singaporean Companies

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 Singapore indeed deserves to be called for what it is – a loud and proud commercial lion, its eyes set on expanding the growth of its financial and IT sectors this 2015. This is a good thing since the influx of investments brings with it huge opportunities to realize growth for your company.

B2B appointment setting in Singapore is no doubt a serious endeavor, one that requires you to know the best approaches in engaging B2B prospects through a telemarketing call.

To better prepare for sales engagements in Singapore, try these tips for a constantly productive appointment setting campaign.

1. Profile your leads. There are probably thousands of business prospects up for grabs out there in the Lion City. Finding the right people that can easily convert to a sale is a matter of creating an ideal client profile. You will need to strip each prospect down to their basic elements, namely their needs and wants. Focusing on these attributes enables you to focus your resources on individuals with high sales possibilities.

2. Nurture them like a baby. You have a prospect that fits your client profile, but a willingness to buy your product is at this point nonexistent. They need to be nourished with information before they can build enough interest to consider a purchase. Consider an email blast complemented by scheduled telemarketing calls to create the needed stir.

3. Score your interactions. Lead scoring is as compulsory to B2B marketing as tomato sauce is to pizza. Without it, you get a bland, unappetizing dish you can never enjoy. Just imagine handing your salespeople with leads that won’t even convert. If you opt to save time and resources, then implement a scoring system that directs you towards prospects of high opportunity.

4. Set the appointment. Once the prospect is hot enough, you should be able to let your appointment setters do their thing, which is schedule a sales meeting with an agent. With a date set, it is just a matter of talking about the fine points about your offers. Doing it right pulls the prospect closer towards a purchase and seals what could be a lasting business partnership.

5. Make competency central. Make no mistake. Lead generation and appointment setting are two complex universes that should be mastered. In this sense, you might want to gain an extra boost from a multi-channel B2B marketing company that knows how succulent Singapore leads can be.

Why Opting for B2B Outsourcing Matters

Why Opting for B2B Outsourcing Matters

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As managers, your main aim is to provide solutions and generate enough revenue to grow your organization. You will need to create unique products as a prerequisite to this. More important than that, however, is an effective strategy for marketing such products.

Businesses possess a lead generation and appointment setting program as these provide your sales teams with the right people to pursue and realize these goals. But aside from that, you might also need to ask yourself this: “Does my marketing campaign have the right stuff?”

Going back to the prime motivators of a successful business, successful revenue generation and business growth can be realized through several factors, one of which is having an optimized marketing infrastructure. And too often, one is compelled to try out outsourcing, what with all this talk about its being “effective” and “cost-efficient.”

You might be even wondering about why you should trust your lead generation activities to an independent enterprise. No doubt, it entails a lot of risks. Then again, recent studies suggest that a majority of B2B companies enjoy considerable benefits from outsourcing specific business functions.

For even more compelling reasons:

Outsourcing frees you from stress. Indeed, any marketer can tell you that generating leads and qualifying these for sales is a difficult task. Competent lead tracking and analytics skills are essential, but imagine the stress it will incur managing a large amount of decision makers! You will need all the help you can get in scoring individual leads and observing their online activities.

Outsourcing provides quality-services. Once you pen a contract with an outsourcing firm, you gain access to its arsenal of competencies. From infrastructure to trained and experienced staff, a well-respected firm within the B2B industry will make sure to maximize your efforts generating qualified sales leads and improve your close volumes.

Outsourcing is reliable. Yes, having someone to handle your lead management activities for you can feel like playing Russian roulette. But in recent years, independent B2B marketing firms have updated their technical capabilities. They now produce accurate and timely reports about the campaigns they handle, determining whether current strategies are producing as expected.

Outsourcing gives you more time for more important things. The beauty of outsourcing lies in the fact that it saves you extra time and money to focus on more important administrative work. If you are opting for balance, then outsourcing is the key.

Appointment Setting Pointers to Live By

Appointment Setting Pointers to Live By

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Every business strives for success. You wouldn’t be engaged in setting up a business in the first place if there’s nothing worth striving for, like sales conversions or opportunities for internal growth.

Real successes however can only be attained once you have the capital to get you through. You will need to invest in new infrastructure, upgrade core lead management facilities, and train staff on key marketing and sales skills.

