In the first two blog posts of this series, we showed you how the customer lifecycle works and how to set up your automated lead generation process. If you haven’t read those posts yet, we’d highly recommend that you check them out to get fully up to speed.
By now you’ll have automatically captured leads with your lead magnet and those are sitting in your CRM. You may wonder, how do you get them to buy from you? The truth is, only a small percentage of your leads will be ready to make an immediate purchase decision. That’s completely normal.
While you focus on closing those sales, though, you can’t ignore the majority of your leads. They are still interested in your business and solution but are just not ready yet to buy. In this article, we’ll show you exactly how you can get them ready and close the deal. That’s called lead nurturing. Let’s start with why it’s so important for every business.
Why automated lead nurturing is important
The short answer is: It will get you more sales while saving you money. Companies that excel at lead nurturing generate 50% more sales at 33% lower cost, plus nurtured leads make 47% larger purchases compared to non-nurtured leads. Can’t really argue with that. And there are a few more reasons that explain why lead nurturing is essential.
You won’t waste your marketing dollars
You’ve already invested resources into getting leads through your automated lead generation process. For example, you might have put some budget towards Facebook ads. Would you want this money to be wasted? Of course not! But that’s what literally happens when leads are captured but not nurtured and converted into paying clients. They need your attention and a one-off attempt at selling them your solution will hardly work. Here’s why.
Hard sells aren’t working
At this point, your leads already know you a little, through social media, blog posts, and your lead magnet, of course. It’s a fresh relationship, and a little bit of trust has been established. That’s when many companies make the mistake to push for the hard sell too soon and subsequently lose their leads. Nobody likes to be forced to buy. Instead, take the approach of slowly but surely nurturing them and gaining their trust.
You won’t lose touch with your leads
As soon as the hard sell hasn’t worked, many businesses simply abandon their leads. That’s the worst thing you could do. By always staying in touch and providing value to your leads, they will slowly open up to you. They’ll ask questions about your products and services from which you can learn. They might refer you to a friend or family member, even though they haven’t bought from you yet. Simply because you’re being helpful. When you stay in touch, you’ll always stay on top of your lead’s minds, and they will come to you when they’re ready.
How the lead nurturing process works
It starts with your automated lead generation efforts pulling your prospects towards your lead magnet. On the last page of your lead magnet, provide your leads with the first Call to Action (also called a CTA; this is where we ask them to take action.) This will take them to a sales letter which will sell them into getting on a call with you. If your prospects are ready to take the next step, they’ll jump on this opportunity. They already trust you enough and see value in your solution. In the call itself, you can close the sale.
As we’ve mentioned, the majority of leads will probably ignore this first CTA though. Those leads will now receive an automated sequence of nurturing emails that provides them with more value and slowly chip away at any objections and fears they might have around taking action. Throughout and at the end of this sequence, you can place more CTAs asking to join the consultation call. If they do so, great!
If not, no problem! We also have a solution for those leads. They will transition into an evergreen newsletter. Here you can continue to add value, share updates, and build a long term relationship. Your newsletter should also include a CTA to get on a call whenever they’re ready. There’s no pressure.
Sounds good? Let us show you the exact steps you can take to set up your automated lead nurturing, plus tips to close the sale in your consultation call.
Set up your lead nurturing step by step
1. Write your sales letter
The first thing you’ll want to do is write your sales letter that’ll convince your leads to take the next step of booking the consultation call with you. Why you need a sales letter here? Because you want to assure your lead that this is the logical next step for them. When they reach the end of the letter, getting on a call with you should be a no-brainer for them.
You might wonder how long your sales letter should be? There’s no right or wrong here. It has to be long enough to establish a reasoning for your lead to book a consultation call with you. Long copy is ok, as long as it’s not long-winded. Your letter should be engaging and fun to read. Simply follow our outline to get started:
2. Set up an automated calendar booking system
Now, let’s set up the automated process that takes your lead from your sales letter to the consultation call. Automated calendar booking systems like ScheduleOnce or Calendly make this super easy. Your lead has direct access to your calendar and can choose a date and time that’s right for them (and for you, of course.) without the endless back and forth emails. You can pre-define which dates and times you want to make yourself available for these calls.
Once booked, your lead will get an automatic confirmation and all necessary details to join the call. We’d recommend doing video calls on Zoom or Skype. This way, you can speak face-to-face, which makes it always easier to establish rapport. Now, all you have to do is check your calendar and join the calls that are booked automatically.
3. Create your automated email sequence
This email sequence is for all leads who didn’t book a call yet. You can set this up directly in your CRM (for example, Keap by Infusionsoft) or any other Email Service Provider you’re using. The purpose of these emails is to let your leads get to know, like, and trust you more, so they’ll buy from you when they’re ready. And all this will happen in the background while you’re not even lifting a finger.
