This week, a question came in to our 5 STAR Support Team: "How do I generate more leads for my business?"
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5 STAR Support Team Member Michael Shea of Advi Coach replies:
This is the question I get most often these days. Without knowing the specific business situation I’ll answer it generically. Essentially this is a marketing question. Marketing boils down to knowing what to say and knowing who to say it to.
- Your USP. The first task is to develop your unique selling proposition and guarantee. This is what I like to call the “why you” strategy. It shouldn’t be merely a list of features and benefits but a compelling proposition that evokes emotion. All of us like to believe that we make our decisions rationally but most of us make decisions, especially purchasing decisions, emotionally. Now you’ve determined what you want to say.
Ok but who do we say it to? Who is your ideal customer? What do they like to do? Where do they like to go? What do they do in their spare time? Where do they get their news and information?
What do they search on the internet…..etc.? Answer those questions and you’ll know to who and where you want to say it.
2. The Tactical Marketing Plan. Now you need to develop and implement a Tactical Marketing Plan to get the message out and generate those leads. It’s important to measure the leads generated by tactic (media advertising, web advertising, trade shows, cold calling, direct mail, etc.) so that you can manage your marketing dollars towards the tactics that are working and not waste money on expensive tactics that aren’t giving you the bang for your buck. Ask all of your leads “how did you hear about us” and keep track.
In choosing your marketing tactics remember that the most effective lead generation strategies use the power of leverage. Think about it as the difference between a water pump and a faucet. With a water pump when you pump you get water and when you stop pumping the water stops flowing. Examples of water pump strategies are networking, cold calling, and advertising. With a faucet if you turn the faucet on the water runs and if you stand there and don’t do anything the water keeps running. These are tactics like strategic alliances, referral programs, and customer recommendations.
3. The Holy Trinity of Increase Sales Performance. I would also suggest that you not to only focus on lead generation but also consider the other two important lead related strategies that make up what I call the holy trinity of increased sales performance. They are lead conversion rate and average sale per lead closed. For example let’s consider a business that generates 2000 leads per year, closes 20% of them at an average sale of $500 for a $2M/year business. Let’s assume they put in place strategies to increase each one of those metrics by just 10%. Now they generate 2200 leads and close 22% of them for an average sale of $550 giving them a $2.66M/year business. That’s a 33% sales increase on only a 10% increase in leads!
There are detailed strategies in our program designed to take you step by step through all of these strategies. These programs have worked for our clients across many different industries and have been developed over our 17 years of experience in the coaching industry.
Free Coaching Session to 5 STAR Members. To implement these strategies requires some business specific information that I realize most people would rather not share in a public forum.
I do provide a Complimentary Coaching Session to all 5 Star members free of charge. You can reach me at 760-274-6240 or send me a message at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it . You can also sign up for the free coaching session at http://mshea.advicoach.com.
