What are you up against?
Getting the right data in front of reps
There’s no shortage of useful data. But when it sits on a multitude of systems, it can take forever to compile a complete picture. Demanding daily quotas give outbound business development reps precious little time to prepare contact information and plan their approach. Inbound calls or live chat sessions give them no time at all.
Turning insight into action
Even when reps have the data, do they really know what to do with it? They can see the prospect’s digital behavior, but a tendency to click is not the same as a propensity to purchase. Predictive scores may not indicate why a prospect is likely to engage. A social media “like” doesn’t mean “buy”. How can these data points provide the insight to spark conversations that convert?
Making social interaction count
Perhaps a Public Relations or Corporate Communications team owns the social listening platform, but what about social interaction? It’s now possible to put live chat on company Facebook pages. Who better to engage in direct conversation than a business development team trained to convert interest into opportunity?
Intelligent nurturing of leads
Leads get converted; leads get rejected. But what about the prospects populating the grey area in-between? Put them back into the email nurturing program until they reappear in the call queue and are treated as a new lead? We need systems and processes that enable scheduled call backs, we need an ongoing dialogue through social media, we need ownership.
Closing the feedback loop
Is the business development team measured only by the number of conversions? Or is there a value attached to the nuanced information gathered, which will help to steer future conversations and segmented communication? How can this be gathered – and made actionable? And will agents take the time to do it, when their KPIs don’t provide the incentive?