As mentioned in my January Conversion Tip, 2009 was the year social media became the must do thing for businesses and marketers. Sites like Twitter and Facebook became mainstream. Businesses and marketers jumped on board hoping to ride the social media wave into profitable heights.

If done right, social media sites can be a boon for your business. They’re a great way to connect with your target audience and current customers, as well as good way to know what people think about your product or service and how many of them are repeating and spreading your message.

But marketing is more than broadcasting a message to your target audience; it’s about getting them to heed your call to action. You want them to enter your sales pipeline and become customers or for those who already have already purchased your product and service to become repeat customers.

What good are 1,000 or 10,000 or 100,000 Facebook fans or Twitter followers if they aren’t entering your sales pipeline or enticing others to do the same? Like all marketing efforts, social media success is measured by how well they turn prospects into clients or existing customers into repeat business. It’s a nice compliment when someone (re)tweets something of you wrote or posts it on their Facebook page. But it’s even better when that person buys your product or service and then uses social media to tell their friends, family, and businesses colleges how much better you’ve made their lives and they need to have the same thing too.

So what’s the best way to get increased conversions and customers from your social media efforts? I’ll discuss that in my next post. (Hint: It involves using existing online marketing best practices.)

Install and Use Site-Wide, Conversion Centric Analytics

Most companies have analytics that provide lots of information about website visitors. However, making sense of all the data can be a nightmare. To boost your online conversion rate, it’s best to go with a conversion-centric analytics platform that 1) shows your website’s lead generation rate at a glance, 2) provides you with individual per-visitor, lead reports, and 3) generates macro behavior reports on visitor and website trends so you can recognize patters and make adjustments to your marketing efforts and website.

It’s also important that the analytics package lets you define what a conversion is.  Does the visitor buy your product? Enter your sales pipeline? Sign up for a free trial? Since the definition of a website conversion will differ from business to business, it’s important that your analytics tool is flexible enough that you can define the call to action as you see fit.

Companies spend thousands of dollars on pay per click (PPC) advertising, SEO, PR, and other marketing initiatives attracting visitors to their website without seeing a significant increase in sales or leads. Filling your sales pipeline with high quality leads doesn’t have to be expensive. Most companies can see an immediate increase in high quality leads by implementing 5 proven online conversion practices into their website. Not only will these tips maximize the quantity and quality of leads in your sales pipeline, they’ll also help your organization where it matters most: the bottom line.

To learn more about these conversion practices, download our free lead generation guide here.

Marketing and sales professionals are realizing that PPC ads, SEO, and other methods of online advertising and promotion are worthless unless you’re able to calculate the ROI from your investment. Though it’s easy to track how many visitors came to your site from different marketing campaigns, it’s difficult to know whether or not these visitors enter your sales pipeline and what factors contributed to their conversion.

On January 26 Sapha is launching a conversion-centric analytics platform. One of its many features is a dashboard where you can see at a glance not only how Sapha tools are converting, but also the conversion rate of your entire website. By understanding your site’s conversion metrics, you can make better decisions regarding marketing efforts and see how website updates affect conversion rates – allowing you to get the most bang for your marketing and website dollars.

More than just a conversion overview, our conversion-centric analytics provides granular reporting so you can learn from the behavior of each visitor that comes to your site. What path did they take before becoming a lead? What information and documents have they gathered from your site? How did they interact with your HookTour? The answers to these questions will soon be available!

If you think it sounds cool, just wait until you see it reporting data from your website.

In 13 days, you can.

If you’re not seeing the quality or quantity of leads from your marketing efforts, you might want to reconsider how you’re generating them.

According to Forrester Research, the following are the top 10 methods of lead generation.

1. Email
2. PR
3. Tradeshows
4. Direct mail
5. Print ads
6. Search marketing (SEO, PPC, etc.)
7. Sponsorships
8. Executive seminars
9. Inside sales
10. Webinars

But are these methods the most effective ways to generate high quality leads?

