April 2018 - QL Tech

6 Ways Workflow Automation Will Improve Your Lead Nurturing ROI

Posted on April 24, 2018November 6, 2019 by admin

Staying competitive in today’s dynamic world is becoming increasingly challenging, especially for small to medium businesses. The number of possible lead nurturing touchpoints (where consumers can interact with the brand) has increased beyond imagination.

For instance,

consumers can call the helpline,
interact with automated chatbots,
contact business support teams,
Lead nurturing over social platforms, and
possibly fill up some inquiry or feedback forms

It is with this context, the idea of lead capturing and lead nurturing can be well understood. The process of engaging with the leads in a personalized (or targeted) way by providing highly relevant and contextual information at each touchpoint of the consumer buyer’s journey can be termed as lead nurturing. The intention is to provide enough value so that the lead can make a purchasing decision in the end possibly in favour of our business.

Marketers have to make sure they treat each prospect with due consideration irrespective of their source. To overcome the challenge of keeping a track of all leads and engaging with them in a personalized manner, organizations invest in CRM and marketing automation tools like Infusionsoft, HubSpot or others.

These Marketing Automation tools play an integral role in managing leads and enhancing the engagement abilities of the marketers with the leads.

What is the most effective lead nurturing method?

Now, let’s look into several automated lead nurturing strategies that can possibly boost your ROI.

1. The Art of Segmentation

The first step and more importantly the most effective lead nurturing strategy for maximizing ROI is to segment the prospect in a meaningful manner. Segmentation will help classify the prospect as per the personas which will determine the method through which the client needs to be pursued. Although it’s not always possible to segment in an automated manner, you can deploy some of the below lead nurturing techniques for automation:

In tools like Infusionsoft, you can TAG a prospect based on his website behaviour. For example, if the visitor has spent considerable time and action on a particular service page, it might indicate a preferred interest area
For web-forms, we can add an extra field to segment the visitor based on their interest.

Expected Outcome – A prospect list which is segmented based on their interests, behaviour or geographies.

2. Timely Follow-Ups

The second important step is to ensure the prospects are followed-up in a highly personalized and timely fashion. This is where marketing automation yields the best results for lead nurturing. The idea is to create an automated machine (as Ryan Deiss call it) so that you can focus on other value-added activities. The medium of follow-up can be any, email, SMS, or push notification. Some of the examples of timely automated follow-ups

A sequence of three nurture emails (Download – Gain-Logic-Fear template) to request the user to purchase your initial offer
Abandonment Cart Email Sequence say within three hours after the user abandoning the cart
Drip series on a successful sign-up to educate the user about your product

The best part about marketing automation tools is that you can structure your follow-ups based on IF-ELSE logic. If X happens, then send Y email/SMS, or if Z happens, then send T Email/SMS. Expected Outcome – A highly targeted lead nurturing email campaign set-up in your own marketing automation tool.

3. Automating the Consumer Journey

Lucid Chart - Consumer Journey lead nurturing

Consumer journey refers to step-by-step activities (or touchpoints) a consumer goes through in the entire lifetime with the brand. Through automation, you can stay ahead of the curve and literally chart out the funnel (or steps) through which you want the consumers to move, before or after their purchase. For example,

Customer is driven to a landing page from a Facebook Ad -> Prompted to download the e-book -> the ones who have downloaded are requested to attend a webinar -> Ones who have attended a webinar are nurtured to undergo a free trial of your product -> Nurture to purchase paid version of software ->nurture the lead to purchase any top-ups (upsell) for the product -> Request feedback, and if feedback is positive, request to refer friends, provide reviews and ratings.

Having a well – constructed representation of the consumer journey (also known as a funnel) which is specific to your business is helpful in optimizing your marketing strategy.

4. Lead Scoring

The next strategy is to assign scores based on user behaviour and engagement. The idea is to devise a meaningful point-based system (or lead scoring) that can be useful for prioritizing the follow-up with your prospects. You should think through your own lead scoring formula and then implement in preferred marketing automation tool. An activity indicating a higher level of interest in your products or services should get more points. Also note, it is also important to keep analyzing the formula and not be afraid of refining it as you go.

This procedure is effective in prioritizing the leads that need to be targeted first. For instance, if the lead is marked as cold, then they would need more engagement with your lead nurturing team. On the other hand, if the lead is marked as hot then they are ready to close the deal and should be approached by the sales team immediately. Expected Outcome – Your prospects are assigned leads cores which in turn will help you segment them as Hot, Warm or Cold.

