Jason Stoffer just gave me a perfect introductory question Calling Internet Leads: How Often, How Much? to start my new series on HOW-TO Develop Effective Internet Lead Workflows.
I agree with Jason’s current conclusion that there is no “holy grail answer” to the question because “each company, industry, and consumer segment comes with it own unique characteristics.”
That is why I will seek to engage my answer starting with his second potential source of finding an answer:
“what approach or methodology should I use to arrive at an answer?”
My answer? Dynamic Internet Lead Workflows built on the fundamental premise of the problem–How to effectively meet someone in a strange place:
So, you purchase Internet leads and you are frustrated with contact and conversion rate. Have you considered that the majority of that conversion effectiveness is in how you manage that lead into a contact? Have you considered that the process of getting that contact is largely a well-researched mathematical problem? Does your lead management system give you the ability to maximize the probability of that contact?
Kaleidico has baked the optimal solution to this mathematical problem into icoSales.
Here is the premise of the math part–don’t worry it won’t hurt a bit.
Rendezvous Dilemma
The rendezvous dilemma is a classic dilemma of game theory (maybe you remember the movie “A Beautiful Mind”). It is simple to conceive and you have probably experienced the problem yourself. Two people agree to meet at a park, or mall, or other reasonably large public place. However, upon arriving they realize that the designated meeting location is much larger than they anticipated and can not directly survey. Consequently, they can not find one another.
Now they have few choices:
1. Both can chose to stay in one spot and do nothing, then of course they will never connect
2. Both can begin to walk about and look for each other, possibly they will meet and possibly they won’t
3. Finally, one can stay in one spot and wait while the other searches for them, as a result (theoretically because this assumes there is no time constraint) they will eventually connect
Now that you have the mathematical foundation, let’s build in our real world problem.
A consumer comes to the Internet looking for a mortgage or at least information about rates, refinancing, purchase, or other related matters. They enter information about how to find them. However, they may get anywhere from zero to only a website URL to find you. At this point, you are both in this great big space called the Internet looking for one another.
Time to create your search strategy and pattern. Obviously, you are not going to chose strategy #1. Strategy #2 is probably equally futile, because they already did their part to find you by submitting a fair amount of personal information. That leaves you with strategy #3, but just wandering about will leave you and the consumer just as frustrated.
So, you need to construct an effective search strategy or pattern that will maximize your contact rate and reduce your time to contact. This is where lead workflows become critical.
This will be the topic of the next few posts…
Technorati Tags: Internet leads, lead workflows, kaleidico, icosales
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