Can Drift Generate Mores Leads and Sales for Your Team?

Can Drift Generate Mores Leads and Sales for Your Team?

Conversational marketing is the hot new trend in today’s business world, and for good reason. Experts have found that conversational marketing can increase the volume of leads by 30%, and even enhance their quality at the same time!

Some people equate conversational marketing with live chat. While live chat is an important component of a conversational marketing strategy, there is much more involved in an effective implementation of this marketing plan than the ability to engage with every single visitor to your website. Conversational marketing is all about engaging prospects on their time and on their terms. It’s about asking the right questions in the right way. When properly utilized, it can break down the walls between marketing, sales, and support, more efficiently qualify leads in a shorter time frame, and optimize conversion rates.

Can a conversational marketing platform like Drift generate more leads and sales for your team? Absolutely! Let’s look at some of the nuts and bolts of conversational marketing, and see why it is such an effective tool.

How It Works

The traditional method of moving the customer down the sales funnel and a conversational marketing strategy are as different as night and day.

The old process would go something like this:

  • The customer visits your company’s website. He is interested in your product or service, and wants to learn more. In order to do so, he has to fill out and submit a form.
  • In a day or two, he receives a follow-up email asking him to set up an appointment with a salesperson. He replies to the email by booking an appointment for Monday on the following week.
  • On that Monday, a salesperson makes contact with him, and closes the sale.

What is wrong with this picture? You may be able to pinpoint several things. For example, the customer is unable to receive information relevant to the sale at the precise time he is looking for it. Once the follow-up email reaches him, his interest may have already “gone cold.”

Moreover, the customer is kept waiting for over a week before he finally gets to engage with a live salesperson one on one. In fact, one survey uncovered a shocking statistic: almost half of companies’ sales teams never respond to request for information forms!

While the old way of moving prospects down the funnel leaves much to be desired, consider a typical conversational marketing process via a platform like Drift:

  • The customer visits your company’s website. After a minute or two, a chat-bot engages him. The chat-bot is able to “determine” that the customer wants to learn more about your product or service, and he is connected to a live representative.
  • The salesperson converses with the customer one and one. Depending on the customer’s interest level and your company’s departmental structure, the salesperson can either set up an appointment for further discussion, or close the sale then and there!

Doesn’t that process seem much easier and much more effective? The customer is not kept waiting; you’re able to qualify this lead as a high priority within minutes; and the customer can be moved down the sales funnel in an expedited fashion. It’s no wonder that so many companies are investing in a conversational marketing platform, and implementing this strategy across all channels of commerce!

Benefits of Conversational Marketing

There are many advantages to implementing an integrated conversational marketing strategy. Here are just a few to consider:

  • Conversational marketing allows you to qualify leads almost immediately. Chat-bots can engage potential customers in real-time, and help you to sort out which prospects are cold leads, which ones are warm, and which ones are hot.
  • A platform like Drift also makes it easier for your sales team to focus their efforts on the hot leads. While chat-bots can handle routine user questions, and weed out prospects that will likely never purchase from your company, your sales team can spend their time engaging with qualified leads that have shown genuine interest. This focused approach can’t help but boost your conversion rates.
  • Customers are not subjected to time frames of weeks or even months for a follow-up to their request for information. Instead, customers are able to engage with company representatives in a comfortable, natural way. This can help to keep their interest alive, and make them more willing to book an appointment or purchase on the spot.
  • Conversational marketing is a highly scalable business strategy. Whether you are engaging with 10 prospects or 10,000, conversational marketing allows your sales team to prioritize only the best leads, while chat-bots and other automated tools handle basic user requests.
  • Conversational marketing also encourages a high level of flexibility in meeting customer needs. For instance, a customer engagement might begin as a sales touch point, but once it becomes clear that the customer requires technical assistance, he can be handed off to your company’s support department. Integrated software allows each department’s representative to access relevant customer history, and be better equipped to handle the customer’s specific needs.

The bottom line is this: conversational marketing generates conversation qualified leads (CQLs). These CQLs allow you to streamline the customer’s journey through the funnel, and generate faster paths to revenue. Who wouldn’t want that?

How Drift can Help

A live messaging platform like Drift can help your company generate those CQLs, and turn them into customers. As one essential facet of an overarching conversational marketing strategy, Drift allows you to prioritize quality and speed over mere quantity. Your customers will be more satisfied as their requests are promptly addressed; and your sales team will be more efficient in engaging leads and converting them into sales.

Conversational marketing will continue to grow in popularity and effectiveness. Humans have been conversing with each other for thousands of years, and will continue to do so into the indefinite future. Leverage the power of real-time, one on one conversations to drive business growth for your company. If you do so, you’ll see the amazing results that come from using a platform like Drift as part of your conversational marketing plan.

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