Acquiring new customers is often quite expensive for many companies. Because despite good and visible marketing, prospective customers are often difficult to convince to make a purchase. Automated lead nurturing, i.e. the leading of a lead to a Marketing Qualified Lead, promises more efficiency here. This is how effective customer acquisition and the effective Customer loyalty. We will show you what is particularly important in these processes.
From Lead to Marketing Qualified Lead - a rocky road
Generating a lead, i.e. the Interest of a possible customer in a company's products or services is easy. This can be done via advertisements, interactions on social networks, flyers, or television and radio commercials. But a lead is far from a successful sale. And no matter how good the measures within a company are, by no means will all leads be convinced to make a purchase.
The art is to lure and entice the simple lead until it becomes a marketing qualified lead.
This path can neither be shortened nor avoided. Because the customer's interest alone is rarely sufficient to justify a purchase.
Marketing automation: Why automated lead nurturing is so effective
The number of leads generated by marketing are all impossible to manage manually and personally. As described above, it's not worth it either. A automated lead-nurturing is a good solution for qualifying as many leads as possible with low personnel and time expenditure. The programs required for this offer an astonishingly wide range of functions and can be used especially in the area of Online marketing and Lead Nurturing automate many repetitive processes and thus accelerate them significantly.
Among other things, leads benefit from the faster response times of the companies. As a company, you benefit from the fact that automated lead nurturing based on Big Data Processes information quickly and takes appropriate action. Of course, this does not generate a Marketing Qualified Lead from every lead. However, the number of sales increases in most cases and the conversion rates improve.
The more customized the automated lead nurturing is through the data obtained, the greater the number of customers reached.
Automation along the customer journey - data as the basis for success
Automated lead nurturing is oriented towards the Customer Journey. In the process, the lead, from the first point of contact with the company, is always followed up and provided with the appropriate information and contact materials.
A simple example: The customer found his way to the provider's site via an ad in social media and looked around with interest. Since the product sounds interesting, he has signed up for the newsletter. Now the marketing automation has a first set of information at its disposal. The source through which the lead came to the page shows his interactions on the page and his willingness to learn more. Automated lead nurturing must therefore now ensure that this interest is not only maintained, but increases to the point wherethat a marketing qualified lead is generated from the simple lead. And this can only be achieved through further information.
These can be obtained from the lead's reactions, among other things. A first Marketing Mail may contain, among other things, various links. Based on the decisions and reactions of the customer, the customer can identified in more detail and assigned to specific target groups or Customer Persona assigned to are created. In this way, a finer and finer differentiation is gradually achieved, resulting in a marketing qualified lead.
The more interaction with the lead, the more likely a company is to generate a Marketing Qualified Lead
Automated lead nurturing offers the major advantage that for the customer many individual contacts generated with the company. In doing so, the Marketing Automation the different steps of the customer along the customer journey and supplies this at every point of contact with the appropriate content. From simple tips to detailed information, from discreet advertising to targeted and personalized marketing. In this way, a marketing qualified lead is gradually created, who can be directly transferred to the sales department or who makes a purchase in the store on his own initiative.
Automated lead nurturing also optimally ensures that the Marketing Qualified Lead feels personally cared for throughout the process and does not notice at all that the interactions on the part of the company are based on an automated system.
Well-tuned automated lead nurturing feels natural and effectively helps turn a lead into a marketing qualified lead
Conclusion: The better automated lead nurturing is used, the higher the share of qualified leads and sales
Today, companies have significantly more options not only to collect their customers' data, but also to use it to to stand up for themselves. But this can hardly be done manually, even with a good marketing team. This is because leads alone do not ensure the desired sales success; they first have to become familiar with the company and its services.
In order to turn a lead into a Marketing Qualified Lead, which can be handed over to Sales, the Marketing automation the key of choice. Automated lead nurturing not only ensures better processes but also increases the Number of qualified leads sustainable. For this, marketing automation must first be thoroughly adjusted, but the advantages for companies are then clear.
