Thursday, December 18, 2008

Why a Business May Just Need a Predictive Dialer for Their Internet Leads

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There are a lot of ways on how you can improve the conversion rate of your business. One of the most effective is that you employ the use of technologies. But if you’re a start-up, you certainly cannot spend a huge chunk of your capital to them. You also have to think about your expenses for salaries and marketing. This means that you have to choose your software very carefully. Thus, besides using Internet leads software, you may also want to make use of predictive dialers.

How Predictive Dialers Work

Predictive dialers can be considered a very intelligent device. First, it can estimate when the sales agent will probably finish his call. While he may be wrapping up his talk with his current customer, the predictive dialer will then call up the next caller. If the phone gets picked up, the call will then be passed on to the sales agent for a matter of seconds.

There are three known types of dialers. First you have the hardware-based dialer, which means you need to have the infrastructure for you to run the component smoothly. Most of these dialers have the latest features available, but they can be costly too. You also have the software-based dialers, where everything works through the World Wide Web. Because the structure doesn’t have to be set up by the business, you can actually minimize on your costs through this one.

There are also companies who try to combine the concept of the two dialers. This means that they make use of a cheaper device such as a voice modem but spend more on comprehensive software.

What You Get from Predictive Dialers

There are already several businesses that are shifting to predictive dialers for their telemarketing strategies. This is because it can increase sales profits of businesses to as much as 50 percent more. Here’s why:

When you are going to stick with the conventional methods, there is a lag time of about 30 to 40 seconds before the phone gets answered. There are even times when the phone call is not picked up at all. You may also have to pass through other communication devices like fax machine, mobile phone, or an answering machine. The sales agent spends a lot of time communicating with the prospect without getting any result. Worse, he may have to call back the same number again, which could mean spending another 30 to 40 seconds.

The dialer, however, allows the sales agent to spend more time. For one, he doesn’t have to dial the number himself—the dialer does. There’s also the assurance that there is already a customer on the other line once he gets to pick up the next call.

Predictive dialers can also be very helpful in controlling your leads. Usually, when you’re calling the customers manually or that you have not organized your database carefully, there’s a huge chance that you will be calling the same prospect twice. A dialer, on the other hand, leaves call logs. Every call will have its own information such as the time the call was placed, the person talked to, and the result of the call.

Just in case the prospect doesn’t want to be contacted by the company again, you can actually choose the code that will send the number into the “do not call” list, so the dialer won’t make the mistake of dialing the number again.

A predictive dialer is a very sound investment. Just imagine connecting to your prospect with 80 percent success rate. This means that you have bigger opportunities to enhance your conversion rate.

Visit our lead management software sponsor: www.leads360.com


Thursday, December 4, 2008

Going Back to Basics: How to Start Gaining Internet Leads

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Why are there more people who are using the Internet to generate leads? Well, there are just millions of Internet users from all over the world that visit websites and search engines. Moreover, thousands of them are avid online shoppers, which mean they buy the things they need and even want through the World Wide Web. Simply put, you have a huge market waiting if you just know how you can derive Internet leads.

How to Start

However, there are just some businesses that do not know how. If you are one of them—if you are starting to opening up your business or that you have been in it for so long but getting bad results—then perhaps it is high time that you go back to basics. Here are some of the steps on how you can start achieving Internet leads:

1. Know the reason why you are marketing online. Why do you want to be seen online? Would you like your Internet leads to buy products directly from your website? Or do you want them to get more information about your business but get the products or avail of the services from your main office? The objectives for online marketing will practically determine how your website will look like, the information that you are going to include in it, how you are going to promote it, and a lot more.

2. Set up a website. You can never go full force in your marketing campaign for getting web leads unless you have a website. For starters, you can always settle for free web hosting, where you can have your website hosted without additional costs. Nevertheless, if you like to have more control over your website, especially when it comes to the content that you can add and the features that you can include, then it is definitely advisable to buy your own domain and rent a web host. It will not cost you a lot, and it is going to be a very good investment.

3. Look for a designer who understands SEO. Of course, when you have a website, you need a website designer. Normally, you want to find one that is very creative so that he will be able to bring about the attractiveness of your website. However, it is important that the website designer is able to connect his design with search engine optimization too. After all, form is never enough. Your website should have function. Moreover, some web design habits do not sit well in SEO, which means that it will be very difficult for your targeted customers to find you in the World Wide Web. For instance, Flash may be considered unnecessary since it will only slow down the download time of your pages. What’s more, search engine spiders cannot read images, only texts.

4. Combine both paid and non-paid methods. Online marketing can either be paid or non-paid techniques. Both have their own advantages and disadvantages, so to make sure that you can consistently obtain online leads, you better practice both. Paid strategies can include pay per click campaigns, which can cost you something but are highly targeted and thus convert visitors highly. Non-paid, meanwhile, can be submission of press releases to various networks. You get an inbound link for your webpages, which then increase your prominence in the World Wide Web.

It is also important that you can update yourself to different techniques in marketing online, as technology and hence methodologies can change. It is only when you learn to cope with these modifications that you will become more competitive in the market.


Visit our lead management software sponsor: www.leads360.com