I met with a client this morning who currently uses Net-Results to track website visitors and identify companies coming to her site. When she sees one who could be a good prospect, she picks up the phone and attempts to call the person who came to her site. She doesn’t always get to the right person, but she does typically make contact with someone in the organization and has a good initial prospecting call. When I asked her how she normally follows up with those prospects, she said she generally handwrites notes and mails them. I thought that was a great idea – very few people do that because email is just easier – so it really makes her standout. But, I felt that the combination of handwritten notes and automated lead nurturing could further enhance her follow-up strategy and give her greater insight into the actual interest level of her prospects. Read more

The term marketing automation has been around for some years now, and many (like us) in the industry believe this term to be pretty commonplace.  Truthfully, however, I can’t tell you the number of times we get blank stares or bits of awkward pauses when we say ‘marketing automation’ with prospective customers, and even prospective channel partners. Then I will say something like “What if you could identify the real prospects who are visiting your site, the things they are interested in, and how often they are visiting? Then you could follow up with an integrated email campaign targeted at a variety of segments based on their interests, behaviors and feedback? And provide scoring and nurturing of these leads within your system, all the while tying it into your CRM system and passing it on to salespeople to turn that information into revenue?” Read more