There is a quiet, but highly lucrative marketplace in generating and selling customer inquiries that have been generated online. These businesses, and I presume you might be a part of one of these, are digital marketing experts that do the hard work of attracting and converting high-interest buyers.

That’s the supply-side of the equation.

On the other side of these successful lead generation companies (lead providers) is the demand component of the equation. Companies, sales teams, and individual sales professionals that want (need) to buy these inquiries.

Attracting and retains this essential side of the equation is arguably the harder part of the business.

Your need to attract and retain lead buyers is the part of the lead generation business that I want to talk about today. It is a challenge that is unique to marketplace and market-maker businesses.

Here are just a few of the unusual challenges it creates.

1. Marketplace businesses require two distinctly different sales and marketing teams. The first team does B2C marketing. They attract and convert insurance, mortgage, education, or solar consumers – leads. The second team is a B2B sales and marketing team. They hunt down and win insurance agencies, mortgage lenders, educational institutions, and solar installers – lead buyers.
2. Most lead buyers are not trained to work (sell to) consumers that have inquired online. They’re often only trained to generate and work referral leads. We’ll dissect this problem more deeply later in this article.
3. The most common complaint heard by lead providers is, “your leads suck!” As you kind imagine this is frustrating even maddening to any professional digital marketer. However, the root problem to this very real and authentically held compliant is often misdiagnosis and therefore mistreated. The reality is that “poor lead quality” is often more related to your lead buyers’ sales training than your lead generation tactics. See challenge number 2 above.

This short list identifies two problems:

1. The need for a sales and marketing strategy to attract lead buyers, and
2. A system for improving the competency of those lead buyers.

Solving these two problems comes with a bunch of benefits:

1. You won’t find yourself scrambling for lead buyers all the time
2. You’ll have less turnover in your client base
3. You’ll be better able to match supply and demand – more fully monetizing your leads without as many unfulfilled “legs”
4. You’ll continually expand awareness and opportunities for your leads
5. You’ll be able to provide your own salesforce warm leads
6. You’ll have less turnover in your salesforce because they have leads

Let’s take a look at an inbound marketing plan that will bring you more qualified lead buyers and nurture more of the unqualified into future opportunities.

What do all sales people want?

We begin our lead buyer marketing plan with a simple understanding of what sales people want – The Silver Bullet.

Now we all know this doesn’t really exist. Even salespeople know this. But, we’re all looking for shortcuts to success. Tips, tricks, and processes that have worked for others.

As a lead provider to hundreds of salespeople and access to as many different ways of working internet leads over many years, you and I know precisely what works and what doesn’t.

The problem is all of this knowledge is doled out in small fractured one-off conversations. Rarely do we document all of these best practices into easy to reference and learn from training material.

Reposition your website to create better lead buyers

This is where your website comes into play. Most lead provider websites are a content-thin microsite that simply lets people know you sell leads. There’s nothing interesting to attract lead buyers.

Instead of this second-thought of a website, create a website that gives sales people what they crave – sales strategies and tactics that work.

The simple step of adding a sales blog will bring you hundreds, even thousands of eager salespeople looking for more deals. Done smartly, your website will give them the sales tips they crave and the leads (opportunities) they need to practice what you’re teaching and ultimately have a shot at hitting that monthly quota.

Increase your value proposition and frequency of your visibility

Now think about the value proposition your building.

Without sales training content, you are just one of hundreds of lead providers that sales folks seek out in a moment of panic, on occasion. The simple act of adding a quality sales-focused content marketing program will increase your value proposition to the sales teams you support with leads. More importantly it gives you the opportunity increase the frequency of the contact with your clients and prospective clients.

What’s more, a high-quality content marketing program focused on sales training is going to make every salesperson that buys your leads better. You can guide them to implement the best practices that your most successful lead buyers have already proven out. You can teach them to set up and execute the most basic follow up systems and strategies. You can teach them how to turn your leads into closed deals at a much higher rate.

This extra effort and investment is guaranteed to increase lead buyer retention, lifetime value, and overall customer satisfaction.

Next Steps?

This isn’t theory. This is a strategy that we’ve executed for years for our clients – lead providers and lead buyers just like you.

If you’re a lead provider looking to attract and retain more lead buyers or you’re a lead buyer looking to improve your success with the internet leads that you’re buying, can build a content program that will improve the skills and success of your sales teams.

Photo by NeONBRAND on Unsplash