Nope.

The top 10 effective methods of lead generation are as follows:

1. Executive Seminars
2. Inside sales
3. Search marketing (SEO, PPC, etc.)
4. Webinars
5. Tradeshows
6. TV advertising
7. Email
8. Radio
9. PR
10. Online video/podcasts/rich media

Of course not all of the above, like TV advertising, are within the budgets or means of every marketing department. However, find out what methods work within your budget and use them.

In the meantime, put the less effective approaches on the back burner and see what a chance in approach can do for your lead generation.

A slow economy is no excuse for an empty sales pipeline. There are plenty of qualified prospects out there. You just need to use more creative and effective ways to find them.

If you’re looking to fill your sales pipeline with quality leads during these difficult economic times, you can’t afford to miss Sapha’s upcoming webinar: 5 Cost-Effective Lead Generation Tools.

Our main speaker, Jake Atwood, is the president of Ovation Sales Group & BuzzBuilder Pro.  He’ll show you five proven sales and marketing tools with a proven track record of generating high quality leads. Best of all, most of these tools are free.

Imagine what more qualified leads could mean to the sales and marketing efforts of your organization.

Seating is limited. Register here to ensure your seat.

After listening to Jake you’ll learn: 

• How to quickly identify people who are ready to buy your product or service
• The best way to use social networking sites to connect with high quality prospects
• Automated lead generation tools that can fill your inbox with high quality, inbound leads
• How to use these 5 tools efficiently and effectively so you’ll see immediate results

Whether your focus is B2B or B2C, you won’t want to miss a webinar that can fill your sales pipeline and boost your organization’s bottom line.

Sign up before it’s too late.

REGISTER NOW

ManageSmarter.com has posted a Sapha case study on how one of our lead conversion tools, a HookTour, was utilized by MasterControl increase their lead conversion rate from 5% to 18%. You can read the case study here.

You can watch MaterControl HookTour here.

Two weeks ago, I wrote about the power of the word “free” and how it successfully lured me into entering a drawing for a free month of personal training at the local gym. I thought I’d follow up on what happened and show the importance of a timely follow-up by your sales staff.

The day after the drawing, a friendly personal trainer gave me a call and said that though I didn’t win the free month of personal training, he was willing to offer me a complimentary training session just for entering. I knew that the session would probably be followed by a sales pitch but decided to try it anyway.

The next day I showed up at the gym and after a talk about some of my fitness requirements, I went through an hour-long session with the personal trainer. It was a very good workout. The trainer worked my back and biceps hard and proved how valuable a personal trainer can be when it comes to achieving some of the fitness goals I’m currently working toward.

After our session, the trainer gave me a very good sales pitch: persuasive but not pushy. In the end, I didn’t sign up for personal training sessions – not because I didn’t see the value in their service but right now personal training sessions don’t fit into my budget. However, I did leave with a positive impression of the trainer and the fitness company he worked for. In the future, if the need for a personal trainer arises, that personal trainer and the company he works for will be the one I call first.

So what happens with the leads that end up in your sales queue? Are they followed up with soon after it arrives in the queue or do it takes days or weeks before someone contacts them? Even if they don’t become a customer, are they left with a positive impression of your company?

Usually when someone requests information about your product or service, they’re hoping to hear back quickly. They’re looking for a solution and have a decision to make and have most likely contacted several competitors. The sooner a sales representative can make initial contact with a prospect, the better it is for both parties. The prospect knows that they’re dealing with a responsive organization and your sales person can qualify them and decide whether they should become part of the sales pipeline.

And just because someone isn’t qualified or decides not to become a customer, they should still be left with a positive impression of your organization. You never know when their needs or situation will change and the product or service you offer might be just what they’re looking for.

How do prospects feel if leads aren’t followed up with in a timely manner?

In my next post I’ll share my experience with one company and how their failure to deliver on their promise to follow up on every leads in 30 minutes or less, left me not even wanting to talk to the sales person.