The Basics of Prospect Cultivation
Having a strong prospect cultivation plan is a necessity of every business. Not just a strong plan, but also one actually capable of converting leads into clients. After all, generating leads is only half the battle – turning them into actual customers is the true test!
Prospect cultivation isn’t rocket science. It really comes down to treating your leads the way you would want to be treated. It means not being too pushy and aggressive. It means contacting them regularly (but not too often!) until they’re ready to purchase. It’s important to build a relationship and become the trusted expert of your industry they turn to by providing the information they might need.
For example, a real estate agent may have 10 prospective seller leads they are cultivating. Rather than contacting the leads all the time asking if they are ready to list their home, an agent may want to send them weekly emails with pertinent information, such as tips for raising home value, a checklist “Open House” tips as well as bi-weekly updates on the market and their home value.
The agent comes across more as a helpful expert than a pushy salesperson – THAT is what prospect cultivation is about. You build up trust and a relationship with each lead. Every company should have a follow-up plan for each type of lead they have (prospective client, past customer, etc) and fine-tune that plan down to a science.
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.
Most CRM/CMS’s provide email campaigns – a series of pre-written emails that go out weekly or bi-weekly over a period of time on different topics the lead might be interested in. Many of these campaigns will also schedule in phone calls once or twice a month to the lead as monthly ‘touch points’ to ensure the lead receives the information. Consistent and persistent follow-up is TRUE prospect cultivation.
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 this day are completely 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.
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