Here are the basic rules for these nurturing emails. They should:
- Get your leads excited to open future emails from you.
- Make a strong first impression of you and your business.
- Not be too much about you, but mostly about them.
- Be helpful and add value.
Every email in your sequence will have a specific purpose. It will take your leads on a journey that ideally ends with them booking a call. Here’s an example of how a 7-day email nurture sequence can look like. Feel free to emulate or adapt it for your business.
Email #1 – Scheduled immediately after they submit the form on your landing page
- Deliver the lead magnet.
- Show them how excited you are to have them here.
- Tell them what they can expect from you going forward.
- Connect them to your social media pages (in case they aren’t following you yet).
- Ask them to whitelist your email, so they can be sure to receive all further emails.
Email #2 – Scheduled 1 hour after the first email
- Share a personal story that relates to their challenges and pain points and how you’ve overcome them.
- Ask them what their main goal or challenge is right now. You want them to reply to your email.
- Give a hint about what you’re going to send in the next email.
Email #3 – Scheduled 1 day after the second email
- Share a useful piece of content (blog post, video, etc.).
- CTA to book a consultation with you.
Email #4 – Scheduled 1 day after the third email
- Ask them to read email #3 if they haven’t already.
- Share another useful piece of content (blog post, video, etc.).
- CTA to book a consultation with you.
Email #5 – Scheduled 1 day after the fourth email
- Call out anything that might be holding them back from moving forward and making a decision. Help them overcome those objections.
- Ask them directly what their biggest fear/concern is right now. You want them to reply to your email.
- Share another useful piece of content (blog post, video, etc.).
- CTA to book a consultation with you.
Email #6 – Scheduled 1 day after the fifth email
- Show them a case study or testimonial that proofs that someone like them has overcome their problems and is now thriving.
- Share another useful piece of content (blog post, video, etc.).
- CTA to book a consultation with you.
Email #7 – Scheduled 1 day after the sixth email
- Give all the details of your offer.
- Show them what happens if they don’t act and stay in the same place.
- Introduce a sense of urgency and scarcity (e.g., limited spots).
- CTA to book a consultation with you.
Email #8 – Scheduled 1 day after the seventh email
- Let them know that you don’t want them to miss out.
- Remind them what they’re missing out on if they don’t take your offer.
- Reiterate urgency and scarcity (e.g., limited spots)
- CTA to book a consultation with you.
Make sure that your emails are set up in a way that once a lead books the call, they will be taken out of this sequence and directly migrate into receiving your evergreen newsletter.
4. Convert your leads
When you’ve set up your lead magnet and the email nurture sequence, you should have a couple of consultation calls automatically booked in your calendar. Now, you just have to convert these hot leads into paying customers.
Here are our tips for a successful sales call:
When your prospect is ready to pull the trigger, make purchasing as easy as possible for them. You can do that by sending them a proposal that outlines everything you talked about in your call and reiterates the value they’re getting. Set up contracts that can be signed electronically (no printouts, manually signing, and scanning necessary). Utilise an online payment provider like Stripe to seamlessly collect the payments for your products or services.
5. Establish your evergreen newsletter
Once a lead has gone through your nurture email sequence, he or she will automatically migrate into your evergreen newsletter. This is a regular email from you (we recommend sending it once a week), and it will do three things for you:
- Build a long term relationship with your audience and keep you top of mind.
- Continue to add value and deliver useful content to your audience.
- Make you accessible so that your prospects can contact you whenever they’re ready to buy.
Putting together a newsletter doesn’t have to take hours. Likely you already have a lot of content sitting around that could be leveraged. Simply follow our tips to get started:
Now it’s your turn
Lead nurturing is a crucial step in your customer lifecycle. What benefit does it bring to generate all those leads through Facebook ads or other outreach methods only to have them sit idle in your CRM? These leads literally want to hear from you. Now you’ve got the chance to turn them into clients and raving fans for your business. They just need a bit of attention and love.
We’ve covered a ton of steps, tactics, and tools in this article. You’ve got a good amount of information to get started. We’ll be honest though, it does take a bit of work to set this up. But it’s 100% worth it! Imagine you could wake up to a filled calendar of pre-qualified dream clients all excited to start working with you!
Still feeling a bit overwhelmed? Or don’t want to set all this up by yourself? We’ve got you covered. We’d be happy to implement an automated lead nurturing process for you in a way that is right for your business and audience. Why not jump on a call with us and we can discuss the details? Simply click the button below to secure your call, and we can get you on the way to more clients and revenue.
