Lead generation success: how to scale with telemarketing

It is satisfying when a campaign is successful, and you can enjoy the fruits of your labour. Setting up and launching a new lead generation programme is time-consuming and labour-intense, so it is great to be rewarded for that effort.

As a marketer, you are always under pressure to keep leads flowing and the pipeline fed. So, when a new campaign delivers, your inclination is tap into that vein to find more of the same.

With lead targets to hit, what else would you do?

Before you step things up, however, it is important to make sure it really makes sense to scale. Success is often nonlinear; it isn’t always the case that the more you put in, the more you get out.

Before you decide to scale your lead generation campaign, here are six factors to keep in mind.

1. Does this campaign still align to your business strategy?

When you launched the campaign, it was no doubt designed to support current priorities, whether sector development, new business targets or retention goals. But things change over time so make sure your campaign objectives are still in sync with the current priorities.

2. How big is the opportunity?

Is there sufficient opportunity to warrant scaling up and justify additional investment or are you sowing seeds on infertile ground? What is the total size of the target segment, are there like-for-like audiences in other sectors, or could you extend your geographical reach to other regions?

3. Will it still deliver ROI?

Every marketing effort will have both fixed and variable costs, which feed into ROI. A small-scale pilot may deliver a return on investment but if your output grows will margins be eroded? Before you scale things up, look for economies of scale and check that costs won’t just spiral.

4. Will your resources flex?

Do you have the resources to manage increased output as you scale? If you are driving more leads to your sales team but they can’t handle the volume, those leads will age and die. Unless leads convert to revenue, the whole exercise could be an expensive failure.

5. Will your processes scale?

Your operational processes may work for existing volumes, but will they break if you scale up? Look for ways to automate or streamline your approach first. Are there redundant steps, duplication of effort or elements of the process you can outsource?

6. Is the time right?

If all the above is in place, you may feel it makes sense to scale. Before you launch new activity, however, consider if there is a more opportune or more lucrative time to scale. Are there new features on the horizon that will give the campaign greater traction, is the whole market ripe for your product, what is the current competitive landscape?

Intelligent scaling – how telemarketing can help.

If you are looking to scale up your lead generation efforts in a sustainable way, a data-led, highly measurable channel such as telemarketing can add real value. If your resources are limited, outsourcing to a specialist provider also offers many benefits:

• Proof of concept

Telemarketing is highly measurable so you can refine and improve campaign performance as you learn. It enables you to systematically test and benchmark new approaches, messaging, and propositions, and gain reliable insight into what is and isn’t working as momentum grows. It can provide deep customer and market insight alongside valuable competitor intelligence to hone your strategy.

• Precision targeting

A data-led channel such as telemarketing allows you to target your effort to the prospects and segments with the highest potential return. This allows you to fine tune your messaging and tailor your proposition to your most important audiences, at the same time capturing valuable insight into their needs to continuously refine and drive ROI.

• Specialist skills and expertise

With a specialist outsourcer, you can access skills you don’t have in-house to extend your reach and improve the effectiveness of your lead generation campaign. These may be native languages that allow you to target a wider geographical region or sales development skills that ensure your leads are a qualified fit before they reach your sales team.

• Flexible, scalable resources

If growth isn’t linear, will your resources be able flex as demand fluctuates? Will your sales team be crippled by peaks and stagnate during troughs? An outsourced resource can ramp up quickly but pause if demand slows. It gives you the ability to scale in stages, adding or removing resources as needed, with no long-term commitment.

• Controlled investment

Using an outsource option avoids the need to invest heavily when you first start to scale up and there are still assumptions to test. If results are unpredictable or you are unsure if you will get the same response across all markets, you have access to additional resource in the short- and medium term, without the need for long-term investment based on assumptions or unknowns.

• Increased visibility and productivity

A specialist outsource agency can provide in-depth reporting and analytics and shared call recordings, giving you greater visibility of campaign performance and deeper customer and market insight. Using purpose-built platforms, they can achieve greater productivity and manage your data productively, identifying pockets of opportunity and nurturing both immediate and long-term pipeline.

If you are looking to scale up your lead generation efforts, telemarketing can offer a controlled, measured approach with the ability to flex and scale as needed, whilst capturing valuable insight to hone and improve results. A specialist agency, working as a trusted partner with deep and broad knowledge of different sectors, and experience based on hundreds of previous campaigns, can also bring fresh ideas, insight, and expertise to inject new life into your lead generation efforts.

Read more on the benefits of outsourcing