Phil Lauterjung

A number of years ago there was a very funny movie called City Slickers, and if you haven’t seen it go rent it.  You’ll be glad you did.  Briefly it’s about some New York ‘city slickers’ who get the bright idea to spend a couple of weeks at a working dude ranch out west.  Jack Palance plays Curly, a grizzled old cowboy who epitomizes what it means to be a cowboy.  In one scene he explains Curly’s Law:

Curly: Do you know what the secret of life is?
Curly: This. [holds up one finger]
Mitch: Your finger?
Curly: One thing. Just one thing. You stick to that and the rest don’t mean sh*t.
Mitch: But what is the “one thing?”
Curly: [smiles] That’s what you have to find out.

Well, one thing may get you through most of your life – maybe.  But, there isn’t any one thing that will get you more leads for your business.  In my last post, In Search of the Marketing Silver Bullet, I made that point and then announced a series that would help you learn more about integrated lead generation.

Before we dive into the nuts and bolts, there are a few things I should make clear.  One is that  businesses must pay very close attention to the strategies and tactics they use for lead generation.  Research (from Sirius Decisions, CSO Insights, and Aberdeen) has shown that most businesses do a poor job of handling the leads they get.  Here are some very sobering results from these studies:

• Only 20% of leads are actively worked.
• The other 80% end up buying within 24 months, usually from someone else.
• At least 50% of companies do a bad job of nurturing leads.
• 51% of sales execs are not happy with the quality of leads.
• 56% of responding companies did not have a formal program to nurture long-term lead opportunities – the ones that end up buying within 24 months.

Those statistics should give you a good reason to assess what you are doing.  If 80% of your leads eventually buy, and from someone else, you don’t need me to do the math for you.  That’s a lot of missed sales revenue!

Before we go into the process end-to-end in the next several posts, here are a couple things to review in your company.

1. Does your marketing speak to your customers in their language, or in your own ‘corporate speak’.  Customers aren’t impressed with a lot of corporate buzz words, they want to know how you solve problems – specifically theirs.  More on this topic later in this series.
2. Do you have a well thought out value proposition?  Does it also speak to the customer’s needs?  Or does it just say how great you are?  You probably are great, but even your not-so-great competition says they are too.  Your value proposition needs to address what makes you truly unique in you customer’s eyes.  NOTE – Free Webinar on Wednesday, Sept. 16, 2009:  How to Craft and Deliver Winning Value Propositions.
3. Have someone you trust, who doesn’t work for you, review your web site and your printed materials and give you an honest assessment regarding the above two points.  Tell them to be brutally honest.  You may not like what you hear, but you will have taken the first step to making changes.  Those will become a key part of an integrated lead generation process that turn your leads into relationships that end up buying from you.

In the next post we begin taking a look at some of your lead sources and what you can do there.  In the meantime, if you have questions, please post them in the comments area.

Photo Credit:  cogdogblog

Related posts:

1. Lead Generation Using Social Media PR The lifeblood of any business is leads – right?  If...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.