Enterprise Marketing: Fixing the Dilemma of Abandoned Leads

Alignment is Paramount for Sales and Enterprise Marketing

Almost every business involved in enterprise marketing online has at some point faced the challenge of abandoned leads. Your content engaged visitors just enough to pique?their interest and convert, but as they progressed through your lead funnel something changed. They stopped responding to your follow-up efforts and never actually made a purchase.

It?s possible to revitalize these potential customers and their interest in your company and products if you have a strong strategy in place to address their needs. It hinges?on what you already know about them through their engagement on your website. The key is to have a plan in place to address their?needs?using targeted information that is appropriate to their?specific interests.

A Recent study by Gleanster Research uncovered some interesting statistics regarding lead generation and conversion rates.

• 50% of leads generated through inbound are qualified, but not yet ready to buy
• Only 25% of leads are ?legitimate? and should advance to your sales team
• 79% of marketing leads will never convert to sales due to the lack of proper lead nurturing.
• 35 ? 50% of sales will go to the vendor who responds first

These statistics outline several very interesting challenges for?online enterprise marketing. First, while your site may be generating traffic, only half of your leads converting are qualified, and fewer still are ready to pass on to your sales team. Quick response to any inquiry can increase your conversion rate and the majority of your leads may be lost due to a lack of proper follow-up.

Creating An Effective Lead Nurturing Strategy

Several factors contribute to the process of nurturing a lead through your sales funnel. Obviously, rapid response to any inquiry is the first step. It?s important to acknowledge interest with prompt follow-up. Next, targeting the message to specifically address your prospects needs is key.

By integrating your enterprise marketing efforts and automating your processes, you can increase engagement and move prospects through the qualification stages. Inbound marketing is about much more than just generating leads. You need to have a strategy and a?process?in place that will deliver the right message to the right prospect at the right time.

One highly effective way to reduce your levels of abandoned leads is to take a look at the online behavior of your visitors and their engagement levels. Where do they spend their time online? Have they read your blog posts about your product only to leave your site after visiting your pricing page??They may be questioning your products value to your price point. Directing your follow-up to drive these visitors to your new blog posts that demonstrate value and using CTAs to inform them of special discounts or payment plans may be all that?s needed to get them to the next step.

Online enterprise marketing is about delivering value to your prospects. Using targeted messages to address their pain points, and delivering relevant information in a timely manner are two steps you can use to give them the justification they need to continue their online relationship with you. ?By defining your lead funnel, targeting your message and aligning your marketing and sales teams to bring your prospects through your lead funnel, you can lower the number of abandoned leads. Today, online customers are looking for relationships. Nurture your prospects through the process and they will reward you with their business.

Does your enterprise marketing plan include nurturing? Lead generation? Lead qualification? If not, your plan my by faulted or incomplete. That the Inbound Marketing Assessment to accuracy gauge your performance. It’s free and will only take a few minutes of your time.

Marketing Matters Inbound?is an inbound marketing firm specializing in online conversions, content?strategy, PPC campaigns and traditional media placement. Our experience in?B2B digital?marketing?and?traditional media?allows us to deliver results through a strategic media mix. We believe in?aligning and merging marketing and sales/operations for optimal return on your marketing investment.