All of us have that good friend we go to once we want relationship recommendation.
But it surely’s not all the time about heartache or that roommate who received’t do their dishes. Typically it’s your leads who’re breaking your coronary heart. You thought you made an important first impression, so why don’t they need a second date?
When your lead gen alternatives are ensuing within the advertising equal of a one-night stand, let Mike King of digital advertising company iPullRank be that good friend.
On this episode of the Call to Action podcast, Mike tells you how one can create long-lasting relationships with leads – the sort that retains them coming again for extra.
On this episode you’ll be taught:
- The risks of focusing too carefully on conversions and what you have to be specializing in as an alternative.
- How data-driven personas might help you get to know your leads earlier than you ask for his or her quantity (or e mail tackle).
- Why unqualifying leads is usually higher than qualifying them.
Take heed to the podcast
Talked about within the podcast
Learn the transcript
Dan: You mentioned in your discuss at Name to Motion Convention final 12 months that you simply appreciated having your touchdown web page brutally critiqued on the Unbounce weblog. First off, thanks for being a great sport about that. You then went on to justly critique our personal Name to Motion Convention touchdown web page for being lower than optimum. Thanks for that, too. Is it me, or are entrepreneurs a bit like rappers? They love dissing their opponents and friends, however they will’t actually take the warmth when it’s directed at them.
Mike: I don’t know if that’s relegated to entrepreneurs or rappers. I feel that’s simply individuals probably not liking criticism. Me, I take pleasure in it as a result of these are all the time alternatives for me to enhance, so whenever you guys had written that publish, my workforce was crying about it. I used to be like, “Yo, they’re proper. Let’s take this as a chance to repair that touchdown web page.” However every time I can return the favor on one thing like that, I all the time love to take action.
Dan: Yeah, truthful sufficient.
Mike: I figured it was gonna be a enjoyable little intro. I like to start out out by getting individuals concerned or make them chortle slightly bit or one thing like that as a result of quite a lot of my stuff will get fairly technical, so I like to start out fairly lighthearted, and it was only a actually good strategy to get into the spirit of the issues that you simply guys do and offer you a style of your individual medication.
Dan: Yeah, no, that’s completely truthful, and I feel it’s a great factor for entrepreneurs to look inward generally. On the similar time you mentioned that lead era isn’t about us. It isn’t essentially how entrepreneurs really feel about it. It’s about how our viewers reacts to it. Why was that one thing that you simply thought was vital to place on the market?
Mike: Yeah, I assumed there was quite a lot of dialogue round how manufacturers are speculated to be or issues that manufacturers are speculated to do. It’s extra about how can we do issues that individuals are gonna react the way in which that we would like them to? It’s not about how we really feel about what it’s that’s being created or how issues are being positioned. It’s all about doing the issues that work for the audiences that we’re going after, so one of many topics of competition all through the convention was issues like pop-ups.
Dan: Proper.
Mike: Effectively, yeah, I hate pop-ups, however everyone knows that pop-ups work, so what’s the purpose in even making a problem about, “Oh, don’t do that as a result of that makes your model look unhealthy”? No, it doesn’t essentially make your model look unhealthy as a result of they work for individuals. So I feel it’s actually vital to do not forget that we as entrepreneurs are on this advertising echo chamber the place individuals are simply saying issues. They’ve opinions, and so they let their private opinions offset what knowledge is telling them. This isn’t me particularly dissing anybody individual. I’m simply saying that we as entrepreneurs simply want to pay attention to our personal biases and do not forget that it’s about our audiences, not about us.
Dan: Yeah, that’s positively good to bear in mind. You have been sort sufficient to offer some relationship recommendation in your discuss as nicely. You identified that we do quite a lot of one-night stands in lead gen, however not sufficient long-term relationships. What did you imply by that?
Mike: Yeah, I feel one of many issues in advertising, particularly digital advertising, is we’re very a lot targeted on that final click on, that final motion of the consumer. So many people work on issues which can be simply utterly low funnel, after which they neglect about creating this relationship with the consumer. So what I’m saying is consider extra of the funnel quite than simply specializing in that final half the place you’re simply attempting to get the prospect in mattress with you quite than desirous about taking them out on a date.
Dan: Proper, so when you fill that funnel, not forgetting about these individuals and persevering with to serve them with related content material that finally will get them to transform.
Mike: Yeah, and I feel you guys, or Unbounce quite, is a superb instance of that. You guys aren’t simply doing issues which can be like oh, get individuals to enroll straight away. You will have tons of content material that’s educating individuals, that’s exhibiting the worth of what you guys do and the trade generally. It creates a greater relationship that you simply guys have along with your prospects. Taking a look at CTAConf for instance, I think about there’s lots of people that go there that aren’t Unbounce prospects, however they respect what you guys do, and due to that you simply’re nurturing these relationships, after which they turn out to be a long-term buyer due to these efforts.
