Lead Generation Services

In today’s market there are numerous ways of obtaining new sales leads for your business. This page of our website aims to show the Pro’s and Cons’ of the most common methods for increasing sale opportunities.

Outsourced Telesales

Pro's	Con's
Low start up cost (as little as £250.00) Skilled and trained staff No office space required Proven track record Can be used when required (minimum 3 hours)/ No fixed overheads Very quick to implement No recruitment issues	In most cases you do not own the data Management of supplier Less understanding of your business Work less closely with the field sales team Integration of the data into your own sales database can be an issue Some suppliers will provide the leads to multiple companies

Overview
The standard of outsourced telesales company’s varies considerably and hence BIZAL would always recommend a small trial i.e. less than £500.00 before embarking on larger projects.

Best Usage
Outsourced telesales can meet many of your lead generation requirements and is very effective in the following areas:

Prospect Profiling
This provides you with all the data required for the sales team to know if the suspect has a requirement, what it is for, who the existing supplier is, budget, purchasing criteria etc. It is also very useful for targeted marketing campaigns because it enables you to send the right information to the right person at the right time.
Events
If your company runs events i.e. seminars, workshops, training etc the ability to use external telesales teams to create a high number of targeted attendees can be invaluable and will not divert your staff from their existing tasks.

Internal Telesales

Pro's	Con's
All activities are entered directly into your own sales database system Work more closely with the field sales team Good understanding of your product / service(s) You own the data Provides the ability to prospect profile when used is conjunction with a sales database Exclusive leads / prospect profiles	Good telesales staff are rare and hence hard to find and keep Management of person / team Higher initial overheads Need office space, IT resources, etc. Training costs Ongoing fixed overhead

Overview
Good internal telesales people are very hard to find and therefore the required results may not be realised. If good people can be found then with proper management, in many cases, advancement to a field sales role will produce excellent results.

Best Usage
Internal Telesales work best on complex sales where a higher amount of industry / company knowledge is needed to generate sales opportunities. When the telesales people work closely with the field salespeople it also has the additional benefit of preparing telesales people for career advancement.

Search Engine Optimisation

Pro's	Con's
High web visibility No extra cost for leads The internet is now the major method of people / companies finding suppliers / product / services You get more than double the amount of website hits for the same position as a PPC advert (see below) Creates additional revenue opportunities from affiliate programs Highly targeted marketing	Not all company’s search the web for suppliers Results may take several months Requires a commitment to a fixed monthly spend There is an ever increasing number of companies that supply this service and not all deliver the results expected A very good website is required to convert hit’s into sales leads / orders

Overview
This has become the “Holy Grail” for many company’s and although it is very effective at generating website traffic, it is very dependant on the effectiveness of the website to generate results.

Best Usage
SEO works best where the website has been optimised for key phrases that have a high number of relevant Internet searches per month. It is also possible to become an effective “affiliate” which can be a very cost effective way of generating additional revenue with very little effort.

Pay per Click

Pro's	Con's
Highly targeted marketing You only pay if there is an interest Quick to implement i.e. less than 2 working days Has good tracking to establish ROI Can be turned on / off as required Maximum / minimum spend per month is easily controlled on most Search Engines	Some key word search terms are very expensive The volume of searches for particular key words will vary from period to period Every click has a cost Often needs some website usability development Generates less traffic than a high page rank Some Search Engines have a minimum monthly spend (e.g. £20.00)

Overview
Pay Per Click is the fastest growing form of advertising and is very quick to implement with company’s spending from £10.00 upwards per month. It is also very targeted advertising i.e. people need to type in your key phrase and also click on your advert before you are charged.

Best Usage
Pay Per Click works best to establish which words should be search engine optimised i.e. market research. It is most cost effective where the phrase is very specific, has low search volumes, and a low cost per click.

Press Advertising

Pro's	Con's
Provides branding as well as sales leads Creates Additional “Comfort Factor” Creates awareness which help other forms of lead generation	Very Untargeted compared with SEO/ PPC Mostly the same readers every day/ week/ month Generally a higher cost per lead for B2B & B2C sales than other methods Works best when repeated over several weeks/ months etc which requires higher investment than many other forms of lead generation In most cases it is very hard to track where the sales leads come from.

Overview
Advertising in press publications is the least targeted of all forms of lead generation. However it does have the benefit of raising the profile of a company and increases credibility / comfort factor.

Best Usage
This form of advertising works best in vertical publications that have a high readership matching the target market user profile. It also works well in conjunction with other marking activities i.e. press articles, telesales etc.

Networking

Pro's	Con's
Referral’s through your contacts are often very strong leads A lot of networking can be done on-line and by email and hence very cost-effective. Helps build company/ brand awareness Often brings new ideas/ routes to market. Identifies potential value added business partners/ relationships	Is often very untargeted compared with SEO/ PPC/ telesales It is harder to establish ROI i.e. Some Networking groups require you to be present every week and hence are often logistically very difficult In many cases it takes several months before you get a positive result.

Overview
Over the last few years there has been a dramatic increase of online and offline networking opportunities that has made it a lot more cost-effective. However, like other forms of marketing it needs to be targeted to produce positive ROI.

Best Usage
Of all the various forms of networking Online / Community networking requires least time and often produces positive results very quickly. This is especially true when answering a question that is relevant to your product / services i.e. an accountant answering a financial query in one of the many forums.

Speed networking is also worth consideration. From the results we have seen to date, it requires a closer look although it is still a recent development in the UK.

Summary

There are many methods of generating sales leads, every method has a different ROI and is dependant on multitude of factors.

BIZAL specialises in optimising this part of the sales process and works with SME’s to Plc’s to define and implement the most cost effective strategy.

For further information please click here »

INSIDE THIS SECTION

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BIZAL announces new sales
trainer for 1 to sales training sessions
16th February 2008

This enables BIZAL to provide additional coaching and mentoring services that are sales focused. This provides an addition to the standard sales and marketing training provided by BIZAL.
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