Lead nurturing will assist in progressing raw leads to opportunity status but for many companies this is a function performed by sales and for many this is part of the lead follow-up process.

Getting commitment from sales on lead follow-up is greatly effected by the issue of lead quality, whether the leads are deemed “sales ready” and whether sales people believe they have better chance of closing deals of their own. Generally speaking if you can’t make it as easy as possible and if sales people are hitting their targets without needing new leads then those leads you feed them are more likely to get ignored.

So why go to the effort of generating leads in the first place? Well we all know that to sustain and grow a business you need to bring on new customers to offset the inevitable churn. Sales can’t have everything on a plate and whether they like it or not you will always need to follow-up leads.

Here are some pointers to get sales people caring about the leads you send them:

Don’t waste sales peoples time  - Reduce admin,  data entry, and filter obvious time wasters or bogus leads. It only pi**es sales people off.

Get leads to them whilst they are hot – For every second that goes by, the less chance you have of converting. Get the leads to sales without delay so they can strike why the iron is hot.

Improve lead quality – You should have the information at hand telling you what your best and worst sources of leads are, so make sure you use this information and focus your efforts on the best sources.

Manage workloads – dumping leads all at once often by surprise and then expecting them to get actioned never endears you to any salesperson. Make sure you drip leads constantly so they can manage their workflow. If you inundate them then you know the leads only get ignored.

Knowledge is power – No-one like cold calling and if you are generating the leads then there is no need. Make sure you provide as much information as you can about the lead, their interactions, what triggered the lead and any history of past lead activity. The more sales knows ,the more confident and professional they will be.

Competition – A bit of healthy competition never hurt anyone and helps no end. Sales people are by nature competitive so don’t be afraid to name and shame lead follow-up rates on a regular basis. Be careful not all leads can be contacted first time so take this into account and don’t judge them on leads they have only just received.

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