The secret of the lead champions
Does your company have enough leads? Can the sellers cherry-pick their desired orders or do they have to take everything that comes along? Lead generation has changed fundamentally in recent years, also with the advent of social media. Demand for new products was generated via trade fairs, adverts, telephone calls or on-site visits. It was already quite modern for email addresses to be collected and for a prospective customer to receive newsletters.
Now we have the internet and potential customers have many opportunities to first find out about potential suppliers and only once a pre-selection has been made do they contact the suppliers of their choice.
An average of 8-10 touchpoints are necessary for a purchase decision
In new German, we speak of touchpoints here. They play an important role in the lead and sales process and are part of the customer journey. Customer journey is a term used in marketing and means customer journey (often also purchase journey). The term customer journey describes the various phases and activities that a potential customer goes through before (and, depending on the model, also after) making a purchase.
Targeted marketing activities are used to provide prospective customers with relevant information. They are often already familiar with your company, but are not yet ready to make a purchase decision. They are still in the middle of the information phase of the customer journey. In times of digital information overload, it is therefore particularly important to be present with interesting content in a targeted manner and at the right time. In this phase, eyes and ears are kept open. It is now easier than ever for information on interesting topics to penetrate the otherwise strong information filter. You can capitalise on this and thus significantly reduce the otherwise relatively high cost of customer acquisition.
Automated playout of the individual elements of a customer journey
In professional marketing software, all steps of the lead generation process are managed efficiently and purposefully. Firstly, all content is only prepared once, which saves time and resources. Landing pages with high-quality content such as white papers are stored in the software to attract and inform interested parties. But the process goes further: follow-up emails are automatically sent out at predetermined times to maintain interest. Every step taken by the prospective customer is meticulously logged and assigned a score. As soon as this predefined score is reached, it is assumed that the prospect has a strong interest in products. This marks the point at which a lead is created for sales and the potential customer enters the sales funnel. The marketing software therefore enables precise control and tracking of the entire lead management process.
Digital lead management increases efficiency by an average of 40% in sales lead qualification
The software now helps to maintain an overview. Thanks to the digital support provided by marketing automation, leads are more transparent than ever before. Marketing teams and sales know at all times which stage of the customer journey the leads are in and also have specific information on which products are generating the most interest. This leads to a complete reduction in information gaps and sales activities can be organised much more efficiently than before and focus on the really interesting leads. Nothing can slip through your fingers and the customer feels like a familiar friend who is understood from the very first sales contact. This promotes an emotional sense of well-being in the customer relationship on both sides and therefore increases loyalty and the number of closed sales opportunities.
The latest developments in digital sales
Artificial intelligence (AI) is playing an increasingly important role in sales today, as it is able to analyse large amounts of data and generate helpful insights. These insights range from identifying promising sales opportunities to optimising sales processes. In today's business world, customers expect customised experiences, and with the right tools, you can deliver just that.
By integrating artificial intelligence, individual behaviour patterns can be derived and integrated into your programme of measures. This opens up completely new potential for addressing leads. Your leads only receive the content that actually interests them. Interested parties receive information about your company and your products at the precise moment when you have the maximum opportunity to take them to the next stage: qualifying the lead for sales .
Products like the Microsoft Co-Pilot use artificial intelligence and data-driven approaches to:
- Repetitive work such as data entry and updating in CRM systems AI automates data entry by analysing emails and notes, extracting relevant information and automatically entering it into CRM systems. This saves sales employees time and minimises errors.
- Create personalised offers and communications that increase the conversion rate of your leads In practice, an e-commerce company, for example, uses AI software to analyse the behaviour of website visitors. For a project service provider, the software analyses project requirements, budgets and customer preferences. Based on this information, it generates customised project proposals and recommendations in real time. For example, if a potential customer searches for software development services, the website can automatically display personalised offers for exactly these services or present similar projects that match the customer's requirements. This personalised approach and the tailored solution proposals increase the likelihood that the customer will accept the offer and thus increase the conversion rate of leads for the project service provider.
- Utilising the potential of predictive analytics. A project service provider can use predictive analytics to identify potential customers. By analysing historical data on successful projects, patterns and trends can be identified. For example, it could show that companies from a certain industry tend to be more successful with a certain project scope. Based on this, the service provider can better target its sales efforts and approach potential customers that better match the success factors of its offering, increasing the chances of successful projects and boosting sales efficiency.
Our conclusion
Modern lead generation relies on automated CRM processes and AI-supported analyses to target potential customers. Intelligent touchpoints along the customer journey allow leads to be qualified efficiently and sales processes to be optimised. AI-based personalisation and predictive analytics increase the conversion rate and sustainably improve customer loyalty.
Thanks to marketing and sales integration, you achieve both an increase in efficiency and greater customer loyalty and retention. You benefit from full information transparency and utilise your resources efficiently and effectively.
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