In ultra-competitive online business, every lead-reliant company – retail, wholesale, B2B, or B2C – tries to tap into their lead data to generate, convert, and retain more customers. From insurers to clothing brands, everyone tries to dig out actionable marketing insights.
At the same time, companies do not manage leads manually – they use automated lead management systems.
- Phonexa’s proprietary lead management software, LMS Sync, dissects the customer journey from A-to-Z, collecting lead data at every touchpoint. With LMS Sync, you know what campaigns drive how many leads and how many of them convert, unlocking the full potential of your customers to grow your bottom line.
Automating your lead management might be the easiest way to increase your ROI and beat the competition, especially if you know how to maximize the efficiency of your lead management system.
https://www.smartinsights.com/lead-generation/lead-generation-strategy/lead-management-stats/
Read on to learn what a lead management system is, how it works, and how to utilize it to convert more leads.
Why Is Software for Lead Management Necessary?
The ever-growing competition has made it increasingly harder to capture, convert, and retain leads:
- Traffic generation is the biggest marketing challenge for 65% of businesses.
- 68% of B2B professionals want to increase the quality of their leads, with 55% also willing to increase their lead volume.
- Only 29% of businesses nurture customers beyond the initial purchase.
In contrast, 53% of marketers spent half or more of their budget on lead generation to acquire quality leads.
Without a doubt, success in lead management is largely dependent on the quality of lead management software, as the latter makes it possible to customize the customer journey for every segment of leads, eventually directing them to the path of conversion.
Lead Management System vs. CRM Lead Management
A lead management system is not the same as CRM, although many think they are. There are substantial differences between lead management in CRM and lead management by lead management software. See the table below.
Software for Lead Management vs. CRM
| Lead Management Software | CRM |
| Focuses on leads | Focuses on customers, including retention and post-purchase relationships |
| Ends its mission upon conversion | Includes retention, upselling, and cross-selling |
But then again, sometimes lead management software and CRM leads management may be used interchangeably, as both describe a customer management system, albeit from different perspectives. Moreover, these systems usually go hand-in-hand to ensure full data visibility and management.
How to Use Your Lead Management System Effectively: A 3-Step Guide
Taking control of your sales funnels means tracking, distributing, and analyzing your leads effectively – the three steps every lead must undergo regardless of what lead software you use.
Without further ado, let’s dig into lead management step-by-step, starting with lead tracking.
Step 1 – Lead Tracking
As your leads interact with your brand, they share valuable personal information, such as their location, preferences, budget, and more. Once you’ve captured their attention, you can put your lead tracking software to work to collect every interaction detail that can be used to improve your business.
Data Trackable Throughout the Customer Life Cycle
| Demographics | Psychographics | Engagement | Lead Quality | Interaction with AI |
| Age, gender, employment, marital status, etc. | Interests, desires, pain points, motivation, etc. | Impressions, views, clicks, and other interaction parameters | Low-quality leads, high-quality leads, exclusive leads, duplicated leads, shared leads, etc. | Performance of your IVR, chatbots, and other AI |
Quality lead tracking, regardless of the type of software, must measure the customer journey for every lead at all interactions, so you can know your customers like the back of your hand, including their purchase habits, values, and every other parameter.
Leads Tracking Software Benefits
- Tailor-made customer journey. Access to customer data makes it possible to customize the customer journey for every lead. For example, you may send high-intent leads to your best sales reps while directing low-intent leads to your IVR first. Tailored engagement results in higher lead activity and more sales.
- Data-driven budget allocation. Serving the ultimate goal of growing your bottom line, lead tracking reveals your most and least profitable campaigns to double down on what works best and eliminate what is dragging you down.
- More conversions. Knowing the lead through and through makes it much easier for a sales agent to sell. It goes without saying, knowledgeable sales reps convert more leads.
Besides tracking leads, you can track your affiliates, taking care of every cent you’ve spent on your affiliate campaigns and issuing due and timely remuneration to your partners. In a nutshell, lead tracking software within a well-thought-out lead management system will put you in the driver’s seat of your business.
Step 2 – Lead Distribution
Once leads are captured and tracked, they must be directed to the product they are looking for. Lead distribution software now steps in to automate, streamline, and scale lead distribution.
A well-tuned lead distribution software will do all the work for you, sending leads to where they want to go based on their motivation and customer data. However, to automate your lead distribution, you must choose the distribution model first.
Popular Distribution Models
| Round Robin | Performance-Based | Location-Based | Budget and Size-Based (if you sell leads) |
| Leads are assigned to available agents until all agents have an equal number of leads | Leads are distributed to the best agent among available agents | Leads are distributed to sales reps with matching or selected locations | Leads are sold to the biggest, most known, or selected company |
The list of distribution models is not exhaustive: depending on your software, you may be able to set any distribution parameters.
https://performancein.com/news/2020/05/21/lead-distribution-why-it-belongs-with-affiliate-programs/
Here’s how a typical real-time lead distribution works:
- Leads are qualified. Lead qualification is assigning value to a particular lead, whether web lead, call lead, exclusive lead, shared lead, or else. All leads are separated into qualified and disqualified categories, with the former distributed to the internal sales department or external buyer according to the distribution criteria.
https://www.deskera.com/blog/lead-qualification/
- Leads are distributed. Lead distribution usually takes into account multiple factors, such as the needs and wants of the lead, the optimal conversion path, and – if you sell leads – the criteria put forward by advertisers (lead buyers).
A well-configured lead distribution system enables near-instant data-driven lead routing, leading to higher conversion and customer satisfaction rates.
Interactive Voice Response to Distribute Your Leads More Effectively
As phone conversations remain the most effective touchpoint, many businesses use interactive voice response (IVR) systems to scale call processing.
Just look at these numbers:
- Four in five customers research the product before reaching a sales rep.
- Around 60% of callers hang up if waiting in a call queue for long.
An IVR redirects callers to a relevant sales agent and can complete some requests independently, saving you important human resources. IVR ensures around-the-lock availability, makes it possible to evaluate your sales reps’ performance, and allows you to get back to call recordings whenever you need.
https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/360038601971-Creating-an-interactive-voice-response-system
Step 3 – Lead Analytics
Upon the conversion, the dust settles for the customer, but not for you. At this point, you have mounds of data to elevate your sales leads management with high-quality lead analytics software.
Lead analytics software interprets customer data into actionable insights, helping you improve in every regard and touchpoint. Depending on the software, your set of tools may look like this:
- Traffic flow reports to conduct lead quality analysis.
- Comparison reports to reveal your best and worst-performing assets.
- Filter analyzer to simulate different scenarios by changing software settings.
- Predictive modeling to predict your performance in new locations and with new audiences.
Lead analytics is paramount for any online business, as it’s called to set and gradually increase your lead quality standards, granting you more conversions over time.
Bring it All Together In a Single Leads Management System
Getting back to the choice you’ll have to make, it’s imperative to ensure that your marketing and sales teams can cooperate. For all this to happen, it might be best to choose a unified lead management system powered by a single software suite.
