Get more qualified leads by using scoring and rank qualified leads according to their buying interest.
Lead scoring is the process in determining both the level of interest of a prospect, in its solution as the level of interest in a prospect. Qualifying and quantifying the prospect in the same breath.
Lead Scoring is useful because only a small percentage of leads are usually ready as immediate sale opportunities in B2B and slightly larger as a pool of opportunities in B2C. As a sales teams does not want to waste their valuable time (and you do not want to miss an opportunity) in a commercial data (lead) when not active in the buying cycle. By sending the lead to sales at an early stage of the buying cycle, this may hurt the relationship between marketing and sales if too many unqualified buying stage leads are passed on.
But there will also be data that will be “hot” (Hot leads) must be delivered to marketing and sales before a competitor can do so or the lead cools down. To detect these leads, it requires a process called (Lead Scoring).
Many queries that arise from actions of stimulus / response activities require nurturing (lead nurturing) before they become “ready” to make a purchase. Therefore marketing requires that you have the ability to decide when to send this lead to the next state of the application process and when to pass on to sales.
When using a process and a score (lead scoring), sales will receive fewer leads but sales of high quality. If executives do not waste time trading low-quality leads, they can concentrate on high quality and increase productivity. In fact, a only 10% increase in the quality of leads can generate a 40% increase in sales productivity.
If a company has a consultative sales force, it is likely that the individual cost is around 20% to 30% of the revenue that each generates. Therefore an improvement in the quality of leads has a strong impact on the final results (bottom line).
How to get to a specific model of qualification
The simplest way is to evaluate the factors involved in assigning the rating and score. To do that we must consider two kinds of criteria:
1) Explicit qualification.
2) Rating implied.
Explicit qualification.
Is based on specific information provided by the contact form through different means:
A form completed by WEB.
Telephone solicitations.
A completed form in an event.
Other channels.
Generally these data points include company name, name of person, role and position of the respondent, time horizon to make a purchase, indicating whether it needs to be covered by a product of the company performing the survey.
Ideally, these data points from the form complete provide a reference on what state the prospect is in the buying cycle.
However, if the prospect is looking for a solution, they are also probably talking with your competitors.
Some of the factors involved in the explicit qualification are:
Company information and contact: is a key factor to assign a score in the rating system. The ideal situation is to obtain as much information as possible. But to get everything you need to know it takes more than a prospecting form, therefore making it more difficult.
Function, duty or responsibility of Contact: is one of the most important scores. However it is sometimes difficult to obtain this information in a single interaction.
Purchase time frame: one of the most inaccurate data points in the system. For various reasons prospects are reluctant to provide specific information about time frames and decision dates. For example, if the decision is within 3 months if they complete a form indicating that the decision will be made within 6 months. The reliability of this data is accomplished with several interactions.
Specific needs of the prospectus: the data gives an idea of the state the lead is within the procurement process. If the prospect is researching specific solutions, they are very likely to be found talking to other competitors.
Rating implied.
The implied rating is based on the behavior of a prospect that could be observed.
Often the implied rating is more accurate than explicit. When evaluating the construction of an implicit qualification is necessary to consider at least three types of data.
Time of interaction: when the interaction takes place has consequences in connection with the prospect during follow-up processes. For example, if a Web site visitor downloads a document and also views an online demonstration, these signals indicate a strong opportunity to make the contact “live” at the prospect level.
Level of core activity: consists in assigning a score if you observe a certain number of actions in a defined time period. It is one of the most important indicators of the process. how many touch points does a prospect have within your site, how many pages viewed in a given session, how many times over how many days does a prospect visit your site.
Web site activity: the most common mistake is trying to measure and know everything that the prospect made on the website. Just concentrate on one or two high-value content and form interactions.
What actions should be performed once the marketing opportunities are rated
The most important advantage of having a rating system of opportunity is the ability to make tactical decisions regarding the prospect. For example, based on Lead Scoring, a typical action plan might be:
Opportunity Type
Actions
A) Send immediately to sales for follow up.
B) Send to sales. Low priority or assign tracking junior executive.
C) Send to a “breeding program” and monitor activity.
D) Leave the top of the funnel to continue to obtain information.
Lead scoring also has many forms as they relate to evaluating a prospect based on FICO scores provided by sources like TRW data and other sources of validating a leads form data. Targus recently wrote a paper on Advanced Segmentation to Optimize Media Purchases a great read. More to come on lead scoring and lead nurturing soon.