5. Loyalty through delight

It is an indomitable fact that the most powerful form of marketing is from the word of mouth. And this only comes through loyal customers who have been extremely satisfied with your product or services. With the help of CRM, businesses can collect personalized information of their client and use that to create personalized WOW lead nurturing sequence for their customers.

Now, who doesn’t love personalized experiences designed just for them? Off course this goes without saying that delighted customers turn into a loyal customer and customer loyalty goes a long way into increasing the ROI for your business

6. Analysis and Optimization

Any marketer knows that analysis plays an integral role in the framework of any marketing strategy’s success. Analytical marketing automation tools help marketers quantify the success and failure of their marketing techniques.

As you all know that there is no certainty of success while implementing a marketing strategy. However, with continuous analysis of any marketing strategy, marketers can determine the parts of the strategy which are succeeding or failing.

Once the above-mentioned points are ascertained then strategy needs to be optimized accordingly, thus increasing the probability of its success.

To sum things up it has been made extremely clear how crucial a role marketing automation tools play in the success of a business. From automating client communication to optimizing your marketing funnel, Marketers need to embrace lead nurturing for their business wholly and solely.

GDPR: Determining the future of digital marketing

Posted on April 18, 2018November 6, 2019 by admin

The arrival of General Data Protection Regulation(GDPR) has been in the horizons for a while but now as the start date for this upcoming regulation has been set for May 25^th 2018; it has become crucial for businesses engaging in digital marketing to be well prepared for this eminent change.

In this article, we have planned to take an in-depth approach while explaining GDPR, for those of you who are seeking clarity on the nitty-gritty details. Having said that the interpretation and perspective built around this regulation can be quiet variable.

Any marketer knows that user info is the currency that determines the success and failure of any marketing campaign. The main intent behind GDPR is to protect the data privacy of the users so that the information provided by them is used responsibly by digital marketers. This implies that everything from an email address, to a name, IP address, photo and more are included when it comes to customer information.

Essentially the main reason behind the implementation of GDPR is to empower the individual rights for web users to control the personal information shared with companies.

How Would GDPR affect digital marketing & Sale?

1. Permission to opt-in or opt-out

Under GDPR, permission has to be explicit. Companies have to have the ability to supply evidence that an individual has chosen to opt-in into communications and did not only fall onto the record by default such as assessing the unchecked ‘opt-in’ box on a form. ‘Double opt-in’ are also best practice; in which opt-in is followed up with a ‘click to validate’ email.

But for corporate or company information, ‘implied consent’ means marketers can email somebody, provided that individual had the choice to opt-in for the emails at the time of purchase.

Unless you are confident that your database doesn’t have any private data e.g. email, telephone number, our recommendation is that you stay as compliant as possible.

2. The cookie Rule

Cookies fall under the GDPR range, provided that they may identify people through device monitoring, mixing information along with different information or by treating folks as unique.

Will cookies require permission? Yes, and so, clear opt-in. As an instance, if a visitor lands on your own website for the very first time. You need to keep cookies blocked or ignored before the person requires any permission activity. Much like email marketing, permission is subject-specific or purpose-specific and, even if the website uses cookies for various purposes, it must find explicit approval for every one of these.

Website managers need to ensure a smooth user experience when surfing and, at precisely the exact same time, supply top selection for permission in a manner that is friendly and also the least intrusive.

3. Third-Party Conformity

For most marketers, third-party tools and marketing technology providers (i.e. advertising automation platforms, CRM etc) form a majority of their digital database. In cases like this, it’s significant that marketers check that their tech suppliers are prepared and ready for GDPR compliance. With steps in place to store and process, and incorporate information appropriately. Ahead of the May 2018 deadline, it is wise for entrepreneurs to:

Ask providers to detail how they are going to store/process information to ensure GDPR compliance.
Ensure there is a point of contact from each side, plus a procedure in place to handle any information breaches. Both sides must Have the Ability to respond fast to manage, react and respond in accordance with ‘Data breach notification’ legislation.
Be sure to simply collect information that that’s necessary, or falls under a ‘legitimate interest’.
Make sure it is possible to delete information if the user stops the service, also they should be able to download their own data when asked.

4. GDPR Scale

Now that we have made it clear how crucial user data security will become once GDPR is fully applied. Now let’s move on to how much of the user information be allowed to be used by businesses.

