Four lead management tips to help you take your team to the next level
You probably know that a lead management system can help you effectively track your leads so they don’t go stale and keep moving through the funnel. And hopefully, you’ve also created a lead scoring system so you can scale up in a way that allows you to focus on the most enthusiastic, informed, and ready to buy.
But despite having such systems in place, many organizations lack a cross-functional lead management strategy that unites the sales and marketing teams behind the common goal—not because they don’t want one, but because leadership just hasn’t made it a focus. It’s unfortunate, but true.
Here are four ways to go beyond the basics that will help you unify your team and get everyone aligned.
1.Marketers and sellers should agree on the common language they will use when discussing customer experience.
People who are part of a group—or a team, or even a family—often invent words or use phrases that would mean something different in another context. This helps create bonds between people who spend a lot of time together.
This is why the word “lead” means different things to marketers and sellers, resulting in miscommunication and mutual frustration. Let’s take a look.
Marketing definition: A “lead” is a person with a valid email address who expressed interest in a product or service.
Sales definition: A “lead” is person from a company in my territory who's connected with me in some way
To solve this problem, bring your marketing and sales teams together to define key terms, words, and acronyms so everyone has proper context and understands language in the same way.
If you think your teams are already on the same page, try this game to find out.
Find out what a “lead” is from four or five people involved in your lead tracking process—lead generation, monitoring lead status, lead nurturing, and so on. Write down what they say.
Get together with your team over lunch or drinks and read the definitions in the envelope. If they say the same thing, then your shared vocabulary is coming together. If not, you have a clear place to start building one.
This process will give you and your team practice in choosing the best wording to communicate your product’s value to customers.
2. Have clear expectations for lead management with SLAs
After you work with someone for a while, you start to know what they’re likely to do. For example, if someone says they’ll have something done by the end of the week, you learn that they really mean 8 a.m. Monday morning. It can be frustrating at first, but eventually you adjust accordingly.
However, a lot of teams operate more like a relay race than a ping-pong game. You might not be able to see when the work is done or what results it drives. This is especially true when your team has a diverse set of roles working in tandem.
To overcome this, define and document the expectations of each party in your strategy and get them out in the open so your whole team can work together to ensure performance and improvement over time. These can become service level agreements (SLAs) for all parties who play a role in your strategy.
Every new lead must be contacted and their status changed from “new” to “working” within two business days.
All leads must be qualified or disqualified within two weeks.
If a lead has no status updates within two weeks, it should be considered “stalled” and eligible for further marketing support.
3. RACI charts keep track of who is accountable for each step in a project/task.
A RACI model is a great way to show who’s responsible, accountable, consulted on and informed about all activities and tasks. These models are especially useful for B2B marketing and lead generation teams because they clarify roles and define what’s expected of each person.
It all comes down to change management. To implement a RACI model, you'll need to do things differently—and hopefully for the better. Still, if you want a RACI to work, you'll need to align on goals and performance measures, secure executive support and sponsorship, and ensure that the person in charge of monitoring SLAs has the power to track and incentivize the responsibilities and tasks that everyone agreed on. This ensures that your team will be held accountable for results.
To that end, the SLAs must be monitored daily, and new roles may need to be created or changed to enforce them.
4. Make a plan for communication and be prepared to make changes along the way.
If your team is to work together effectively, it’s important to be on the same page and follow through with commitments. But that’s just the beginning of a successful process. There’s a saying that “Change is the only constant.” So, any lead management strategy should also include a mechanism for communicating feedback and iterating. Changes need to be reviewed, revised, and tested to find opportunities to improve.
Consider setting up a bi-weekly meeting to discuss the progress of your project. This will give you an opportunity to talk about any challenges you're facing, as well as what's gone right so far. Also, review your lead management strategy’s performance on a quarterly basis. This is a good opportunity to evaluate its big-picture impact and can give members of the team a chance to propose changes to what’s not working.
With our tool you can centralize your work, communicate easily with your team, and generally reduce the complexity of project or tasks collaboration — so your team is free to focus on what they do best.
Conclusion
What’s next for your lead management strategy?
No two organizations are the same, so what works for you will be unique. However, these four tips will guide you to a lead management strategy that continues to improve over time. Learn more about how an effective lead management strategy can impact your business for the better with us
