One thing which separates successful sales professionals from the rest is the way they qualify their leads. If you’re struggling in your sales process, you should make sure you’re not missing this crucial step and you also may need to check how you’re qualifying your prospects.
It can be easy to use the excuse that every lead opportunity is too unique to track efficiently. Perhaps you feel it takes too much time or manual process, so you skip a thorough qualification process and operate on hunch instead. The trouble with this strategy is you’re not effectively targeting leads and could be letting high-interest opportunities go as a result. This doesn’t help you reach your sales quotas.
So how do you build a solid, results-driven qualification process? Read on for 5 easy ways to qualify your leads and get real results in your sales process.
1. Purchasing Power
Many business purchases are handled by committees of different branch members within the organization. You’ll want to determine their purchase approval process early on so you’re communicating with the right people who have the power to make a buying decision. It’s also important to keep track of changes in corporate structure. This way, you have the most relevant information about who you should be targeting within a given organization.
2. Demand Equals Action
One of the main questions you should be asking about your sales opportunities is whether your product or service is relevant to their business needs. Does this company have a pain point that your service can resolve? Evaluate whether your lead really has the demand for your solution and determine why you’re the best fit over other similar products in the market. Alignment equals sales success.
3. Value Trumps Cost
Many buyers fixate on cost, but if you target leads who understand the value of your solution, cost can become less of a sticking point in your sales process. Help your prospects build a believable business use case for your product or service using free demonstrations, case studies, products tours, and the like. Then focus on the leads which show responsiveness and interest in these demonstrations.
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4. Establish a Timeline
Once you’ve qualified your lead using the above 3 steps, it’s time to develop a timeline to purchase with them. This plan is mutually created and accepted between you and your prospect – and should be put in writing. This creates a definite clarity of interest and sets a purchase date for your potential buyer to look forward to. A lead who is open to this step is highly likely to close.
5. Scoring Your Leads
Leadscoring is a way to track the above 4 points in an easy to update, automated system based on the behaviors and actions of your potential buyers. This involves assigning points to lead opportunities for each individual behavior or action they take in response to your sales process and indicates their overall interest. It’s a great way to help you automate your lead qualification process and keep you focused on the leads which are most likely to result in a conversion.
Tools to Help
Including these five steps in your lead qualification process will help you stop wasting time on the wrong leads, and home in on the right ones. Fortunately, there are tools to help you organize your opportunities, arrange calls, analyze responses, and score your leads so can save some time and manual labor. You can even automate some of the process to make the workload easier. If you have interest in going beyond gut instinct and would like to learn more, call us at (877) 590-2511.