As most of you are aware that platforms like Google or Facebook.com have certain functionalities. Asking users to provide their personal info for a variety of reasons, now the question is where does GDPR come into all this?

Well, the answer is clear, GDPR will create levels on the basis of which the type of information. That is being been collected will be determined. And platforms need clearly communicate to the user on the details of how their provided info will be used by the businesses.

Let’s call it the GDPR scale shall we, this scale applies the principle of “purpose limitation”. Under which personal data must only be “collected for specified, explicit and legitimate purposes and not further processed in a manner that is incompatible with those purposes”

5. Rise of the Inbound Techniques

With all the upcoming restrictions regarding customer privacy and data protection, the increase in the application of inbound techniques by the marketers is bound to happen. As Inbound marketing implicitly dictates that the consumer should come to the business, rather than the other way around. Inbound marketing also knows as content marketing aiming to provide the users with a more personalized experience. Hence resulting in improvement in customer service.

Gated content, organic and paid social media, website registration pop-ups, webinars, event subscriptions, etc. Can generate leads, enrich our clients’ adventures or drive sales or conversion. What we must do today is to make our audiences aware of exactly. What we will do with the data we gather and where we store/use it.

Disclosure:

Although the above-mentioned points are the product of the extensive research done by us, however as we have mentioned above as well the interpretation of the regulation can vary from business to business. It is strongly advisable for businesses to consult an advocate beforehand in order to ensure 100 % compliance.

Few final words!

Now it may appear from the above-mentioned points the arrival of GDPR might paint a bleak picture for the future of digital marketing, however, if business to adhering inbound principals the quality of customer service will amplify through leaps & bounds without having to worry about GDPR restrictions.

Now hate to state the obvious but better customer service means a happy customer. Which results in customer loyalty and so on and so forth, we’re sure you get the gist.

Well, that’s our uptake on this, will keep you posted!!

How to Build Backlinks for a Brand New Site and with No Money

Posted on April 3, 2018November 6, 2019 by admin

Have you just launched a brand new website? Are you struggling to build backlinks due to restricted budgets? Well, then you have landed upon the right web page. This post is completely tailored to you. As you would know, Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) and backlinks are as good as twin sisters. In fact, generating backlinks from authoritative websites are one of the most and foremost activities of SEO. And, here you cannot have 100% control. Further, it plays an important role in rankings because it walks hand in hand with organic traffic.

When search engine website crawlers visit your websites to build a search engine index, they particularly look for backlinks. In case you have good rankings on SERPs but your site lacks backlinks, search engines may assume that your website content quality is low!

A backlink is a web link which on clicking returns to your website. Building a backlink is indeed tough. It requires skills, patience and efforts. But, in this post, we have tried our best to help you out. You will be able to build backlinks to your brand new site without investing your money.

Tips to Build Backlinks When You Have a Brand New Site and No Money

1. Content contribution on other’s sites

In traditional language, it used to be addressed as guest posting where a newbie website writes a blog post for another site and earn backlinks from either author bio or body content. However, things have changed drastically, especially post Panda and Penguin updates. Now it is not about what you write on guest sites. It is all about how your content will help the users of that particular guest site.

To summarise, yes, guest posting is still alive – but only if it is relevant to that website and their readers.

Also, nowadays, a variety of content is being produced since the users have various ways to consume the content. And among all, guests-graphic is the most popular content to contribute and earn authority contextual backlinks. The reason behind it is such content can be easily shared on social networks.

So, research on the most trending topic via tools like Right relevance, Buzzsumo and come up with an engaging title that suits the guest website most. Approach them with your suggested title and on getting approval, submit the best possible guests-graphic. Along with the submission of guests-graphic, offer a small blog-style write up explaining that infographic.

2. Testimonials – the secret sauce to build quality backlinks

When you just read the single term “testimonial”, the first thing that might appear in your mind would be some good words written by your customers for you. Yes, we are also talking about the same thing – testimonials – but the other way round. Try giving testimonials on others’ websites.

Testimonials-For-Bulid-Quality-Backlinks

For instance, if you are using any social media marketing tool, SEO tool or email marketing software – write good reviews on their portals. On getting your feedback approved, you might earn quality backlinks. Providing you are a loyal customer of that product or service, chances are high that you can build backlinks in exchange for a testimonial. But, make a point that you write a review that actually helps others to make a decision regarding that service. Don’t just write to earn a backlink.

