Duct Tape Marketing

You know how important that first follow-up with a new prospect is.  It's his chance to qualify you and your company, and test your service orientation. It could also be a "dodge;" an avoidance tactic by someone who's uncomfortable with saying "no," which could turn into a huge waste of your time. In this article, we'll take a brief look at ways of determining "engagement" early on in the buying/selling process and how understanding it can help you focus on your best prospects.

A year ago, would you have thought that 'twitter' was an effective marketing strategy?  Or that 'tweeting' in public would not earn you weird looks?  That was before Twitter, Inc. asked the world, “What are you doing?”  Twitter.com, a fusion of social networking and instant messaging, is a rapidly rising social media site that welcomes nearly 2 million visitors each month.

If you're using a free report or trial offer as a lead generator, you obviously want your conversion rate as high as possible. If your landing page is clunky or confusing or just plain ugly, you might be losing out on many valuable prospects. I've recently implemented a few simple changes to a client's landing page that resulted in double the conversions. These changes are all easy to do, so I urge you to try them yourself:

Effective lead generation is more often than not one of the biggest challenges for a business. But the biggest problem is that up to 80% of marketing expenditures on lead generation and collateral go to waste because the sales department doesn’t know what to do with leads once they get them.
Leads are all about follow-up, follow-up, follow-up. Effective lead follow-up and nurturing processes are keys to making your investments count. You must have a nurture program in place, and make sure that all sales people know how to properly implement it. By demonstrating speedy follow-up within a set timeframe, you demonstrate that you are on top of things and that you take your business seriously.
So what do you do with those leads that might not be ready to buy right now?

Research shows that 30 - 45% of leads that were not considered viable opportunities by sales became sales-ready opportunities within 12 months.

You managed to entice your email reader or web surfer to click your link or your ad. In today's cluttered web marketing world, that's quite an accomplishment. But don't start celebrating yet. It's what happens after the click that determines the success of your campaign.