Understanding Lead Scoring & Why it Matters
Marketers are primarily worried about generating enough leads. But once they have it, they need to figure out which leads are interested in becoming a customer, and who is worth the time and effort.
Not all leads are created equal. They come from various sources, such as the website, email campaigns, cold calling, collateral downloads, email subscriptions, business conferences, and webinars. But all leads have a potential level that can help the sales representatives understand which leads are more likely to convert into paying customers.
Lead scoring matters not only in treating every prospect alike but also in focusing on the most viable ones. Marketing Sherpa found that using lead scoring boost lead generation ROI by 77% over those that didn’t use lead scoring.1
But first, what is Lead Scoring?
What is Lead Scoring?
Lead scoring is the process in which marketing and sales departments rank the leads generated based on their value and their likeliness of becoming a customer. This score depends on specific criteria or attributes (i.e. company size, budget, purchase timeframe, their current place in the buying cycle, and their fit for your business.)
These factors help companies prioritize and delegate each lead with the appropriate actions. The better the fit of the customer profile, the more likely the companies gain new business. Overall, lead scoring increases the combined efficiency and productivity of the sales and marketing department.
Why is Lead Scoring Essential?
Following a lead scoring system helps you identify the difference between interest and intention when processing your leads. It allows you to reach out to the ones that matter the most instead of low-value prospects, saving both time and resources. Lead scoring has been implemented by 68% of B2B organizations and 40% of salespeople have reported having a derived value from it.2
Leading scoring systems can benefit businesses by:
● Improving the targeting leads, designing further marketing initiatives, and advancing the best prospects in a business’s sales funnel.
● Optimizing the lead flow by increasing the collaboration between sales and marketing teams.
● Increasing the cohesion between these two sales and marketing helps companies achieve their business objectives and increase revenue.
● Providing data to the marketing team that effectively nurture qualified leads, eventually converting them to customers,
Understanding the Lead Scoring Model
The lead scoring model is a system used to evaluate leads and assign them values in the form of numerical points. You can score your leads based on multiple attributes, such as the professional information they have shared with you and how they have engaged with the business.
The model helps the sales and marketing teams quickly identify the potential leads, prioritize them, respond to them quickly, and increase the rate at which these leads become customers.
No matter how you design your lead scoring model, it should have the following things in common,
● The Marketing and Sales Objective Should Align
Sales representatives are the ones who are directly interacting with the leads that have just turned into customers, as well as the leads who have the potential to turn into customers. Sales representatives put themselves in the shoes of the leads so they can understand customers’ needs and advance them further in the sales funnel. Thus, marketing teams can use the help of sales representatives to generate specifically designed collaterals and other resources that encourage prospects to convert.
This tactic strengthens the sales funnel and helps discard the mistakenly-considered leads. Therefore, the sales and marketing team benefit from working together to develop scoring criteria that identify strong leads prospects.
● The Implicit Scoring and Explicit Scoring Data
A useful lead scoring model must look at both implicit and explicit scoring data. Implicit scoring data refers to the points that leads gain based on their behavioral action (i.e. website visits, social media interactions, content downloads, contact form submissions, etc.)
On the other hand, explicit scoring refers to the points assigned based on the specific objective qualities, such as firmographics or demographic details, along with the personal information directly shared by the prospects (i.e. job title, level of experience in the industry, company size, revenue, location, etc.)
In contrast to explicit scoring, implicit scoring often contributes to the overall score. A prospect may score only once for sharing their job title, but they will score an additional point every time it downloads a piece of content or opens an email.
To better track every customer action, companies can use a CRM platform.
● Negative scoring
Negative scoring is defined as removing points from the leads’ scores based on the actions or behavior that indicates a waning or complete lack of interest. Such leads stop progressing after a particular stage. For example, lead scores decrease when leads stop opening emails and begin unsubscribing from the email list. Negative scoring can help businesses recognize the weaker leads and focus on nurturing the stronger potential customers instead.
● Update the model regularly
Regularly refining the model as per the most recent data keeps your lead scoring accurate. Updating the lead scoring model helps the sales and marketing department identify patterns, such as what particular characteristics and prospect behavior increases or decreases sales. Thus, if your target customer profile has shifted, your scoring model should be adjusted accordingly.
How Can Red Sky Blue Water Help Your Business?
At Red Sky Blue Water, our experts believe in working efficiently with different lead prospects. We help companies upgrade their existing sales and marketing technology with powerful lead scoring capabilities that focus on usability. Implementing lead scoring not only saves you your time and resources, but it also saves you the frustration that comes from trying to pursue inaccurately determined leads.
If you have any questions or would like a little guidance, we would love to connect with you and discuss more.
Endnotes
1. http://blog.leadsquared.com/mining-the-real-gems-from-your-data-lead-scoring-and-engagement-scoring/