3. Quote industry influencers in your content

This one is a little tricky, especially if your brand awareness isn’t spread to a significant level. Write a long-form blog post and quote experiences, findings or sayings of industry experts therein. While promoting that blog or article, give a shout-out to the quoted influencer on social media. If your content is well written and they like the citation, they might place a link of your article on their website. This way you will earn quality backlinks as well as will get known in their huge and widespread network.

You can use data from the reliable sources in your niche from the sites like Statista, Pew Research and others. While writing such posts, take care of your keywords too. It should not be completely out of the place. This is because your website readers would be habituated of reading some sort of content from you. If all of a sudden, they will find something irrelevant to them, anytime they can unsubscribe.

4. Niche relevant blog commenting, forum commenting

This is a little similar to writing testimonials. It is a bitter truth that not all your testimonials will get approved in a single click; but, then what? You can’t sit and wait to build backlinks. You have to find other ways that also fall under complete white hat SEO. The similar technique is blog commenting and forum posting.

Most of the businesses run a blog and every blogger would love to read comments on their blogs. Identify the best blogs and blogging sites in your niche, and comment on your findings of that content. Do not post sales pitch or offensive content. But, post your overall positive opinion about that post. Also, you can ask to read a sequel or prequel of that post. Such comments have higher chances of getting approved rather than silly comments like “nice article”, “thanks for publishing”, etc.

Coming back to forum commenting i.e. forum participation – it is equally important as blog commenting. Here, you need to identify the active forums of your domain, preferably where industry influencers also visit. Few of the best places (as forums) are Quora, Inbound.org, LinkedIn Groups and Facebook Groups. Start with participating in the trending posts and the most active posts. Once your name and presence get established, you can start creating your own posts and ask for others’ opinion.

In both cases, you need to create a thorough authentic profile with a correct URL to your website.

5. Spread the word about your business

There’s a saying, “Don’t wait for it to happen. Make it happen.” Here, we are talking about spreading awareness about your business. Unless and until you do self-promotion, chances are rare that you will get noticed in the crowd. It does not mean that in each and every promotion sound too salesy. Rather, help your community by providing value. Build some long-lasting valuable relationships on social media with fellow industry people. Know about them and let them know about you. Once your online presence gets noticed in front of them, you can then make an “ask”.

One of the advised ways is to reach journalists and influencers from your niche through emails. If you don’t get their email ID, reach out to them on social networks. When you pitch them, ensure that your content copy is scrip and to the point. No one in this world has time to sit and read through long boring emails.

6. Become a contributor on the websites having high DA/PA

There are many portals which allow you to post your content and in exchange, you get a backlink to your website. But, post your content only on the sites having high DA (domain authority) and high PA (page authority). This is because your goal is not only to build backlinks but to build quality backlinks. Also, check spam scores of those portals. It should not be more than 2. You can use tools like Open Site Explorer to check these parameters.

Few of the recommended sites are Medium, List.ly, Growth hackers, etc. Try out these if it falls under your niche. Another major advantage you will get is building your brand value. On posting frequently, you will get subscribers to your post and that’s how people will get habituated to hear from you at regular intervals. This, in turn, will boost your personal brand as well as the corporate brand.

7. Difficult but fruitful method – HARO (Help a reporter out)

How many sites you daily come across which offers FREE trials? Too many, right? And there would be surely some portals which can be accessed for FREE forever but what all it requires is your registration.

Similarly, there is a site called HARO (https://www.helpareporter.com/).

Help_A_Reporter-HARO-for-Backlink-building

HARO provides journalists with a robust database of sources for upcoming stories and daily opportunities for sources to secure valuable media coverage.

Go and create your account thereby filling all required details, including your website URL. You will receive three emails a day with requests to reply to the information that reporters need. Scan through the emails you have received, identify the most relevant to you and post the reply to that particular query. You will not be able to build backlinks for all your replies. But you never know, for which relevant reply you may earn a good one.

Closing Thoughts:

The above-listed techniques are not the only ones, there are many. You can also help hacked sites, fix external broken links, and do social media promotions and business listing. Benefits will come from these areas too. If you are popular in your network but only your site is a newbie, try to get interviewed by an expert and in return earn backlinks.

Hope you loved reading it. Do drop in your thoughts on building backlinks in the comments box. We’d love to hear from you.