Qualified Leads | 3 Steps To Acquiring Leads Consistently
The buying process has undergone dramatic changes in the last couple of years. It’s no longer sufficient to try and find customers simply by advertising your products and sending out email blasts. Nowadays, acquiring qualified leads is slightly different.
In fact, you need to ensure that your business gets found by customers.
You need to find ways to effectively cut through the noise. You must learn how to capture the prospect’s interest, and build a trust-based relationship with them. This is the only way to successfully & consistently convert them into buyers.
To do so, you need to have a comprehensive lead generation strategy in place. In other words, you need to create an automated process that will attract new visitors, stimulate their interest and “capture” them as qualified leads. Some what like what the lady is doing below, get the picture?! 😉
Now, what exactly does the term qualified entail? Simply put, qualified leads are prospects that have entered your sales funnel after expressing interest in your content, products, or services.
For a lead to be qualified, they need to possess certain characteristics that align with your buyer persona. This includes their demographics, interests, wants & needs, goals, problems, and pain points.
In other words, a qualified lead is someone who fits the description of your ideal customer, and has expressed interest in your business by exchanging their information (name and email) for one of your lead magnets.
In order to generate qualified leads, you need to target the right people with your marketing message.
If the message you’re trying to convey is too broad or unclear, you might generate leads who are not actually interested in the products and services you’re providing.
Why You Need To Capture Qualified Leads In The First Place
You might find this shocking, but the fact is, most of your website visitors (around 90% on average) aren’t going to make a purchase on their very first visit.
And if you don’t capture their email addresses right there and then and turn them into leads, they’ll simply leave your website, likely never to return.
And if your products are multi-layered and complex, or you’re selling a high-ticket ($1,000 – $10,000+) products or services, the percentages can be less than a percent.
The vast majority of your website visitors aren’t looking to make a purchase anyway. They’re simply browsing, searching for relevant information related to their problems or goals they wish to achieve.
In other words, they’re at the very top of your funnel, and have just started their customer journey:
This goes to show you just how many different steps a prospect typically takes to go from being a simple website visitor, to becoming one of your loyal customers.
Your objective at the top of the funnel is to attract as many people as possible, and get them to convert into leads by opting in for one of your lead magnets.
Converting Visitors Into Qualified Leads
In other words, you don’t want the traffic you’re driving to leave your website “empty-handed”.
Instead, you want to present them a free offer that’s relevant, valuable, and which they can benefit from, and ask for their email address in return.
Depending on your business and niche, the lead magnet can be anything from a PDF report, an e-book, newsletter subscription, webinar registration, free trial, discount coupon, and so on…
The thing is, people at the top of your funnel are either:
- Unaware that they have a certain problem, or
- Have just realized it and are looking for possible solutions
They’re not looking for specific products or brands, and certainly aren’t looking for your particular offers. Instead, they are looking for information that might help them overcome certain challenges, solve a particular problem, or achieve a goal.
For example, if you’re in the health & fitness industry, the people at the top of the funnel aren’t looking for your “revolutionary 14-day diet” or whatever the name of your product might be.
Instead, they’re looking for a way to lose weight and improve their health.
That’s why, the perfect offer for these people who are researching their problem, and looking for possible solutions are freebies like reports, guides, and e-books on that particular topic.
Here’s an example of a great lead magnet focused on a specific result for the top of the funnel:
This is something you can and should take advantage of. Remember that it’s way easier to promote a free offer at the top of your funnel, than it is to convince someone to buy your $5,000 high-ticket product at the bottom.
In the earliest stages of your funnel, you never want to ask too much out of your prospects. You don’t really need a ton of information anyway.
What you should ask for is definitely their email address, maybe even their name, and rarely their phone number.
The reason is simple – the value you’re providing with your lead magnet needs to be greater, or at least equal to the commitment you’re asking from them.
And since the offer is free anyway, you don’t really need their job title, company name, their income status, etc.
This is a mistake commonly done by B2B companies, where they ask for too much information right off the bat. They end up losing leads and potential customers. Prospects can either feel it’s unnecessary to provide that much information… Or, they might simply be put off by lengthy opt-in forms.
If additional information is required to determine which products you’re going to offer to the lead further down the line, and how you’re going to promote them, you can always get it in the next step of the process.
Capturing Leads In The Middle Of The Funnel
Prospects in the middle of your funnel fully understand their problem, and are actively searching for the best solutions.
They are looking for and researching different products, services, and tools, similar to the ones you offer. However, they’re not ready to make the purchase just yet. They’re simply weighing out their options.
This is where more in-depth information will work best. You can offer them stuff like case studies, demonstrations, and “how-to” videos. This will help them better understand all the possibilities laid out in front of them.
