FREE Training:
How to Convert Social Media Contacts into Customers
Step 5 - OPPORTUNITY
Hopefully, you’ve taken the advice in the previous sections to heart and have the success to prove it, by successfully identifying your quality prospects and nurturing them as they need. Now, you should be at the stage to spot the prospects that will be open to buying from you—so you can jump on the opportunity.
Seeing The Wood For The Trees
This is where some business fall at the final hurdle. How do you get the timing right? Making the move to sell to a prospect can make or break the whole process: if the prospect isn’t close enough to buying from you, then you run the risk of turning them away. On the other hand, if you wait too long, your prospect might lose interest. It may not be 100% clear what your prospect’s intentions are.
A business that doesn’t recognise the telltale signs of a hot prospect will throw everything they have at all of their leads. Of course, this isn’t a very successful strategy, as time and money will be wasted on people who aren’t ready to buy. This way, you can lose sight of the golden nuggets in your database and miss your opportunity with them.
The Answer Already There
The best way to know which prospects are ready to buy is through prospect scoring. Dividing your prospects into ‘cool’, ‘warm’ and ‘hot’ prospects, and setting a threshold for each, will allow you to focus on the individuals that are ready to do business. Then, with your cool and warm prospects, you can continue to nurture them until they are ready.
It is beneficial to base your thresholds on what you already know worked in the past. Put the ‘relationship’ into prospect relationship management! What did your previous customers talk about with you just before you made a successful transaction? What warmed them to you? Most importantly, what clued you in that they were ready to buy? If an individual is mirroring these success indicators—then congratulations, you’ve got a hot prospect on your hands.
But if you can’t rely on historical data, then practice will make perfect. Remember, this isn’t a complete shot in the dark: you’ve collected enough information through your CRM and your sales pipeline to know that your prospect is still likely to want to buy from you.
Make sure your software can handle this sort of measurement. Simple software may make your data accessible, but can it notify you when a warm prospect turns into a hot prospect? With popcorn, you can set the score for your prospects, and adjust them if needed. This is especially important; as your business grows, your CRM’s tools needs to learn with you.
Respond Accordingly
Having identified which prospects are hot enough to chase, you need to plan your response. This depends on how you sell, and what your industry standard is. What do customers for your industry expect? Is it a phone call or an online transaction?
The tried and true can help to secure that sale, but also don’t be afraid to experiment. Your hot prospects might appreciate a more personal approach. Don’t fret if you try something new and they don’t react as you’d hoped; you can fine-tune the process as you go. Besides, it might work for another customer in the future—after all, they are all individuals.
Discover all the steps to PRM NOW
Step 1 – POST (4 mins)
‘NURTURE’ is about cultivating your leads, so that the opportunities stand out.
Step 2 – REACT (5 mins)
‘REACT’ discusses how to drive more ‘POST’ engagement and how to identify time wasters and real prospects.
Step 1 – MANAGE (3 mins)
‘MANAGE’ is a vital part of converting your Social Media Contacts whilst ensuring that leads are not missed.
Step 4 – NURTURE (4 mins)
‘NURTURE’ is about cultivating your leads, so that the opportunities stand out.
Step 5 – OPPORTUNITY (5 mins)
‘OPPORTUNITY’ goes though how to turn all the opportunities and successfully spot the HOT prospects.
Step 6 – WON (6 mins)
Now you’ve “WON” the customer, what should you do to turn them into advocates?
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