3 Steps to be in control of your lead generation campaigns

When I was a kid, my mom used to tell me that I wanted to have everything under control. I hated it. I wanted everyone to think that I was more of a bohemian. With the time I have realised that my mom was right.

I actually discovered that I like to have everything under control when I started working in digital marketing: With the right tools and based on data gathered in the initial steps of a campaign, I would be able to make the right decisions. In other words, I would be able to be in control of the results of any campaign an optimise it to get even better results on an ongoing basis.

There are three main things that data tells me or will need to tell me during the duration of a campaign in order to achieve the best results. Data that I will need to ensure I can get prior and during any activity:

How can I prove the ROI of my efforts to the client and to us?

Any email marketing campaign is, at the end, an effort to improve the marketing results of our client. In order to achieve it, I always want to have a clear goal from the client and that means having a goal that follows the SMART rule: Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic and Timely. Once this is confirmed, I know, first, if this will be achievable via Lead Generation activities, and second, how to prove the ROI of the campaign to the client.

Let’s say that, for example, our client is an online retailer and he wants to achieve more sales on his website at the same time he can increase the size of his database paying a maximum CPA of $50 per sale. In this case to find out if this is achievable, we will first check what is the CPL we need based on his offer (i.e. $5CPL) and calculate what is the conversion from lead to sale (CR) needed to hit the $50 CPA. Following the example, we would need a 10% CR from lead to sale. This CR needed will be my main focus during the entire campaign as this will be the rate that will prove a positive ROI of my efforts to the client.

Where should I spend more time to get the best results?

Any digital marketing campaign can give you tones of information and data and it is very easy to get lost amongst that data. To find out where should I spend more time in order to achieve the best results, the best option is to go back to the first point: any data that will help you proving an ROI for your client is the key, combined obviously with any tracking data needed for billing purposes.

Continuing with our online retail client, we agreed that to achieve a positive ROI on my client’s side I’ll need a 10% CR from lead to sale. To achieve that, our main focus will be on setting up the campaign in a way that we can track not only the leads generated but also the sales generated due to our activities.

How can I improve the last results?

Finally, choosing the right data to analyse will help us optimising the campaign on a very accurate way and not falling into the mistake of using it just as a vanity tool. Metrics are not there just to look at them being proud of the OR, CTR or even conversion rate you achieved. Metrics are there to help you achieving the ultimate goal of each client that we specified in the first point. Data will tell you why are you or why are you not achieving the results desired by the client and that information will set the path to optimise the campaign and improve the last results.

After launching the campaign on a CPL basis, we realised that we got a great volume of leads at the rate of $5 CPL but the conversion rate from lead to sale was at 6%, which made it unsustainable for our client. In order to run this campaign on an ongoing basis we will need to hit the 10% and data will tell us what has been working and what hasn’t: is there any particular sources that are hitting that rate? If not, should we qualify a bit further the leads risking the overall volume of leads but achieving a higher CR from lead to sale for example?

Following these three steps I can always ensure that first of all, what the client is asking is feasible in the lead generation space and therefore worth starting, secondly that the strategy followed is the right one and finally that it is scalable.

As you can see, my mom was quite right telling me that I like to have everything under control!

———————
About the author
Marc Pasques
Senior Account Strategist

Marc started working in the Marketing space over 10 years ago and after receiving his Masters degree in “Social Media & Digital Marketing Branding and Strategy” he moved to the Digital industry to never go back. He has helped big companies to manage their lead generation and digital marketing campaigns, and small start-ups to to grow their digital presence and sales.