Dan: Yeah, you recommend a mannequin of lead gen that includes spending much more time attending to know individuals earlier than they shut the deal.
Mike: Sure.
Dan: What are a number of the advantages of that strategy?
Mike: Yeah, and I feel it goes again to the final level in that the extra that you simply perceive who you’re speaking to and how one can present worth to these individuals, the extra they’re gonna stick round and perceive that you simply get them. Once more, this isn’t about us. It’s in regards to the individuals which can be in these audiences, so how can we place the issues that we would like these individuals to do in that it turns into extra worthwhile to them apart from simply the precise transaction? So understanding your viewers is gonna can help you be actually hyper-focused on the issues that they need, and then you definitely’ll have the ability to create these issues and in the end win primarily based on the targets that you simply’re going after.
Dan: To get into brass tacks slightly bit, what do you imply whenever you say that personas ought to inform qualification of leads?
Mike: So in relation to qualification of leads, I imply sometimes everybody’s like, “Oh, this individual spent 5 minutes on the location, and so they checked out this web page, and so they checked out that web page.” Effectively, that’s very imprecise. I imply, any individual might do these issues after which additionally not convert, so having a greater understanding of who this individual is or who these individuals are as they’re going all through the method of conversion helps you 1) put the suitable messages in entrance of them and a pair of) makes certain that you simply’re getting individuals which can be really worthwhile to you.
So quite than going after hundreds of thousands of individuals after which simply filtering individuals out, it might be higher to filter individuals out to start with so that individuals on the again finish of the method are solely coping with high quality. I feel a great instance of that is the distinction between marketing-qualified leads and sales-qualified leads. A variety of occasions salespeople get upset on the leads that they’re getting from advertising as a result of they really feel like they’re not as worthwhile but. They’re not as certified or not as scorching of a lead, so if all people is considering the identical method just like the gross sales workforce is considering — that we solely need probably the most certified individuals — then you definitely’re not losing anyone’s time. What you’re doing is simply giving individuals worthwhile stuff, so I’m saying for those who qualify earlier and get extra aggressive about that, then you definitely’re solely coping with high quality on the again finish.
Dan: Proper, I feel generally it may be onerous for individuals to have that perspective, particularly if a advertising workforce is damaged up in a method the place the individuals driving consciousness and producing these leads, their KPIs are all about extra leads whereas the salespeople, they’re frightened about qualification, so for those who don’t make that connection to kinda take that holistic strategy, then I can see how in a siloed construction you may run into some issues there.
Mike: Completely.
Dan: You make the connection between creating data-driven personas and one thing that I feel not sufficient entrepreneurs discuss and even take into consideration, which is readability. Why is readability one thing that not simply content material entrepreneurs, however conversion-oriented entrepreneurs ought to care about?
Mike: Yeah, and we’ve made this connection kinda by chance simply enjoying round with knowledge. I’ve all the time understood what readability is as a result of I’m a developer myself, and understanding content material we’ve all the time performed round with these metrics, however then what we did is we ended up evaluating it with that web page worth metric in Google Analytics, and most of the time we’re seeing that issues which can be extra complicated to learn are method decrease in web page worth. So in the end they’re not changing, and that needs to be sort of an axiom, an apparent factor, however being that we will have a look at a particular metric, which is readability, and decide that altering that rating for content material has a direct affect on conversion. I feel that that’s extremely vital, and it’s a very simple method to earn more money out of your content material.
So far as connecting that to data-driven personas, nicely, one of many outputs from demographic knowledge is individuals’s studying stage, so in case you have an viewers that has a really low studying stage and your content material has very low readability, then there’s a transparent disconnect there. So one of many issues that individuals don’t like about personas is that sometimes they’re simply the output of some form of qualitative group setting affinity mapping session, after which quite a lot of data-driven entrepreneurs simply don’t imagine in them. They don’t imagine that there are methods to make personas measurable, and I counter that that’s completely false. There’s a lot knowledge now that permits us to try this even at no cost, so why not leverage that knowledge to make this complete course of measurable after which use that as a key element of figuring out methods to convert or make individuals convert extra?
Dan: Yeah, I feel that’s one other actually good instance of how utilizing knowledge helps inform the entire funnel and helps kinda break down these silos as a result of content material entrepreneurs could also be taking a look at KPIs like time on web page whereas the efficiency entrepreneurs are taking a look at issues like conversion charge, however right here you’re making the connection between these two issues, and I feel that empowers advertising groups to maneuver ahead way more collaboratively and confidently.
Mike: Yeah, after which the opposite element is we consider all these channels in very alternative ways, and clearly search is the one the place we’re getting intent, and customers have a really particular factor that they’re searching for, so typically talking it’s gonna convert extra, however the factor is for those who’re in a position to measure these viewers websites primarily based on these totally different channels, you see that the affect isn’t as dramatic between channels whenever you see the viewers as one other knowledge level.
