How To Successfully Target Leads

how_to_successfully_target_leads_zq

06 Oct How To Successfully Target Leads

Insurance agents who are generating their own leads internally spend huge portions of their resources hunting down leads that have little chance of converting into customers. Agents who turn to third party lead providers without vetting their vendor, however, can waste money on uncontactable, unqualified or uninterested leads. The result is a subpar lead pool with an increased cost per lead and diminished conversion rates. At a time when consumers have come to expect more transparency in the supply chains of their goods and services, insurance agents turn to marketers to practice careful ethics when designing and running a lead generation campaign.

In February 2016, a survey from Demand Gen Report showed that 83% of marketers consider lead quality over lead quantity their top overall priority for lead generation, followed closely by improving campaign results. One strategy for improving lead quality and gaining better conversion rates is to hire a lead generation service that willingly reveals the full lifecycle of the leads they deliver to clients. Insisting on this requirement eliminates the possibility of paying for leads that have been questionably procured or don’t comply with federal regulations.

In the past, it was difficult for lead generation companies to verify lead origins and provide this kind of transparency, but today’s technology and the increased amount of data consumers share on the Internet have made it easier. Most consumers now actively engage in researching products and services before purchase, and voluntarily provide information on their location, demographics, and purchase history. Whereas leads were once generated by drawing on massive pools of people who fit a certain demographic, big data allows lead generators to refine their search to people in that demographic who also fit more specific qualifications and are in a position to make a purchase.

Agents can also play an important role in improving the quality of leads they are delivered from third party services. By carefully tracking and scoring the performance of each lead as it is contacted, nurtured, and pushed towards sales, agents can better refine their lead generation qualifications. Eighty-six percent of marketers are now using lead scoring as an integral part of their strategy. Feeding this information back to the lead generation company allows them, in turn, to improve their strategies, creating a positive feedback loop that helps both agents and lead generators deliver better results.

Lead targeting can feasibly be done with a wide brush, but leads generated within vague search parameters are less than likely to deliver real results. Tracking and monitoring your leads from their inception through to conversion will help you determine which of your search parameters are performing best and which need to be reconsidered. Working to develop your strategy in partnership with an experienced lead generator will allow you to take advantage of big data that most sales agents wouldn’t otherwise have access to. For further reading on the future of lead generation, read our white paper here.

 

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