In the beginning, someone raises a hand and says, "Yes - tell me more." From that moment on, a company becomes engaged in one of the most critical function that influences sales success: lead management.

Traditional marketing involves a one-way message from a business to the market, be it business to consumer or business to business. The business then waits and hopes that the market responds to the offer by purchasing a product.

Direct marketing is the marketing of products and services directly from the seller to the end user. It combines advertising and selling in a simple, targeted, measurable effort. Direct marketing most often involves using a database and/or outside sources of information to solicit the market with offers. The information is segmented into various populations and offers are delivered to each segment.

Lead Generation (commonly abbreviated as Lead-Gen) is a marketing term that refers to the creation or generation of prospective customer interest or inquiry into a business' products or services. Often lead generation is associated with marketing activity targeted at generating sales opportunities for a company's sales force.

Hence a lead can be defined as information regarding or provided by a customer who may be interested in making a purchase of services / product offered.

After the market segment performs the expected action (i.e., makes a purchase, calls an 800 number, enters a contest, etc.), the results are tracked and fed back into the database. This information is used for future contact efforts by the business.

Lead Management is the process of rapidly and effectively creating, nurturing, distributing and analyzing leads. The ultimate goal? To increase the likelihood that a lead will convert to a qualified opportunity and then in to a new satisfied customer.

Change is sweeping through marketing organizations everywhere. Expectations are rising - "give us more, better quality leads, more quickly" - while budgets and headcounts shrink. The mandate of doing more with less has never been more apparent, and pressure is increasing for marketing teams to draw a direct line between their activities and the bottom line.

PACE Hypothesis

Process oriented Lead Generation will assist the organization in achieving its growth goals and increasing its bottom-line. The ultimate goal of any marketing department is to generate qualified leads for sales. Sales then convert leads into customers. The rate at which deals close is the final yardstick by which every marketing investment should be measured.

Defining Lead Management

A. Campaign Planning

This stage consists of planning the entire campaign in detail - choosing the customer universe, determining lists/databases, defining service offerings to the chosen universe, developing messaging, selecting the medium, setting the timing for the lead generation campaign, planning the marketing campaign, then specifying lead qualification and distribution mechanism with Sales. Metrics to measure the success ratio of the campaign are also defined at this stage.

B. Identify Prospects

This stage consists of identifying the prospective customers from the chosen customer universe. The lead generation teams utilizes the selected media to reach to the lists/databases and shortlist the prospective customers who would be interested in the service offerings of the organization. Prospects are ideally decision makers in a client organization.

C. Qualify Leads

In this stage, prospects are qualified, scored and processed according to pre-determined criteria for lead qualification. Typical lead process points and 'flags' are defined, including qualification questions and processes, distribution rules, lead scoring (specific definitions of A, B and C-level leads), components and duration of the sales cycle, how to deal with atypical or out-of-profile leads, and ownership of each stage of the process.

D. Distribute Leads

Lead distribution is the process of getting leads to the right person at the right time. There can be multiple distribution systems - according to geography, territory, product, service offering, line of business, lead source, level of urgency, or new vs. existing customers. Lead distribution can be short circuited if they have a short time frame to make a decision, or a ready-approved budget, or if they have a particular urgency or a high value associated with them.

E. Nurture Leads

Lead nurturing allows organizations to remain in touch with long term leads until the lead is ready to be advanced into the sales cycle. When the lead is closer to making a purchase, it can be passed on to the sales team.

F. Track, Measure and Evaluate Campaigns

The last stage of lead management is to close the loop on results. Post-campaign analysis and reporting is the key to demonstrating success or perhaps identifying how a marketing approach could be improved. By going through a detailed planning process with metrics definition at the outset, teams are clear as to what is to be measured at each step, and have visibility into how similar campaigns have performed. When the ROMI and cost-per-lead from each campaign is accurately reported, patterns can be identified which help marketing teams to do more often what is proven to work well.

Companies that follow lead management best practices can expect to increase their return on every lead generated. By managing the process from the first stages of planning through the qualification, distribution and nurturing process, marketing teams gather meaningful data on what works, and what needs improvement. This continuous process of planning, execution and evaluation ensures that ROMI is maximized on marketing activities and prospects are engaged right up to the purchase decision. It also ensures that the sales team is focused on 'real' leads rather than chasing and qualifying prospects.

Implementing lead management best practices reduces the overall cost of marketing, fills the sales pipeline faster with better quality leads, and grows revenue. Therefore, every marketing organization can finally discover the real gold amongst their leads.