So what you may find yourself seeing is that sure viewers varieties nonetheless convert very nicely from social media or simply in addition to they do from search, however as a result of the main target is so broad and also you’re getting all forms of individuals, you may see that typically talking search is your finest channel. So whenever you’re in a position to phase by viewers and channel as a number of dimensions, you get to some extent the place you perceive that it’s not simply the channel itself, it’s additionally the kind of individual coming from that channel.
Dan: Yeah, I imply I feel it goes again to what you mentioned earlier than — like we’re not simply speaking about rappers and entrepreneurs and leads. We’re in the end speaking about individuals right here, and that’s vital to bear in mind at each step.
Mike: Proper, proper.
Dan: You talked about one other mannequin in your discuss that includes unqualifying leads as an alternative of qualifying them.
Mike: Positive.
Dan: What does that seem like?
Mike: Yeah, and that’s kinda one thing that I seen simply trying round at individuals’s totally different conversion pages or their “Contact Us” pages, and I do know that Wil Reynolds — who additionally spoke at CTAConf — their firm really has not too long ago shifted to an unqualifying contact web page as nicely. So the exemplar that I confirmed in my discuss was from an company – nicely, not an company – it’s onerous to explain as a result of it’s like a distributed sort of factor the place this man named Dan Mall – his firm’s referred to as SuperFriendly – he has no workers. He simply pulls collectively a gaggle of individuals to work on a given venture at any time, and on his web page there isn’t any contact type. There’s a bunch of textual content that you must learn to then work out methods to attain out to them, and I feel that’s a really fascinating mannequin in that it solely brings the individuals that actually wanna work with you.
So I feel it’s a really fascinating mannequin, however on the similar time I feel it may also be a turnoff. Like, there are these individuals that may be very fascinated about working with you, however they could be turned off by your perspective since you’re kinda coming throughout as, I don’t know, what’s the phrase for a way startup individuals act the place they’re all condescending in direction of everybody after which simply making some mediocre product? Regardless of the phrase is for that, that’s the way you come throughout when you might have copy like that or a course of like that, so it’s a double-edged sword. Finally it’s about: what do you wish to be within the market? How do you wanna be perceived? And it goes again to branding and issues of that nature, however I feel you could be very cautious with that as a result of chances are you’ll find yourself scaring off lots of people that may be good high quality leads, prospects, purchasers, companions for you.
Dan: Proper, yeah. Oli Gardner, Unbounce’s co-founder, talks about good and unhealthy friction and the way if you need any individual to fill out a type, then sometimes you wanna scale back friction, however generally whenever you’re actually attempting to qualify individuals, including slightly bit extra friction — one other discipline or two — might be a great factor, however in fact there are good and unhealthy methods of doing that, and I feel desirous about your model is one thing that is a crucial consideration.
Mike: Precisely, precisely.
Dan: You make one other distinction between low-effort and high-effort lead gen. Are you able to break that down for us?
Mike: Yeah, certain. So what we’re in the course of doing, and it’s nonetheless ongoing, is a comparability of issues that don’t take a lot work to do. So for instance for those who simply wanna go after some key phrases on paid search, you make a touchdown web page, and also you’re simply capturing leads that method versus doing one thing that’s very content-driven and has some elements to it that we’ve got to customized construct from scratch. And there’s quite a lot of evaluation that went with that content material that we created. On this case, what I’m evaluating is what we did is we pulled an inventory of websites from Searchmetrics’s checklist of winners and losers, and we made touchdown pages that had messages to go for the winners and the losers, and that is particularly an inventory that they’ve of people that had the most important destructive and optimistic modifications in visibility in natural search primarily based on how they tracked issues of their system.
So we simply created a touchdown web page for that, after which we additionally did this actually in-depth research of the Inc. 500 the place we took all 500 of the domains and did some evaluation, put collectively predictive fashions round their propensity to be penalized by Google primarily based on quite a lot of metrics which can be out there, after which we did this complete research. We did very in-depth prospecting of individuals in any respect these corporations and actually put collectively this concerted effort to succeed in very particular individuals via our advertising effort. We simply needed to see what yields the perfect outcomes, so is it the factor that took a day to do or the factor that took a month to just do to see what affect it has on that focus on viewers to get a sign of which of these is gonna be extra worthwhile like is it even price doing all of the evaluation that we did?
Dan: That’s such an fascinating and vital query, low versus excessive effort, and it’s one thing that I do know that we speak about always. Usually there’s a notion that extra effort is gonna yield extra outcomes. You’re employed onerous, and it’ll repay within the outcomes, however usually what it comes all the way down to is working smarter as an alternative of more durable, and I feel really setting that up as an experiment is a reasonably worthwhile factor.
