Here’s a question for you: What’s the real cost of using poor data sources in your business?
Everyone marketing and selling to corporate training and HR is looking for a silver bullet to reach qualified decision makers. While there is no one right way to market to this sector, one thing is clear – you must avoid the “bad data trap” if you are to achieve success selling to these markets.
Exhausting your time trying to manage poor data while marketing your products and services can cause immense setbacks to your business.
Using “inexpensive” lists with inaccurate information will negatively impact your business development efforts – and your bottom line.
Issues caused by using inferior data include:
- Wasted time, energy, and talents
- Campaign efforts not effectively measurable
- Loss of inbound opportunities
- Sellers waste time calling contacts who’ve left the company or are not decision makers
- Lower revenue per rep
- Decreased morale due to time wasted searching for the right contacts
To avoid this “bad data” trap, we recommend three easy steps to help achieve greater productivity while increasing your bottom line.
Step 1:
The obvious first step is this: you MUST locate a high quality source of leads — preferably decision maker contacts.
Find out: Is your list partner really just a “list broker”, compiling and selling inaccurate data from other sources? OR — do they build their lists from scratch like Mentor Tech Group does?
What’s the difference?
List brokers aggregate data from other lists. The result? Data that is often old, outdated, and inaccurate – otherwise known as Bad Data.
But list OWNERS, like Mentor Tech Group, create a database in-house, by hand. MTG lists are built via personal conversations with each contact in our database. We do not compile information from other lists. We create and maintain our database by speaking with and qualifying each and every contact as a decision maker within their organization. This allows us to categorize each contact in our database by Job Code, giving you more detailed information about each contact’s role and responsibilities.
Our internal team building the list are called “Market Intelligence Consultants”, each of whom is a seasoned industry professional. These are not “telemarketers” simply asking how to spell a contact’s first and last name, or verifying titles. Rather, they are highly-trained professionals, who speak with each contact personally to verify their decision making responsibilities and capture invaluable sales notes to maximize your sales team’s outbound efforts. This is not like the typical data you will find available from list brokers – this is Market Intelligence, providing you with more insight into each contact. Our “MICs” make over 130,000 phone calls each year to build and maintain this information – for YOUR benefit!
By connecting over the phone, they can ask key questions and make a judgment call to determine IF the prospect merits membership in the MTG database. The result? Highly accurate, decision-maker data for more effective prospecting. This is VERY different from the data you will get from any typical list broker.
Step 2:
Once you have a high quality source of leads, you must effectively market to them, nurture them with value-added content to keep them engaged with you. The goal is to provide valuable insights and information, as you build trust and confidence in your brand and offering.
It is imperative that you create an ongoing lead nurturing outreach effort, to develop prospects and remain in front of them at regular intervals. Then, when their elusive time of need arises, they will think of you first. Being “the last one in the door”, will make you “the first one they think of” when looking for a solution in your space.
Step 3:
Provide your business development team with a high quality CRM system to track, monitor, and manage all prospect and customer information. Research your options carefully when choosing a CRM system – the low priced option may not be the best solution for your business needs. Free options may sound good at the start, but they offer limited ability to create customized campaigns or to sort, track, and report on important data down the road.
Most CRM systems provide an array of reporting capabilities, so be sure to create fields containing drop down pick-lists to capture critical information you can then report on later, including: reason for won/lost sales, opportunity stages, last outreach date, last call result, marketing responses, etc. Use this information to create tickler files, targeted marketing campaigns, and revenue forecasting!
The Bottom Line
The bottom line is this: you must BEGIN the sales /marketing process by using high quality data, or the entire process will be ineffective right from the start.
Avoid the bad data trap…
Give your business developers the decision-maker contacts they seek by using Mentor Tech Group’s market intelligence data. Then, implement a long-term marketing strategy to nurture and develop those leads over time.
Remember, not everyone will be ready to buy when you first contact them. But, with a high quality list provided by Mentor Tech Group, combined with a content-rich lead nurturing campaign, and lots of “polite persistence”, you will be present and ready to address your prospects’ needs at the time they ARE ready to buy.
Happy Hunting!
Calculate the ROI you could see by using a high-quality, drilled down list of decision-makers in your industry – then contact us for a customized list quote.
For a list quote, or to learn more about our unique “market intelligence” database, please contact Mentor Tech Group today at: (651) 457-8600, Ext. 3
