6 favorite metaphors for leading nurturing
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... a Seedling This metaphor, which compares a prospect to a seedling, equates the process of lead nurturing to the skills needed to grow plants. Nurturing, in this metaphor, is the watering, sunlight, and perhaps even the talking to a seedling. Nurturing provides everything required to make it grow into a thriving plant— ideally, one that will deliver the sweet fruit of recurring revenue quarter after quarter, year after year. ... a Romantic Relationship In this metaphor, lead nurturing is compared to a courtship, with the marketer as the wooer and the prospect as the wooed. This metaphor emphasizes using the appropriate message at the appropriate time. For instance, just as a gentleman caller wouldn’t ask a woman to marry him on the first date, neither would a marketer ask for the sale the minute a prospect expresses any interest at all in the marketer’s product or service. Patience, marketers, patience. ... a Conversation This analogy stresses the back and forth between the prospect and the marketer. In this metaphor, as a prospect exposes his digital body language as he, for instance, visits different parts of a website; the marketer keeps the conversation going by directing the prospect to various pieces of content that appear to interest him. This analogy of the lead nurturing process places a premium on the marketer’s ability to not simply talk to a prospect—but to stop and listen every once in a while. ... a Teaching Moment Some view lead nurturing as an advisor-student relationship. This way of thinking aligns with the main theme of “The Challenger Sale,” a book that made the case that the most effective salespeople tell prospective customers something they don’t know. They, in effect, teach them. They instruct them on how a pain point—maybe even one the prospects didn’t even know they had—can be made far less painful with the vendor’s product or service. ... a Mediocre Baseball Player A poor baseball player hits about .200, which means he gets a hit one out of every five times at bat. Batting around .200 used to be called the Mendoza Line after a weak-hitting shortstop named Mario Mendoza from the 1970s. Many savvy marketers are beginning to address this inherent deficiency in email-based nurturing programs with multi-channel lead nurturing tools such as LinkedIn Lead Accelerator, which adds targeted display and social advertising to the nurturing mix. Many lead nurturing programs are like bad hitters, because the prospects in the marketer’s database only open about 20 percent of the marketer’s emails. (This problem is even worse than it seems, because only about 5 percent of website visitors even share their email address). The concept of lead nurturing is fairly simple. It’s the process of building relationships with prospects who aren’t yet ready to buy your product or service. Because up to 90 percent of the purchase process may be complete before a prospect reaches out to sales, marketers are more responsible for lead nurturing than ever. And lead nurturing delivers results. Forrester Research said companies that excel at lead nurturing generate 50 percent more sales ready leads—at a 33 percent lower cost. Leads that are nurtured tend to be more valuable, with nurtured leads making 47 percent larger purchases than leads that were not nurtured. For many marketers, lead nurturing has become synonymous with marketing automation, and the concept of lead nurturing can sometimes get obscured by all the new technology. So marketing automation vendors got pretty good at explaining lead nurturing with metaphors. Here are six of our favorites, especially the one you can have garnished with olives.. 6 Favorite Metaphors for Lead Nurturing LEAD NURTURING IS LIKE... 50% 47% ... a 3-Martini Lunch Before the rise of the Internet, the sales team controlled lead nurturing. Salespeople built relationships with prospects—that is they nurtured leads, because not everybody is ready to buy right now—by demonstrating their industry knowledge, by showing their humorous or entertaining side, and, ultimately by explaining why a prospect should buy the salesperson’s product or service. Often, the salespeople did their lead nurturing over lunch—occasionally over the mythical, Don Draper-style three-martini lunch. Learn more about how you can nurture leads to drive more conversions with LinkedIn Lead Accelerator by visiting business.linkedin.com/marketing-solutions
Transcript of 6 favorite metaphors for leading nurturing
... a SeedlingThis metaphor, which compares a prospect to a seedling, equates the process of lead nurturing to the skills needed to grow plants. Nurturing, in this metaphor, is the watering, sunlight, and perhaps even the talking to a seedling. Nurturing provides everything required to make it grow into a thriving plant— ideally, one that will deliver the sweet fruit of recurring revenue quarter after quarter, year after year.
... a Romantic RelationshipIn this metaphor, lead nurturing is compared to a courtship, with the marketer as the wooer and the prospect as the wooed. This metaphor emphasizes using the appropriate message at the appropriate time. For instance, just as a gentleman caller wouldn’t ask a woman to marry him on the first date, neither would a marketer ask for the sale the minute a prospect expresses any interest at all in the marketer’s product or service. Patience, marketers, patience.
... a ConversationThis analogy stresses the back and forth between the prospect and the marketer. In this metaphor, as a prospect exposes his digital body language as he, for instance, visits different parts of a website; the marketer keeps the conversation going by directing the prospect to various pieces of content that appear to interest him. This analogy of the lead nurturing process places a premium on the marketer’s ability to not simply talk to a prospect—but to stop and listen every once in a while.
... a Teaching MomentSome view lead nurturing as an advisor-student relationship. This way of thinking aligns with the main theme of “The Challenger Sale,” a book that made the case that the most effective salespeople tell prospective customers something they don’t know. They, in effect, teach them. They instruct them on how a pain point—maybe even one the prospects didn’t even know they had—can be made far less painful with the vendor’s product or service.
... a Mediocre Baseball Player
A poor baseball player hits about .200, which means he gets a hit one out of every five times at bat. Batting around .200 used to be called the Mendoza Line after a weak-hitting shortstop named Mario Mendoza from the 1970s.
Many savvy marketers are beginning to address this inherent deficiency in email-based nurturing programs with multi-channel lead nurturing tools such as LinkedIn Lead Accelerator, which adds targeted display and social advertising to the nurturing mix.
Many lead nurturing programs are like bad hitters, because the prospects in the marketer’s database only open about 20 percent of the marketer’s emails. (This problem is even worse than it seems, because only about 5 percent of website visitors even share their email address).
The concept of lead nurturing is fairly simple. It’s the process of building relationships with prospects who aren’t yet ready to buy your product or service. Because up to 90 percent of the purchase process may be complete before a prospect reaches out to sales, marketers are more responsible for lead nurturing than ever. And lead nurturing delivers results.
Forrester Research said companies that excel at lead nurturing generate 50 percent more sales ready leads—at a 33 percent lower cost.
Leads that are nurtured tend to be more valuable, with nurtured leads making 47 percent larger purchases than leads that were not nurtured.
For many marketers, lead nurturing has become synonymous with marketing automation, and the concept of lead nurturing can sometimes get obscured by all the new technology. So marketing automation vendors got pretty good at explaining lead nurturing with metaphors. Here are six of our favorites, especially the one you can have garnished with olives..
6Favorite Metaphors for Lead Nurturing
LEAD NURTURING IS LIKE...
50% 47%
... a 3-Martini LunchBefore the rise of the Internet, the sales team controlled lead nurturing. Salespeople built relationships with prospects—that is they nurtured leads, because not everybody is ready to buy right now—by demonstrating their industry knowledge, by showing their humorous or entertaining side, and, ultimately by explaining why a prospect should buy the salesperson’s product or service. Often, the salespeople did their lead nurturing over lunch—occasionally over the mythical, Don Draper-style three-martini lunch.
Learn more about how you can nurture leads to drive more conversions with LinkedIn Lead Accelerator by visiting business.linkedin.com/marketing-solutions