Mike: It’s fascinating as a result of we achieve this a lot testing throughout the guess and verify, however we don’t take a look at our guess and verify, if that is sensible.
Dan: Proper.
Mike: Like quite than having two methods and considering like, “Okay, nicely, let’s do that one after which see what the opposite one does,” there isn’t as a lot of that. There’s extra like, “Okay, nicely, I’m simply gonna do my touchdown web page, and I’ve my supply and my advert copy and go away it at that and simply take a look at inside that.” Not whether or not totally different, extra worthwhile – or not essentially worthwhile – extra high-effort strategy may be price testing in opposition to the low-effort strategy.
Dan: How has this modified the way in which you guys strategy issues in your workforce?
Mike: I feel typically talking we’re all the time attempting to consider how can we strategically do issues otherwise. I feel it’s largely as a result of that’s simply the way in which I’m — like I wish to query quite a lot of the established order. I wish to see if issues can’t be carried out the opposite method, and perhaps I’m only a cussed individual or what have you ever, but when individuals inform me that is the perfect follow, I’m like, “Effectively, why don’t we strive the alternative of that and see what occurs?” I feel the whole lot relies on who you might be, how you probably did issues, what have you ever, however most of the time I see that taking the opposite strategy yields one thing totally different. It might not essentially be higher outcomes, however no matter it’s, I find yourself studying one thing from it, after which we apply it to different issues.
Dan: Yeah, that’s a great level: that we as entrepreneurs speak about experimenting with and testing our campaigns and our advertising, however we hardly ever take a step again and put our personal processes beneath the identical quantity of scrutiny.
Mike: Yeah, completely, and I feel that being that the businesses I’ve labored previously have been so strategy-focused, it’s been very simple for me to take that high-level look, but additionally as a result of my background is in improvement and laptop science and stuff, it’s very simple for me to have a look at the minutia and be like okay, how can we then flip this into one thing, like how can we execute on it? To that time, that’s one thing that we’re actually attempting to get higher at is how can we flip this nice strategic focus into equally nice execution focus as nicely.
Dan: Okay, so earlier than I allow you to go, I wanna ask you about pop-ups. You talked about them slightly bit earlier, and as you mentioned, it’s one in all these items that everyone says they hate, however the knowledge exhibits that conversion instruments like exit overlays and welcome mats often work. Do you suppose it’s time for entrepreneurs to cease worrying about these things, or do you see these techniques working proper now, however is that bubble gonna burst finally?
Mike: Yeah, I feel it’s fascinating. In my discuss I used to be kinda making enjoyable of Neil Patel due to – nicely, I wasn’t sort of. I used to be positively making enjoyable of Neil Patel.
Dan: Little doubt about that.
Mike: Due to the variety of pop-ups he makes use of. However the actuality of it’s {that a} man like Neil Patel doesn’t care what I feel. That man may be very targeted on the info, and the info is telling him that he can try this, and it really works very nicely, and regardless of whoever’s gonna discuss shit about him – I don’t know if I can say that, however I assume I simply did.
Dan: You probably did.
Mike: Whoever’s gonna speak about him in a destructive method, he’s nonetheless gonna concentrate on the issues that make him cash, and I feel the way in which that he works is sort of a sign of what actually works quite than what some other entrepreneurs like, “Oh, nicely, I really feel like that’s not good to your model,” like whether or not it’s me, whether or not it’s whoever, so I feel that we simply should proceed to have a tradition of testing issues and see what works for our audiences. Usually talking it’s to be anticipated that pop-ups, welcome mats and such are going to yield nice outcomes. It’s simply what do you wanna do as a model? What does your viewers inform you you need to concentrate on? After which use that as your true north quite than, “Oh, I really feel like pop-ups are unhealthy.”
Dan: Yeah, that’s a great level. Neil is aware of his model, and he is aware of his viewers, and which may work for them. He won’t be chatting with the identical viewers that you’re or that you simply have been chatting with on the Name to Motion Convention, however he’s made that call, and it really works.
Mike: Yeah, completely, completely.
Dan: Yeah, and I feel however simply because it really works for Neil Patel and on his properties doesn’t essentially imply it’s gonna work for different entrepreneurs.
Mike: Proper, and I feel, once more, typically talking finest practices all the time must be questioned. Once more, I feel they must be ran via the lens of your viewers to find out what’s gonna be just right for you, but it surely’s very tough for me, and it needs to be for anybody, to actually simply take these “finest practices” at face worth. It’s worthwhile to all the time be testing. I assume that’s my sound chunk.
Dan: All proper, nicely, let’s finish with that one. It’s a great one. Thanks a lot, Mike, for taking the time to talk. This was nice.
Mike: Yeah, thanks for having me.