Since prospects in this stage are clearly showing interest and involvement, you can ask for additional information without being obtrusive.
For example, a phone number, their industry, and company role. These are the middle of the funnel details that allow you to take a more personalized approach when engaging the lead.
Here, your content need to continue to educate and provide value to the lead, but you also want to start positioning your business at the perfect solution for your lead’s problems, or the best way to achieve their goals.
Collecting more details like the lead’s biggest challenges and pain points can be quite beneficial. It will allow you to better understand the specific problem they are trying to solve. Thus, you can tailor your marketing campaigns accordingly.
Converting Qualified Leads Into Customers
Once the lead reached the bottom of your funnel, they already know which solution they want to try. They know how much time they’re willing to invest. And, most importantly, how much money they’re willing to pay for that solution.
If you’ve done your homework in the previous stages, and have generated interest, consistently provided value, earned the lead’s trust, and manage to convey the benefits they’ll receive from your offers, this last step will be pretty straightforward.
Now, the prospects are typically looking for information that will validate their decision to make a purchase. Testimonials, case studies, and free trials work wonders here.
If you think about it, there isn’t a software company that doesn’t offer a free trial of the product. And it’s not too difficult to understand why – it reduces the risk and allows the potential customer to test out the features of the software before asking them to make the monetary commitment.
Once the potential customer knows what your product or service provides, and has a clear idea of the results they can expect to achieve, you can introduce them to the different payment options. At that point, it’s much easier to convince them to take the final step and make a purchase.
The Tripwire
Another effective strategy you can implement towards the bottom of the funnel is introducing your qualified leads to a “tripwire”.
This is a low-ticket offer, typically ranging from $5- $50. It doesn’t serve as your main source of income, but rather to convert the lead into a paid customer.
The tripwire needs to be a simple and affordable offer. An offer which will help the potential customers overcome the fear of buying. One that will help you gain their trust.
Tripwires can be anything from introductory courses, hard-copy books, lower-priced products, again all depending on your business and industry.
The main thing with tripwires is that their perceived value needs to be much higher than the actual price.
In other words, the lead needs to feel like they’re getting a great deal. It should be obvious to them that they’re receiving a ton of valuable information, for a relatively low investment.
Once they’ve made a purchase from you and recognize the real value of your paid products or services, it’ll be much easier to get them to buy your main offer. After all, high ticket product requires them to whip out their credit card and pay several hundred (or even thousands) of dollars.
All your marketing efforts at the bottom of the funnel should be focused on displaying the value of your products and services to the potential customers. You have to focus on removing any buying objections, to convert leads into buyers.
Let’s Summarize
Website conversions are incredibly low (less than 5%), especially on the first visit.
However, the reason is not that your audience doesn’t care about your products or services… It’s that they’re not ready to make a purchase the instant they land on one of your pages.
You need to have a lead capture strategy in place. You must also nurture the leads and move them along your sales funnel by dissecting their ultimate buying decision into a series of “micro-conversions”.
Creating a comprehensive sales funnel, and sending traffic to landing pages where you can “capture” the prospect’s email address is a much more effective way of generating qualified leads, then simply driving traffic to your website’s homepage.
However, you need to test out different approaches. Make sure that your offers are aligned with all the different stages of the buyer’s journey your leads are in.
This will dramatically increase your conversion rates, resulting in more sales and higher profits.
Want to learn how to create powerful, fully-automated sales funnels for your business?
Then I invite you to join the Wealth Academy Sales Funnels Specialist Certification Program.
We teach aspiring entrepreneurs, marketing professionals, and business owners how to plan out, create, implement, and optimize high-converting sales funnels, from start to finish.
If you want to generate more qualified leads for your business and reliably convert them into life-long customers, increase the customer lifetime value, and turn existing customers into repeat buyers – then this program is perfect for you!
Click here to discover how you can become a Wealth Academy Certified Sales Funnels Specialist.
About The Author
Your Millionaire Mentor
Shaqir Hussyin
Shaqir Hussyin is the founder and CEO of WealthAcademy.com & Funnels.com. Nicknamed the “Backpack Millionaire”, he’s invested $350,000 into his own education and training. Whilst traveling to 100+ countries, Shaqir has built over 10+ million dollar brands and attracted over 500,000+ subscribers.
His signature program is now available: Max Income System; 14 Simple Steps To Making Your First Income Online.
Shaqir is also a highly sought-after speaker and direct response “Sales Funnels” global leader. Shaqir’s work has impacted over 100,000 businesses in 65 different countries. Connect with Shaqir on Instagram, YouTube, LinkedIn & FB Group...
