3 Ways to Bring Lost Leads Back Into Your Revenue Pool

Companies are attributing close to 25% of sales to the email marketing channel and are working hard to improve on those results. Every day email marketers are throwing away valuable leads – leads that could result in significant increases in conversions and pipeline. We want to help you discover clients hiding amongst those almost-lost leads. Important actions to take are:

•  Make sure your marketing strategy efficiently supports re-engaging buyers who are job-change
•  Don’t miss important business opportunities who fall victim to your spam filter
•  Mine your out-of-office emails for improved lead volume and increased revenue

1. No Longer with the Company Doesn’t Mean No Longer a Lead

With 30% of lead data going bad every year due to changes in email addresses, phone numbers and employers, you have to realize the cost of decayed data and correct it. When a lead is acquired and nurtured through inbound marketing, there will be a point when he/she bounces after changing jobs.

You will need to identify that lead and turn him/her back to the funnel. Those who used to be your leads are more likely to become your leads again if you trigger the acquisition.

The moment when a buyer is most open to new solutions is right after changing employers. A person who recently changed jobs likely has an empty inbox, so if you approach them at this time, you gain the first mover advantage of reaching them first.

If you then take this opportunity to re-establish yourself as a trusted advisor, you can help to frame their purchasing decisions by educating them on the market.

While the results from both inbound marketing and outbound marketing are usually top of funnel leads, the results from this rebound marketing strategy are more often middle of the funnel leads.

Inbound and outbound too often include heavy competition for the prospect’s time, while rebound marketing leverages your previous goodwill to earn their time before your competitors even know where to find them. Having started closer to the middle of the funnel, you will also spend less time and effort nurturing them.

The workflow for Rebound Marketing looks like this:

1. Identify bounced leads and isolate job changers.
2. Update data with reliable social media channels or personal contacts.
3. Score these leads based on their previous engagement level and updated data.
4. Determine the method and moment to reach out.
5. Offer them a special marketing campaign combining customer retention and lead acquisition.
6. When leads are re-acquired, record and treat them as past leads or buyers, not strangers.

Instead of letting these job changers fall through the cracks, you have now created an even stronger relationship than before with higher potential for success. Remember, they already know about you and absolutely do not want to download materials for early-stage prospects. Match the level of your previous relationship, creating a sense of continuity across your buyer’s career.

2. Don’t Lose Email Leads to Your Spam Filter

Chances are you could be missing important business opportunities if your email Inbox utilizes a spam filter. Take a few minutes now to investigate your email screening procedures for messages received from unknown senders. You might even discover a new client hiding among the spam!

Email inquiries from new business prospects, which by definition are unknown and unexpected when they arrive in your Inbox, can take a detour to your spam box without your knowledge.

When was the last time you did not receive an email sent by a client or friend? Failed email delivery can be quite common. Businesses frequently contact vendors via email and engage the most qualified candidate who responds first. You miss out on a potential engagement if the email inquiry does not show up in your inbox.

Here are five easy steps to protect your email, receive incoming leads, and avoid technical nightmares:

1. Check your spam box often if you use automated email filtering.
2. Add a response form to your Website. Your Webmaster can set this up so that you are automatically alerted with an email recognized by your server.
3. Update your “safe” and “blocked” sender lists often, especially if delivery is controlled at the ISP level. Add a company’s email domain to your approved email list when you get a new lead from the company.
4. Separate business from personal correspondence by using two different email accounts.
5. Avoid downloading free software or clicking on unsolicited ads. If you do, you may find yourself subject to a virus or malicious Adware attack.

3. Out-of-Office Responses Are Filled with Leads

U.S. workers are away from the office just under 6% of the year. Mining out-of-office (OOO) emails can significantly improve your lead volume and, more importantly, your revenue! Let’s look at some numbers to see just how much potential opportunity is lost in these responses.

Let’s say the average U.S. worker receives one week of vacation and ten federal holidays each year. If the number of leads that can be found in each out-of-office email is about one out of every two emails, that’s a lot of potential loss.

For example, if you send out 5000 emails per week for a campaign, you would receive 1200 out-of-office emails per month. Assuming one lead for every two OOO emails, then you receive 600 additional leads each month!  All this from data you have access to, but are not effectively leveraging.

So the next question is: What would it take to mine this information manually? You can look into automated services or follow the manual process:

1. First, sift through the email in your campaign response inbox to find out-of-office emails.
2. Next, read the out-of-office email and capture the relevant information.
3. Note: You will most often capture name and email address and rarely company, phone number, and title.
4. Finally, upload this information into your email service provider, marketing automation solution, or customer relationship management system.

Even though there are limitations to what can be accomplished by this process, the results can add up quickly. Out-of-office emails will deliver significant value to your company if you are able to mine them.

Note that both frequency of email campaigns and the target audience size of each campaign directly affect the return you can expect from mining out-of-office emails.

In summary, marketers are masters at creating demand and generating leads, and email is a marketer’s go-to tool. It is flexible, engaging, and provides tremendous return on investment (ROI). Mining your out-of-office, no longer works here, and spammed emails will help make sure you’re getting the most out of this valuable tool.