Send-Off Strategy: Turning Dead Leads Into Cash

Couldn’t you just scream? You chase after a potential new client with all your heart. You build up a great rapport with the prospective client – spent hours working on a proposal and everything looked just ducky – then BAM!

“We’ve decided to go with another company, but thanks.”

WHAT? Huh?

You’re outraged. You’re frustrated.

You try to negotiate; you try to outsell the competition, but still – NO SALE.

What do you do now? Do you rip up that lead and pound your head into the desk?

Please realize that the dead lead in your hand can be worth a ton of money to you – even if they don’t buy your services ever.

If you are throwing away your dead leads like most people would …. Please, I urge you to watch the video I posted up today.

It will show you the secret of the Send Off Strategy – a very simple, low-cost, low-cost way to transform dead leads into dollars.

What if you could take all your dead sales leads and turn them into a source of new clients with only the click of a mouse?  Here’s how you can turn that stack of not interested sales leads into a tidy pile of new accounts. It’s a simple strategy but one that pays off nicely.

When you’re a service professional you do everything you can to keep your business relationships alive.  To keep accounts pumping cash into your business you must always the looking for ways to provide value to others.

But sometimes business relationships end. Some die of natural causes; the client goes out of business, moves out of town or no longer needs your type of services. Others die a horrible death; they owe you money, you’ve gone to court and no matter what you’ll never do business with them again.

But there’s another type of relationship that lingers between the living account and the dead account – I call them zombie relationships – the undead.

With zombie relationships nothing happens. They’re not in the market for your services anytime soon but the relationship isn’t an acrimonious one. The last time you spoke to each other the client turned your offer down – but that’s all.

It’s important for you to bury the dead. You can’t afford to keep chasing leads that are not going to turn into sales. I’ve seen too many professional services providers waste countless hours trying to get blood out of a stone – instead of pursuing new opportunities.

Why do smart professionals waste their time like that? Many times it has to do with the comfort level of speaking to friendly prospects who never say “yes” instead of risking our egos and approaching strangers who might reject us. I regularly audit sales leads for my clients to make sure they aren’t wasting precious resources on leads that lead nowhere.

After you’ve determined that you’ve given a lead your very best but they’re just not going to buy its time to say goodbye. But before you shovel the dirt on them it’s only right to say a few words. Here are some words you can say that can create value from dead leads.

For example, let’s say you’re a caterer and you have spent considerable time in pursuing business from a bride to be. Even though you had built up a rapport and trust and even though the prospective client really liked what you had to offer – for some reason she went to your competition. (Maybe her mother-in-law forced her to use someone else or the yacht she rented only allowed her to use their exclusive caterer.)

Do you just rip that lead up and throw it in the garbage? I hope not. With all the talk about recycling I hope you consider recycling that lead. How?

First, the caterer must realize that the bride to be is still a valuable consumer to a number of event professionals. Secondly, the bride to be can still refer business to you.

Wouldn’t that bride be tickled pink to receive a valuable discount from one or more of your event industry associates? What if the caterer sent out a legitimately exciting discount coupon that offered an exceptional package for limos, photography, flowers and invitations. It would build tremendous goodwill with the bride and could potentially result in referral commissions from the other providers.

Next you could motivate the bride to be to refer business to you directly by giving her a remarkable incentive to do so. What if our caterer kept in touch with the bride and sent a sincere thank you along with a tangible expression of gratitude in the form of an irresistible offer?

Here’s how that might look, but let’s use a wedding DJ as an example this time.

A wedding DJ named Tony doesn’t get the gig for Donna’s wedding.  Not because Tony wears too much cologne and smells like Bloomingdale’s exhaust vents – no – Donna ended up getting married on that yacht that only permits their own guys to perform. Instead of Tony throwing away all the time and energy he put into developing a relationship with Donna, here’s the e-mail he could send…

Dear Donna,

Congratulations on your wedding!  The weather was perfect on Saturday and I was thinking of how useful the Hudson must have looked from that gorgeous yacht.  I bet it was a great evening.

Thanks so much for giving us a call back in May to discuss your wedding plans.  I’m really thankful for the time that you and Scott spent at my office and I know that my pal Jimmy at the limo company took good care of you.

To thank you for giving me the opportunity to discuss your wedding with you I’d like to give you $50. If you book any of our services with us by December 31 of next year I’ll take $50 off of our regular fee. Please just use this code XYZ when you call to book your event and you’ll save $50!

Now odds are you won’t be getting married again by December 31!  So I’d like to extend this offer to any of your friends and family that may be planning a special occasion.  Just tell them to use code XYZ and I’ll take $50 off – and I’ll send you a check for $50 just for the referral!

Best wishes,

Tony

Now isn’t that a simple strategy?  As long as Tony treated Donna with care and professionalism back when she was a live lead, chances are she’ll appreciate the offer.  You are setting her up to be a champion to her friends and family by allowing her to offer value to them.

You may want to follow up with a separate e-mail for a coupon code that she can forward to friends.

I used this tactic in my business and believe me it works. If you end up getting one expert client because you took the time to thank your prospects and offer them some more value before you discarded them, is it worth it?

I challenge you to dig through your database this week and come up with a fantastic going away present for it your soon to be dead leads. The last time I checked sending an e-mail out didn’t cost a whole bunch of money. It’s just a matter of getting it done.

I could spend hours sharing sales strategies and marketing tactics with you but if you don’t take action on them it’s a waste of your time. Too many service professionals have lots of big ideas but unfortunately they lack the organizational discipline and know how to successfully execute on them.

When I worked with coaching and consulting clients might help them create sales strategies that day can easily execute. And then I make sure the client does the work that’s required. It’s sort of like being a personal trainer.

You know you should go for that walk or better yet that jog – but you don’t. You know you should be eating healthy – but you don’t.

It’s not just a matter of knowing what to do – it’s getting things done that produces results. I’ll be sharing more information about how I helped service professionals like you break through all the excuses and obstacles to create and execute on marketing plans that generate all the clients they’ll ever need.

You don’t have to be satisfied with your current marketing results. If you are not booked solid with highly profitable new projects and clients and you are still using the marketing strategies that got you here – nothing is going to change. You’re going to continue to struggle.

I look forward to working with many of you on a one-to-one basis in helping you create the business future of your dreams.

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