Moreover, finding the appropriate marketing solutions to realize sales goals might seem intricate. Actually, it only involves setting up an effective B2B appointment setting campaign.

There is no denying that B2B appointments serve as customer entry points. The fact that they play an essential role in enhancing one’s influence over customer decisions drives marketers to find better appointment setting schemes.

It shouldn’t pose any difficulty at all. Though, it requires a thorough mastery of the following appointment setting activities.

Make sure your pipeline only gets high quality B2B leads. Most appointment setters find themselves in a difficult position to gain confirmations. This is partly due to the poor sales leads that enter one’s sales funnel. Hence, it is crucial that your lead nurturing activities be persistent in building and maintaining interest towards your offers.

Optimize your content. Content is a powerful tool that lets you manipulate buyer interests. However, the use of content can serve as a double edged knife. Proper content management, targeting and execution is crucial. Aside from that, optimizing your content to suit target profiles is essential in attracting the right kind of people to your lead management database.

Don’t be too hasty. Setting B2B appointments can be a subject of pure enthusiasm among eager marketers. The reality however is that the sales process requires a very long time before a target wants to buy your product. It will take a good three months before a prospect wishes to set an appointment, so be patient. Don’t try to force your way in. Instead, wait for the perfect time to harvest a confirmation.

Build your campaign on relationships. What are your marketing priorities? If you say increased sales volume, then consider revamping your strategies. There’s nothing wrong with anticipating sales goals, but it would be better to prioritize building solid relationships with prospects. This requires a certain amount of proficiency from your telemarketers. Luckily, one can always depend on an independent B2B outsourcing firm to do the nurturing and ultimately realize sales goals.

Put On The Heat In Your Appointment Setting Campaigns

Put On The Heat In Your Appointment Setting Campaigns

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When it comes to managing a business, organizing a marketing campaign will always be a constant in your plans. The question here is whether you are up to the task. Planning, organizing, and executing an appointment setting campaign should be a part of your daily activities. But there is the question of capacity in your part. How will you get your marketing team to up their game play in increasing the sales leads they are looking for? Considering how difficult it was to generate new B2B leads in the market these days, you really need to know where to start. And here are some suggestions for you:

  1. Ask only what is necessary – think of this as your first date, where your business prospects are not yet willing to share with you their darkest secrets. To put them at ease, as well as get you started, you need to ask them only what your marketing team truly needs. You can follow-up the details once you are on your way in lead nurturing.
  2. Follow-up quickly – the first sixty minutes of a business call is crucial to your lead generation team. Whether this is from a customer inquiry, complaint, or an actual customer, the chances of you staying in their good graces gets exponentially smaller once the one hour mark is past. You can arrange for a telemarketing representative to call them back immediately and see what can be done for them.
  3. Concentrate on them, seriously – for a successful sale, it is not about you or your products being offered. Rather, you should be focused on your customer’s needs and see to it that whatever you are offering will actually work for them. There are just too many cases of marketers pushing their wares to prospects that, simply put, have absolutely no need for them.
  4. No need to rush the sale – here is the thing, when you receive an initial sales call, try not to go straight at head with the sale. You need to first establish a connection with them. As a marketer, it is your responsibility to perk the interest of prospects and keep your company at the top of their minds. Remember, most of the sales you make come after the third or fourth call to prospects.
  5. Nurture, nurture, nurture – this is a task that many marketers seem loathe to do, but is exactly what you need. Most business prospects are not interested in your offers yet. Maybe in the future, yes. That is why you need to put some effort in your marketing, by keeping your business at the top of their minds. Send them emails, newsletters, forum invitations, or even a simple ‘touching base’ call. These can be very effective marketing tactics to use.

It can be really interesting to note just where your business can go with the right marketing tactic. You see, in a successful appointment setting campaign, you need to use several marketing mediums. Getting the right fit and support can be a big boost for you.

Coaching Tips For Your Appointment Setting Campaigns

Coaching Tips For Your Appointment Setting Campaigns

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You must admit, appointment setting campaigns can be a real challenge for the untrained. That is why we need to have the managers and trainers for it. This is where you, as the manager, enter the picture. Training and coaching is part and parcel of business, one that you will constantly have to face. When you consider the different ways of improving your sales leads, you have to make sure that your people know what should be done, especially if they are involved in telemarketing. And while it is true that there are several ways to coach your team, you have to remember some of the basics in leading them. And what are these?

