The Basics Of Prospect Cultivation

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The Basics Of Prospect Cultivation

Author: AshleyLichty | Total views: 44 | Word Count: 494 | Category: Marketing | Date: Feb 26th 2008

A lead follow-up plan is only as good as it's ability to convert prospects to actual clients. That's why any business without strong prospect cultivation techniques isn't likely to go far. Sure they may be able to generate tons of leads for themselves, but really, what's the point if they can't convert them to clients?

Prospect cultivation isn't hard at all. It just involves treating leads like human beings and not being too pushy. It means building a trusting relationship with them and becoming known to them as an expert in your field that they can rely on. It's important, when following up with leads, to send them information relating to your products and services that they may be interested in.

If you were a real estate agent with seller leads, you probably wouldn't be calling them once a month just to ask to list their home. Instead, keeping good prospect cultivation techniques inside, you add them to your follow-up campaign. This involves sending them weekly emails with market updates, open house tips, home value tips and an occasional CMA on their home.

That is what prospect cultivation is all about - consistent and persistent follow up. The agent in the above example came across as a trusted and helpful expert rather than a pushy salesperson. Every business should develop a similar method of following up with their leads and tweak it until it's the best it can be.

Of course, when you have hundreds of thousands of leads to follow up with, prospect cultivation can wind up a bit complicated. When dealing with thousands of new leads per week, how can you possibly coordinate follow-up. When should a salesperson call a lead? How often? What do they talk about when they do call?

Luckily, that's where a beautiful thing called technology comes in - automated follow-up software to be exact. Otherwise known as a customer relationship manager (CRM) or contact management system (CMS) these programs can help manage and automate your follow up. This helps cut down on confusion and time-wasting on your sales floor.

All the many different programs available for prospect cultivation tend to have similar features: email drip campaigns, task scheduling and alerts, calendars, etc. The email campaigns allow you to automatically send informational emails to leads on a regular basis. They often incorporate a sales call and script into the schedule as well.

A CRM provides many other features as well, and many can be built to a company's specifications depending on what features are most important to their particular plan of follow-up. The surprising fact is most companies today are totally unaware of what a CRM system is, and just how much time and money it can save them on follow-up. All in all, strong prospect cultivation tactics is one aspect of marketing many companies miss the mark on.

Article Source: OrganizingWeb.net

About the Author

About the author: Ashley Lichty is a content developer and search engine optimization specialist at ProspectMX.com. Get more information on prospect cultivation, lead generation and other topics from ProspectMX.com.

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A lead follow-up plan is only as good as it's ability to convert prospects to actual clients. That's why any business without strong prospect cultivation techniques isn't likely to go far. Sure they may be able to generate tons of leads for themselves, but really, what's the point if they can't convert them to clients? 
Prospect cultivation isn't hard at all. It just involves treating leads like human beings and not being too pushy. It means building a trusting relationship with them and becoming known to them as an expert in your field that they can rely on. It's important, when following up with leads, to send them information relating to your products and services that they may be interested in. 
If you were a real estate agent with seller leads, you probably wouldn't be calling them once a month just to ask to list their home. Instead, keeping good prospect cultivation techniques inside, you add them to your follow-up campaign. This involves sending them weekly emails with market updates, open house tips, home value tips and an occasional CMA on their home. 
That is what prospect cultivation is all about - consistent and persistent follow up. The agent in the above example came across as a trusted and helpful expert rather than a pushy salesperson. Every business should develop a similar method of following up with their leads and tweak it until it's the best it can be. 
Of course, when you have hundreds of thousands of leads to follow up with, prospect cultivation can wind up a bit complicated. When dealing with thousands of new leads per week, how can you possibly coordinate follow-up. When should a salesperson call a lead? How often? What do they talk about when they do call? 
Luckily, that's where a beautiful thing called technology comes in - automated follow-up software to be exact. Otherwise known as a customer relationship manager (CRM) or contact management system (CMS) these programs can help manage and automate your follow up. This helps cut down on confusion and time-wasting on your sales floor. 
All the many different programs available for prospect cultivation tend to have similar features: email drip campaigns, task scheduling and alerts, calendars, etc. The email campaigns allow you to automatically send informational emails to leads on a regular basis. They often incorporate a sales call and script into the schedule as well. 
A CRM provides many other features as well, and many can be built to a company's specifications depending on what features are most important to their particular plan of follow-up. The surprising fact is most companies today are totally unaware of what a CRM system is, and just how much time and money it can save them on follow-up. All in all, strong prospect cultivation tactics is one aspect of marketing many companies miss the mark on. Article Source: <a href="http://www.organizingweb.net" target="_blank">OrganizingWeb.net</a> About the Author: About the author: Ashley Lichty is a content developer and search engine optimization specialist at <a href="http://www.prospectmx.com">ProspectMX.com.</a> Get more information on <a href="http://www.prospectmx.com/services/prospect-cultivation">prospect cultivation,</a> lead generation and other topics from ProspectMX.com.