Lead generation is often expensive and time-consuming. You don’t want your investments to go to waste. Unfortunately, this is precisely what will happen if you don’t have the right lead nurturing process in place.
Nurturing leads allows you to turn the spark of interest into a bright flame. Not only does it help you convert leads, but it also increases their value. According to research by Writer’s Block Live, purchases made by nurtured leads are 47% larger than those made by non-nurtured leads.
So what does lead nurturing look like?
While there’s no process that universally works for every business, here are some tips that will maximize the chances of your campaign succeeding:
1. Create Targeted Content
Targeted content is the lifeblood of lead nurturing. Once the top of your funnel captures a lead, it’s time to understand their needs and tailor your content accordingly.
It’s important to mention that targeted content isn’t the same as relatable content. The two types share a common thread of having to resonate with the audience, but targeted content has an additional job. Namely, it has to drill specifically into the lead’s pain point and introduce a solution to their problem.
For targeted content to work, you must have a deep understanding of your audience persona(s). You should know each segment’s key problems, motivations, interests, and goals. Then, prepare an array of targeted content that addresses each of these factors for every segment.
Targeted content might take time to nail down, but don’t brush over this step, as it can make or break the effectiveness of your lead nurturing campaigns. Dig deep beneath the surface, and craft a message that will make each lead feel like it’s meant for them and nobody else.
2. Leverage Drip Marketing
Drip marketing is the practice of sharing your content in smaller pieces, often through a sequence. A prime example is email nurturing, where you send emails that educate, entertain, and persuade your audience to take action.
Emails can contain news, updates, offers, and other types of content that will help the lead move through your funnel. But regardless of the type, all nurture content should have one key ingredient – massive value!
Why?
Because leads can go cold pretty quickly if you don’t keep them hooked. And the best way to ensure someone engages with your content is to offer them value with no strings attached, at least at the beginning. As the sequence starts reaching the end, you can send out more salesy pieces that will convert a lead. By that time, you’ll have provided a lead with the amount of value that should make them want to return the favor.
For that to happen, though, you need to check another important box:
3. Have Clear CTAs
One of the main goals of lead nurturing is to make it easy for a prospect to arrive at a decision and take action. To make this happen, you’ll want to steer away from filling your content with multiple CTAs.
Imagine receiving an email that offers you to:
- Join a Facebook group
- Download a whitepaper
- Schedule a free call
While this might sound good at first glance in terms of options, it would complicate things and force you to spend time weighing all the options. As a result, it’s likely that you wouldn’t take any action right away. You’d leave the email and probably forget about it.
This is why every piece of content should have one clear CTA. Whatever it is, make sure that it’s in line with the stage in the buying journey that each lead is currently in. The timing has to be right, which we’ll cover later.
4. Set Up Lead Scoring
Not every lead is equally warm. So how do you know which ones are more likely to convert?
This is where lead scoring comes in.
The way it works is pretty simple. All you have to do is assign points to leads based on the actions they take. For instance, Lead A downloaded your free book, while Lead B just visited your landing page and left. In this case, Lead A would seem more valuable and receive more points than Lead B.
This type of scoring is highly valuable as it allows you to tailor your lead nurturing campaigns much more effectively. You can avoid targeting colder leads with content they’re not ready for and make sure the warmer leads stay engaged.
To score your leads accurately, you’ll want to befriend analytics. Track each of your top-of-the-funnel efforts and see how different leads interact with your content and offers. Then, summarize the data and put it to good use through scoring.
5. Don’t Forget About Timing
Lead nurturing isn’t just about what content you send, but also when you send it. As mentioned, you need to follow the lead through their buying journey and give them the right content at the right time.
If someone just subscribed to your email list, the last thing you want to do is bombard them with content and come across as spammy. This will almost certainly lead to them unsubscribing, which is the last thing you want.
Make sure to create a schedule that will keep you in front of your leads without being intrusive. There’s no perfect number here, but as a general rule, you shouldn’t send out content more than a couple of times per week. Even that might be too much unless you ensure that each piece has something of genuine value.
If you see that your content remains unopened, or even worse, that your emails are ending up in spam, timing might be the issue. To fix this or prevent it from happening in the first place, make sure your content leads prospects through the funnel instead of trying to push them through it.
Develop Strong Relationships with Leads
Even though nurturing leads might seem daunting, it’s simpler in practice than theory, especially since you can automate a large part of it. There are countless tools that allow you to gather all the right data and maximize its potential.
Of course, the human touch is irreplaceable, so make sure that your campaigns have it. Put yourself in your leads’ shoes and think about what sort of content would inspire them to take action. Focus on providing value, and your efforts will pay off.