How to Manage Your Appointment Setting Team Like Baseball

First of all, you should know how to listen. While you may know something about improving their performance, you should also be aware that the techniques or strategies to be used may not match the skills or line of thinking of your employees. This is especially true if you are adopting Western business tactics to Eastern business environments. That is why you should make it a point to hear out your people. Tell them what you need, using the tools you require, and then listen to their opinions after employing it.

Second, learn how to guide your B2B lead generation team. Do not take over their work. You can tell them to contact someone, buy something, or listen to a lecture. But never should you do that task for them. They need to learn, and in a business environment, the fastest way for them to do that is by doing it by themselves. Sure, they may hit some rough patches along the way, but as long as you are there to show them the ropes, they will be able to swing it on their own. This would be an advantage for you as well, since you can show them the value of taking personal responsibility for their actions.

Lastly, always focus on the action. You see, it is so easy to teach them new tricks. The real test on whether your message got across them is by putting their lessons in action. Every time you and your marketing team talk about new ways in generating B2B leads, make it a point to do these methods immediately. It might fail, that is true, but it can also be an opportunity for you and your people to improve. The thing here is that you should always be ready for it. Being constantly on your toes can help you, and your team, perform better in the long run.

All right, say that you want to teach a new product sales strategy that can help in your appointment setting campaigns, but you do not have the time for it. Indeed, you may not have complete information about it. In cases like these, it is best for you to seek the help of professional marketers who can push your business further. Outsourcing is not a bad idea. You just have to make sure that you are working with the best people for the job.

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The Three People You Need In Sales Leads Marketing

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As a business owner, you certainly want to make a presence in all aspects of your operations. You have the energy and the determination to make your marketing and lead generation processes succeed. Still, there will come the time that you lose steam, feel sluggish, or simply run out of ideas to propel your firm forward. When this happens, it can pose a serious stumbling block in the continued success of your company in generating qualified sales leads. But it does not have to be a serious handicap. If you have done your homework right, then you would know that your business will need at least three people to keep things going even when you are no longer around. And these are:

#1 The Visionary

This is a person who can visualize the direction of the company 5-10 years from now. Well, they may not be able to foresee what to do the next day, but you do need someone with long-term plans.

#2 The Strategist

A visionary sees where your business can go, but it takes a strategist to plan that path out. This is also the person responsible for communicating the vision to those below the business ladder.

#3 The Tactician

Basically, this person stands in the frontlines, putting the strategist’s plans into effect. If the plan does not pan out right, then it is the tactician’s job to make the necessary deviations to reach the desired goal. They can use various marketing tools like social media or even telemarketing, ensuring the success of their campaign.

The success of your business and its appointment setting processes depends largely on these three people. If make the right hires, then generating B2B leads will not be that hard anymore. Of course, it helps if you can alternate between yourself and them, just to make sure everything is on the right track.

A Graphic illustration of a man on a telephone call while using computer

Improve Your Appointment Setting Call Handling

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In any appointment setting campaign, calling B2B leads prospects on the phone is a normal activity. After all, identifying business leads and nurturing them for future conversion is not something you can do simply online. Either you talk directly to your prospects or, if not possible, use direct communication tools for it, like telemarketing, as an example. But since we are talking about calling prospects, we need to be good in handling it. So, how will you go about it, then?

First, you should plan your campaign carefully. All lead generation campaigns that fail lack the proper planning in their processes. If you want to be effective in attracting the attention of prospects, you need to prioritize learning what makes them tick. And that requires lots of planning.

Second, build rapport. Banter with them, if you know them already. If not, show them the necessary courtesy and go straight to the point.

Third, inform them of your call. Either by email or another business call, you need to tell them beforehand why you are calling in the first place.

Fourth, ask good questions. You need to know what exactly your prospects are looking for in the first place. Asking them good questions will give you clues about what you can actually offer them.

Lastly, do not waste their time. Time is precious, and you as a marketer should understand that. It is the same thing with your prospects. As a rule, the less time you need to spend in order to tell them your purpose, the better.

These are just some tips that you can follow in order to be more effective in handling calls for sales leads. Will there be anything else you can add?

