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Utilizing Lead Enrichment to Turbo Charge CRM

September 1, 2017
12:45 PM

There is an old American drama film called Glengarry Glen Ross which shows the life of a few real estate salesmen who fight over a particular set of leads called the Glengarry Leads. Now, the Sales Manager Blake, portrayed by actor Alec Baldwin announces at the beginning of the movie that only the top two salesmen of the month will be allowed access to the Glengarry Leads while the rest will be fired without hesitation through a very abusive drill to motivate the other sales personnel.

Now those who don’t have any marketing experience may have doubts regarding the importance of Leads mentioned in the movie but professionals who have done sales at least one point or other in their corporate career will know how important the value of a solid lead is. Sales is not an easy job. The effort in getting the appointment, making the client understand about the product, convincing the client regarding the product & services, etc., takes time & effort.

The whole process can get more streamlined and easier if the sales team knows the exact personnel in targeted organizations to approach for their job to get done. But the question that arises is how can it be made possible?

Enter CRM

Customer Relationship Management in simple words can be put as technologies that companies use to manage & analyze the company’s interactions and data with current and potential customers with the goal of improving business relationships, customer retention & sales growth.

A CRM system gives everyone in an organization from sales, marketing, operations, recruiting, or any other line of business, an organized way to maintain relationships to perform better and drive success. This gives much more visibility and access to data which makes it easier to collaborate across different departments in an organization which will, in turn, result in increased productivity. The features of CRM can be used by organizations of all sizes, especially where teams try to do more with less.

The concept of CRM, which got its origins from the 1970s through data that was recorded in office files &spreadsheets, is the building block of mainstream business. Over the past few decades, it has evolved from general Database Marketing to today’s Social & Mobile CRM software which is helping Corporates across the world. But just maintaining CRM software and recording data for the sake of it will not be adequate enough in the corporate world. This is where Lead Enrichment comes into play.

Lead Enrichment

Lead Enrichment can be referred to as a process that provides an enriched view of leads to the sales team. As I mentioned in the beginning, sales is not an easy job and can be much more streamlined if the Leads are properly defined. Through the help of CRM, it’s possible to keep track of all the data but the problem arises when the important information gets hidden in a pile of data. Lead Enrichment can be used to identify the most relevant data and keep track of it for future use.

Why Lead Enrichment is necessary?

It’s no hidden fact that organizations need leads to provide to their sales team. Companies use different marketing methods like Direct mail, Telemarketing, Networking, etc., for generating leads. The leads that are generated are then stored in the CRM software for further use. But the chances of the collected data being the qualified one is rare. Imagine the sales reps hitting the road with all the collected data and getting exhausted by chasing all the customers instead of just the ones that need to be targeted. Through the process of Lead Enrichment, the collected data can be skimmed down to the most relevant records which in turn help the sales team in doing their jobs better.

Lead Enrichment also helps in properly executing digital marketing strategies, advertising campaigns, e-mail campaigns, and other approaches so that identifying the targets gets much easier.

Data Decay can be quoted as one of the other reasons why Lead Enrichment is required. Data Decay happens when the existing data in the CRM gets outdated over time. For example, a company moving its office from one place to another, a manager moving from the existing company to another, etc., all come under Data Decay. Lead Enrichment should be maintained across the CRM system to ensure that constant updates of leads happen, in order to minimize data decay.

Methods of Lead Enrichment

Intelligent forms instead of shorter ones

Imagine that a marketing manager of a corporate has designed a visitor form for his website visitors. The chances of the form getting filled will increase if it’s kept short instead of a lengthy one. But by following this process the marketer will miss out on the acquisition of several lead details.

The manager can use the help of intelligent forms which is a two-step process. These forms ask for minimal details like name, company, title & e-mail address on the first conversion and details like phone number, industry type, company revenues, employee count, etc. in the second one without asking for the details that were previously asked.

Sales intelligence

It is a method that is used to enrich the already existing leads in the CRM Database. Companies use the help of software and sometimes human reviewers to extract information about people and companies from the internet. Usually utilized in integration with both CRM and marketing automation systems, these intelligence processes allow users to enhance lead records with a simple process, narrowing down only the data elements they require from the compiled intelligence data.

Lead Enrichment - Essential For CRM; Essential For Business

Having CRM software is necessary to run your business in today’s market, whether it’s a startup or an established business. And Lead Enrichment is an essential element to maintain Lead Quality. Because at the end of the day, it’ll be beneficial for both the sales team as well as the company if the quality leads don’t end up in a pile of irrelevant data.