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To turn leads into satisfied customers, you have to invest some of your already scarce resources in nurturing those contacts. With marketing automation you can achieve more and save resources at the same time.
Is your work ending up in the bin?
The vast majority of B2B buying decisions start with research on the internet. With informative and engaging content, you have turned prospects into leads. We certainly do not need to tell you that leads want to be nurtured so they become customers. And it is no secret either that email marketing is a strong tool for convincing your leads of your company's services.
Every day, far more than 100 million emails end up unread in the bin, sorted out and locked away as spam.
What can you do about it? For your emails to be read, they have to be relevant to the recipient. Relevant means tailored exactly to their current need. That would mean you cannot send generic emails but have to tailor each one to its recipient. Quite a lot of effort, right? We are convinced that personalised lead nurturing is easy to implement. The keyword is marketing automation.
What does B2B lead nurturing actually mean?
Nurturing means caring for something. B2B lead nurturing is therefore the care of your B2B prospects. Its goal is to supply the recipients of your messages with the right information at exactly the right time and so guide them through the customer journey.
The relevance of B2B lead nurturing can be shown with a few figures:
- 63% of people who gather information about a company will not buy from it. Conversely, this means 37% of your leads could become customers.
- 50% of all buyers choose the vendor that responds fastest.
- 65% of marketing professionals do without lead nurturing altogether.
- Yet automated B2B lead nurturing could generate 451% (!) more qualified leads.
B2B lead nurturing: respond fast to what your customers are looking for
The potential of future customers among your leads is huge. For your leads to become customers, you have to respond quickly and know exactly what your prospects want. Emails are among the most efficient tools for meeting your prospects where they are. To be as efficient as possible, you have to use your resources well.
B2B lead nurturing in practice: a (fictitious) example
A trading company that imports and sells machine tools and provides the related service supplies its prospects with a weekly personalised newsletter that covers a wide range of topics. Besides current trends in CNC controls, technology and Industry 4.0, recipients also get information on changed DIN standards, new tools and current purchase prices for raw materials. User reports are a regular part of the newsletter too. The trading company thus positions itself as a reliable source, and as an expert who answers questions before they are even asked.
B2B lead nurturing: how strangers become paying customers
The basis for success with leads is the right strategy. You not only have to understand your target groups' needs in detail but also serve them in a tailored way. To do so, analyse your prospects' behaviour and then provide them with useful resources.
With
- white papers,
- cost comparisons
- and webinars
you create the attention your leads need, for example. With consultations, demos or a trial offer you support prospects on the way to a decision, and once your leads have become customers, you retain them with benefits.
Is manual B2B lead nurturing enough?
Nurturing leads by hand is the status quo in most companies. A well-thought-out process is usually missing. The lead list does receive newsletters regularly, but often with generic content: embellished product presentations and praise for the «comprehensive all-round service», but rarely exactly the information that matters to the recipient.
The result: one click and your newsletter ends up unread in digital nirvana. Somewhat cynically, one could say: at least lead nurturing is happening. As we saw above, in most cases leads are not nurtured at all. And if just one customer results in the end, it was worth it, wasn't it?
The main problem with nurturing: missing resources
Various sources estimate that 80% of your leads will never become customers. That does not sound too bad at first, because conversely 20% do become customers. In practice, though, it is not as simple as it sounds in theory. Do not forget: those 20% do not become customers as if by magic either.
As mentioned, lead nurturing is an effective way of turning leads into customers, provided your content is relevant to each recipient. This is exactly where the problem starts for most companies: where are all the resources for nurturing leads supposed to come from? Especially for those right at the start of the customer journey.
It is not only small marketing teams who ask this question. In larger companies with bigger marketing departments, too, people and time are often the bottleneck for successful lead nurturing. That is a pity, especially since marketing automation is so well suited to B2B lead nurturing.
Saving resources and achieving more with marketing automation
Marketing automation means a platform or software tools that collect and prepare customer data and, depending on a trigger, launch different preset processes that lead your leads to the goal you want. What is remarkable about marketing automation: you can run even large campaigns at any scale, segment your leads precisely and serve their needs and interests individually.
Personalised marketing that reaches your leads exactly when they need the information: that is marketing automation.
And the best part: you need far fewer resources than for comparable results the conventional way.
Benefits of marketing automation in B2B lead nurturing
Most marketing automation solutions are based on evaluating your CRM data and trigger certain actions based on specific triggers or segments. That is why you absolutely need clear processes, because automation works by rules. Done right, it brings several benefits:
- More qualified contacts and higher conversions
- Personalised marketing campaigns
- Better collaboration between marketing, sales and service on one platform
- Automatic adaptation of marketing activities to the needs and interests of the target groups
- Comprehensive nurturing of leads from the awareness stage to the loyalty stage as a customer
Avoid the typical pitfalls, though: we have collected them in the most common marketing automation mistakes.
Conclusion: scale good lead nurturing with marketing automation
Relationships need care to grow and thrive. That applies in private life as much as in business. Personalised content tailored exactly to the interests and needs of your buyer persona is indispensable in B2B, but unfortunately also very resource-intensive. With marketing automation you can make B2B lead nurturing more effective without straining your resources.
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