How to Manage Your Appointment Setting Team Like Baseball

How to Manage Your Appointment Setting Team Like Baseball

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If there is one thing that can be said about baseball, it has a lot of connection with managing a business. Sure, swinging a bat or catching a ball is all sport to you, but the underlying principles can be transferred into business. Among the lessons that you can glean from it deals with managing your marketing team, like in your appointment setting campaign.

Just like baseball, you need to know a few important things before you start generating useful sales leads for your business. Among these are:

Looking at the numbers, but relying on instincts – just like the time when Girardi replaced all. Star baseman Rodriguez in the 9th winning with Ibanez in order to hit a homerun (due to gut feeling), businesses owners should also use the numbers to get a clear picture of their market. But when the time requires it, you should also learn to trust your instincts.

Make the choice and stand by them – making that sacrifice play, or a trade from another team, can be painful, but the only way you can tell whether you made the right choice or not is at the end of the game. Do not falter in your business decisions and see it through the end. That lead generation gamble might pay off.

Keep calm and keep going – just like a baseball game, there is no fool-proof plan. One thing or another can affect your B2B leads operation, and it is your job to stay calm and plan your next step.

It also helps if you can choose the appropriate marketing medium for the job. Be it social media or telemarketing, you have to ensure that this is a match for your business.

Five Tips in Effective Appointment Setting

Five Tips in Effective Appointment Setting

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Setting up an appointment may sound easy but once you get to be the person on the phone, talking to the customers might not sound like what you expected. However, there are tips to effectively set an appointment.

A Call Always Work Out With a Plan

Most call centers follow a call flow, in order to take control of the call. A call flow is mainly a checklist of all the necessary and relevant information that must be shared to the customers. And most importantly the list should include the order of how the conversation should flow that way the call is organized and not stray too much off of the topic.

Smile through your Voice

When talking to a person face-to-face, if you want them to listen to you, you smile. You want to sound and look friendly. Over the phone, you can’t see the customers; however smiling will still make you sound friendly. It is easier to communicate if the line is clear and effortless. Make them feel comfortable with the conversation. If you sound nice it is easy to convince people.

Impress the Customer

Every sales call is like a meal, there has to be a sumptuous and tempting main course. In a sales call you have to have an offer that a customer can’t say no to. The tricky part is how to build up the offer while mostly the first part of the call would include resistant from the customer. Engage them first with the benefits and then impress them with the offer. The offer mainly will be the reason why you are making a call to set up the appointment.

Engage on a Conversation

When on a call, you don’t always talk, you also listen. Sounding pleasant and interested in what the customer has to say always helps a conversation to flow spontaneously. However, remember to keep the conversation on topic as much as possible without sounding uninterested. Don’t forget to explain the reason of calling, in a clear manner. The duration of the appointment is a necessary mention since most people value their time. The technique in leading a good conversation is to ask open ended questions, paraphrase their answers and affirm it to them so they’ll pick up the habit of saying yes.

Don’t Be Discouraged by a No

Giving up is a phrase that must not exist in appointment setting. Every call must be separated from each other; after all it was a different person at the receiving end. If a prospect says no, always evaluate what part of the call did not go well and work on it and use it if a similar situation happens again. Be positive and get positive results after.

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A Lesson From Warren Buffett For Telemarketing In Singapore

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Lead generation is serious business in Singapore. After all, how are you supposed to continue selling if you do not have any customers, right? For this to be successful, you need to hire the right people for the job of generating B2B leads. While there are a lot of qualities that you need to look for, perhaps the words of billionaire Warren Buffett can help you:

“Somebody once said that in looking for people to hire, you look for three qualities: integrity, intelligence, and energy. And if they don’t have the first, the other two will kill you.” – Warren Buffet

Yes, integrity means a lot. This is the a mental and moral compass that ensures quality product and services. without it, all your efforts will not be worth it. You may have the intelligence, but if you cannot prove to your business prospects that you are reliable, then you are nowhere near generating sales leads. You may have energy, but if all you do is something apart from appointment setting, then you succeed in nothing at all. You have to build the trust of your business prospects.

Buffett understood the value of integrity. As an investments expert, he knows the abject fear of people that they will lose their money in businesses they invest in. By showing them integrity, he earned their trust, kept their money safe (not to mention growing it), and made his company the powerhouse investment firm it is today. This can be done in your telemarketing campaign in Singapore as well.