Your leads are your prospective customers. Your prospective customers are important for you because they are the ones that want your products.
These customers have opted for your products and are a constant source of traffic for your website. But, not all leads are going to convert into sales.
According to a survey by Hubspot, 63% of people inquiring information on your business are not ready to purchase today and may take as long as 24 months to buy.
So, you’ve got your leads but they’re not buying? Statistics by Gleanster Research, suggest that 50% of leads are qualified but not yet ready to buy.
Most of the businesses ask, “Why aren’t our leads actually buying” A market research by MarketingSherpa suggests that, 79% of marketing leads never really convert into professional sales. The main cause behind this can be considered as lack of lead nurturing that leads to such a poor performance.
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The importance of nurturing your leads is clearly demonstrated by the statistics. I am sure that as a business you put a lot of efforts to generate leads from different sources.
Going by the market research conducted by Gleanster Research, 50% of the leads generated by you are qualified, but are not ready to buy right now. Out of these, 25% of the leads that you generate are totally not qualified which means that they won't ever buy.
You might wonder how lead nurturing comes to play into all this. Here’s your answer- Out of these 50 percent of your qualified leads, 80 percent of the customers will buy from someone among your competitors in the coming 24 months.
It is not necessary that the potential customers, who provide you with their email addresses, account for your warm leads. Some of them might just want access to your free content without having an intention to convert.
Furthermore, market Research clearly shows that companies that excel at lead nurturing generate 50% more sales ready leads at a 33% lower cost. So, if you are wondering how to nurture your prospects to get increased conversions, these are 5 special practises that you need to look out:
Image source: business.com
Your content forms the backbone for nurturing your leads. It is what makes you different from your competitors in the market. Make yourself stand out by posting quality content that focus on the pain points of your customer.
One way is to post How-to videos for your product. It can be a great way to gain exposure among your qualified customers who are not ready to buy. And apart from that, every customer is somewhere looking for a how- to video because it makes life easier. (It is easier for me to do things by watching a how-to video).
Analyse the problems that your customers are facing and provide solutions for them. Research demonstrates that problems create a sense of fear and anxiety while solutions help to relieve stress and fear. If you focus at a problem, your customer will also expect your product to solve it for them.
For example, if you are selling a lawn mower, you can add a how to video to show how to decorate your garden.
You need a way to get your leads especially that are not ready to buy, in to your database. Once you have their information you can use it wisely along with your marketing strategies to increase conversions for your business.
One way to accomplish this task is by providing free downloadable content. When a customer is visiting your website, they might not be interested in buying but their interests might lie in viewing your content. You may ask for simple details such as their names, email addresses, mobile number in exchange for the free content that you provide.
For example, if you are a garment seller, you can provide “5 ways to pair a white shirt” as your downloadable content.
Most companies find it hard to get conversions from their prospects, because they want their customers to commit immediately. Consider yourself in a situation; if you are asked for marriage on the very first date, you are bound to say no. It works the same way with your customers.
Build trust with your customers by initiating a conversation with them and asking about their problems. Focus on building a relationship with your customers, if you want them to commit. You can use all your resources like content, blogs etc to give consistently to your customers and establish credibility with them.
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When customers visit your website they might have a query. Though, they might not want to buy at the moment but they would have queries related to you products. Now, if you provide them live solutions it will initiate a spark in the customer ultimately leading to conversions.
This is the reason many websites these days have a live chat option. It can be considered equivalent to a sales call and is a wonderful opportunity to make a great first expression.
Image source: Chat box at Sarv.com
Personalized emails generate up to 6 times higher revenue per email than non-personalized emails. It is easy to understand this through the example of shopping cart abandonments. An abandoned cart is important to lead nurturing.
When you send your prospects personalized emails related to the products they have in their cart, they understand that you are giving them the required attention.
Take good care of these leads, as they might need one little email to go ahead and make the actual purchase.
Image source: Ometria.com
Lead nurturing has proven benefits for e commerce markets. There are always ways to reach out to your qualified leads that are not ready to buy. At the end of the day, it is all about approaching your customers for the micro yeses’ gradually, and then moving to the big Yes. It might take time but will surely help you close more leads.
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