Effective Sales Lead Generation: Finally, The Magic Formula?
Let's talk about sales lead generation.
Have you found that Salespeople and Sales Leaders all lament the same thing?
"We need more leads."
"Why do you need more leads?"
"To fill our pipeline."
"To reach our quota."
"To get the 3, 4, even 5-times coverage we need."
So, I had an interesting conversation with a senior Sales Leader last week. He couldn't answer a pretty straight-forward lead gen question. It prompted me to post this poll on LinkedIn to find out whether or not this is a common issue. If the poll is still going by the time you read this, just click on the image to cast your vote:
In the meantime, let's get back to taking about lead generation.
What is the easiest, simplest, and seemingly most logical thing to do when you need more leads?
You do more lead gen.
Right?
Let's think about this for a moment.
After all, lead gen is hard, and it is getting harder all the time.
Why?
Because, while apps, platforms and tech have made it really easy to REACH OUT to your ideal buyers in huge numbers, it is now super-hard to get them TO ENGAGE with, and respond to, your lead gen.
Take yourself as an example:
How many sales emails do you receive every day. How many of them do you read?
How many cold sales calls do you receive every day? How many do you take?
How many sales pitches do you receive on LinkedIn every day? How many do you ignore?
So, what makes you think your current outreaches will continue to work for you?
The reality is that lead gen is increasingly failing because modern buyers are fed up with being pitch-slapped.
In my experience (and in that of my clients) there is a WRONG WAY and there is a RIGHT WAY to think about lead gen, demand gen and prospect engagement.
Why?
Because, the old pushy selling techniques do nothing more than annoy, and even put off, your ideal prospects, long before you even have a chance to speak with them.
These old lead gen practices simply don't work any longer..
I mean, what's the point? The stats are horrible:
How many outreaches does it take you to unearth a single lead?
How many leads does it take you to make a single sale?
Think about it: How much time, effort and money is spent on your current lead gen practices? What is the return on that investment? How much better could it be?
So, let me challenge this thinking.
Why not re-think your lead gen?
Why not ask yourself:
"Do we REALLY need MORE leads? Or do we just need BETTER leads?
Here's the thing though:
MORE leads just means a whole lot more work, effort and time invested in following up, pursing, qualifying in, or qualifying out.
Why not do away with this inefficient numbers game?
Why not do something smarter instead?
Why not aim for lead QUALITY, instead of lead QUANTITY?
How do you go about that?
I described it here:
The 3 Keys That Unlock Your Engagement with Executive Buyers
What’s Next?
I invite you to explore your sales and your current lead gen practices, and what you can do to lift both.
Then:
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