Friday, 27 January 2012

Lead Generation - Can Your Business Afford Not To Do It?

By Miguel Pancardo


Every business needs a steady supply of fresh leads. This needs to happen on a daily basis and has to be kept track of. The conundrum many of us find at the beginning is cost. It looks expensive and, in truth, it CAN be expensive, but thee are some things to take into consideration that will lower that cost.

When many people start their business, they simply put up a sales page and sell an item. While this might be profitable, it does nothing to encourage the growth of the business. Although an email address is probably obtained with each sale, no follow up is made to it.

This type of business model allows you to sell a single item one time to a single customer. A better model is to have a way to sell multiple items to that same customer over time through following up. Of course, getting the person to buy multiple times or even the first time requires skillfully written sales page or follow up emails. Most people do not have the skill necessary, so to get the best results, consider having someone else write your copy for you.

However, copywriters that are good at what they do are not cheap to hire. The expense should pay for itself over time however. No matter what type of business you go into, there is an initial outlay or overheard where you have to put money into the business upfront and wait a while for sales to turn into actual profit.

The site itself has to be designed so that anyone can navigate through it. I have seen a lot of expensive, flashy sites that basically generate no income for the owner other than the sales that come from it. Add in the costs of hosting, domain registration and upkeep and you may never recover the entire cost of the business as it will always be creeping up and biting you on the butt!

A site that is set up to generate leads on an ongoing basis on the other hand is more profitable in the long run and can pay for itself many times over. The site doesn't even have to be anything fancy or expensive. You can simply offer a free report in exchange for an email address and name. As long as this person stays on your list, you can market to him multiple times and hopefully he will buy from you multiple times over the years.

Since the people agree to receive email from you when they request your free report, there is no risk of spamming, especially if you use double opt-in. This means that when someone enters their email address for the report, they must first click on a link and confirm their email before the report is sent. This prevents people from entering false email addresses or addresses that belong to someone else. Double opt-in confirms that your prospect is aware of what you are offering and has willingly asked to receive it.

Lead generation monetizes your list every time a new person joins. The total cost? A few minutes and some time to follow up. The results? Lasting recurring sales from a customer who now trusts you implicitly.




About the Author:



No comments:

Post a Comment