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Precision B2B lead scoring based on prospects’ online behaviours

“There is always room at the top.”

Daniel Webster

I’ve touched more than once recently on the subject of lead scoring. Today I’d like to discuss a tried and tested lead scoring method for tracking the forward actions of prospects who have received a ‘cold’ B2B email. 

We’ll begin from the point when a prospect has clicked through from a link in your marketing email to a landing page on your website. From this point onwards it’s possible to track the behaviour of that prospect with a view to predicting their likely level of interest.

By setting a cookie to track every prospect who clicks through to your website you can track behaviours of any visitor who is in your lead database. 

At this stage in the process, many marketers pin their hopes exclusively on the prospect filling out a ‘contact us’ form, or clicking on a banner offering a free white paper, etc. But while this is great in an ideal world, in reality it doesn’t always happen, at least not on an initial visit.

Let’s say that two prospects click through to your site: one clicks away, never to return; the other spends time with you, visits various pages, etc, before eventually clicking away.  Although they didn’t convert at the time, by tracking their movements you’re able to establish, for example, that they’ve been back to the site three times, spent time reading your blog and, on another occasion located to your site by searching for your company name. Without the ability to track their relative behaviours, the two prospects may look identical, but clearly there is a world of difference.

By monitoring and tracking online behaviours such as e-mail responses, completed forms and website visits, it is possible to gain much more accurate lead scores. So when you score a lead, assign a point value to each action, just as you’d assign a value to a job title, etc. particular actions —such as using your company brand name in a search, visiting your pricing page or returning frequently to your site—indicate higher readiness to buy, so assign even higher weights to these actions.

Too many marketers rely only on basic demographic data (title, company size, etc.) and BANT criteria (budget, authority, need and timing) when lead scoring (prospects’ answers to BANT questions are notoriously inaccurate). This is all critical stuff, but such data will only tell you how interested you are in the prospect. It will tell you very little about you how interested the prospect is in you!

Actions speak louder than words. Measure a prospect’s actions and you establish their real level of interest and engagement in your product.

Before a prospect is ready to talk with a salesperson, they’re more likely to use search tools to identify their requirements, build short lists and evaluate vendors, etc.

At the same time, when someone is actively showing an interest in your product, you want to be able to identify them and pass them to the right sales person as quickly as possible. Lead scoring based on online behaviours enables you identify the hottest leads, even before you’ve spoken to them on the telephone.

As a result, you’re able to engage with prospective buyers at the right time because you’ll have a very good idea of where they are in the buying cycle.

The vast majority of leads from e-marketing campaigns remain in the research phase. Prematurely passing these fledgling leads to sales can lead to disaster since it can alienate the prospect with an unwanted interruption and make the salesperson even less likely to follow up on future marketing leads. Accurate lead nurturing, the art and science of building relationships with qualified prospects, regardless of their timing to buy, has become the holy grail of lead generation. Neglect at your peril.

And finally, always remember…

Give a man a match, and he’ll be warm for a minute, but set him on fire, and he’ll be warm for the rest of his life.

That’s it for now. Thanks for reading. As ever, your comments and ideas are very welcome. 

And always to a higher response!

Norman

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