You can offer your site visitors the option of sending their requests for quotes (RFQ) by fax using a pdf form or printable page of your site. Some of your customers might prefer using fax to send their initial requests but you should not expect a lot of fax traffic unless faxed quotes are still largely the norm in your industry. 

The greatest thing about fax leads is that you can control the layout of the information you need to qualify your leads and help them more quickly. The fax form should include spaces for their name, company, phone, email, address, and line items with quantities, descriptions, etc. The fax form should also contain a space for project descriptions or comments & questions. Add your web address and phone numbers to the top and bottom of the fax form. 

Ideally, your visitor will be able to fill out the fax form online (better legibility), print it, and fax it to you.  You can also create a form they can print, fill out, and fax to you but expect bad hand writing and drawings (which can be helpful).  Use the information on the faxes you receive just like any other lead you get. Call the lead, build a relationship, and discuss their projects, materials, and how you can help them. After your first contact, put the quote together and send it to them. Follow up as usual - quickly. 

Aside from a few industries, most companies are moving away from faxes and the rate of that migration is increasing but some of your visitors will appreciate the option and you might get a few orders you would otherwise not have received without a fax lead option.   

I bought Lead Generation for the Complex Sale by Brian J. Carroll on Saturday 1-27-07 and have thoroughly enjoyed it. Chapter 12 (lead Generation on the web) covers many of the subjects covered on LeadOptimize.com.

If you want to read more about the book itself, see:

Lead Generation for the Complex Sale: Boost the Quality and Quantity of Leads to Increase Your ROI

You can find information about the book and Brian Carroll at prweb.

Technorati Profile

Many of you - maybe most of you - already know about this but I heard a few questions about it lately “around the water cooler” and decided I could cover it quickly and maybe help a few souls too.  

It is still fairly common to see a “send us an e-mail” link on a website where you can click on that link and your email client automatically opens with “To:” address and the subject line filled in.  All you have to do is type the body of your email and press “send.”  Email might be useful if you are requesting long answers to specific question or if you are fishing for stories and anecdotes.  Email links are exceptionally simple to add to your website but they are not very good for attracting qualified leads.  The main reasons not to use email links for leads are: 

How often do you want to reach through the screen, put your hands around a lead’s scrawny rediculous-question-creating neck, and squeeze?  Don’t do it - and put down the stapler.  You will only hurt yourself in the longrun.  Remember, YOU are the expert and your visitors attend your website because of that.  They ask questions because they want your guidance - and hopefully, your products.  Please don’t expect them to always know how to ask for it.  In fact, you should embrace the chance to teach them. 

Always respond positively and politely to emails and contact form leads.  You will receive questions that seem stupid, downright ignorant, rude, or as if the visitor thought he was on a completely different site.  Expect those leads and respond to them as positively as if they had just told you the lottery picked your number.  There will be times when you (or your email response person) will want to respond sarcastically or even not at all but you must reject those urges and teach your salespeople to as well.  Some leads will be more valuable than others and it is tempting to dismiss some as worthless but you should always respond positively and politely to every lead. 

Even though you might not be able to profitably help a customer, respond with appreciation and offer an alternative product or the name of a competitor that might serve them better.  If you can help them with a link on your site then help them.  If you can reply with a referral, copy the company to whom you are referring that visitor and you will have made another friend in your business (colleagues in your industry will often repay the favor).  Look at every site inquiry as an opportunity to give someone something great to say about your website and business.  Many of your leads (however they come to you) will purchase your products and some of them will not but they should all have something nice to say about you. 

Define what level of service you want your site to be known for and clearly communicate that expectation to your employees from site designers, email responders, and salespeople.  You can really boost the word-of-mouth publicity for your site by dedicating yourself to well-written valuable information and fast and positive responses.  The best (and cheapest) traffic you can build is traffic created by people telling other people about your site and adding links to their own sites because of the wealth of information you have and the impressive rate of response to site inquiries.  When you impress a lead with your fast response from an email inquiry he or she might be more inclined to purchase from you because response time is often an indicator (or perceived indicator) of the level of service they can expect from the rest of your company. 

Contact form leads from your site will increase if you post your promised response time.  Visitors tend to prefer the known versus the unknown.  Above the “contact us” form say something like, “Tell us how we can help you with your project and one of our associates will respond to you quickly.  We always respond to inquiries from our Contact Us form within 12 hours and often much sooner.”  Post your average response time if you know it.  I would be very impressed with a site that posted its average response time of 2 hours and 23 minutes and even more impressed if I heard back within 2 hours.  Your service level can be tailored based on the days you operate and how you operate.  If you are not open on weekends, state that clearly but state that someone will respond early Monday morning.  If you or someone on your sales or design team will answer emails on the weekend, you can maintain your level of service over the weekend.  You might find that commissioned salespeople are eager to accept the responsibility of the email leads over the weekend in exchange for the opportunity to take those leads themselves. 

It might be more difficult to respond to fax leads on the weekends.  In this case, build the expectation and guide them to the email with something like, “We will respond to your fax inquiries Mondays through Fridays.  If you prefer a response during the weekend, please use our Contact Us form for a response via email within 12 hours.”  Remember to set up your after hours and weekend voicemail system to guide leads in the same manner. 

Give your visitors options for contacting you, guide them to the best option for them, live up to your promises, and respond postively.  Your dedication to your service level is ultra-important so here is the overview. 

• Define your service level and dedicate yourself to maintaining that.
• Post your promised response time. 
• Guide leads through to the best contact method for their needs. 
• Respond positively and politely. 

Over the last few months, I have found that using Google image search is often more effective for finding some items than using regular text search.

To check myself, I asked friends, family, and clients to try it and give me their feedback. The results have been very positive - mostly that they find results faster. I do wonder if part of the reason for the positive feedback is that many people are very “visual” by nature so seeing a picture of what they are searching for is more captivating than text results.

In addition to finding useable results faster, they report that they can find sites through text that they could not find through normal search - a great argument for paying more attention to image SEO.

Image search is really only more effective for searches for specific tangible items such as, say, “wooden benches” as opposed to more intellectual items such as “sales leads.”

Try it yourself and let me know what you find.

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Multiply Sales Leads from Your Website

What good is all of the work to make your website generate sales leads if your emails turn your sales leads away? This article is about responding effectively to contact form leads to close the sale.

Those of you who know me know I like to start with the summary - usually bullets. So, here are the basics of writing email responses that sell:

1. Respond fast!
2. Write professionally but personally
3. Use your site as a tool
4. Upsell & plug

Respond Fast

Responding to contact form sales leads fast (immediately when possible) can have a dramatic impact on the customer. I have seen people buy a product just because they got a fast response. The top two reasons I see/hear for the positive responses to fast responses have to do with timing and perceived service quality.

First, when a person needs a product fast (or now) and you are the first to respond, he will often buy just because he can be done with the whole transaction now. His goal was not to spend the day SEARCHING for a widget. The goal was to a BUY a widget. Let him buy your widget and let him get on with his day. The second reason is that when you repsond quickly, you are perceived as attentive and service-oriented - something for which many people are very willing to pay extra. It is absolutely best if you will follow up your fast email with good service as this will usually pay you dividends through repeat sales (different topic).

Write Professionally but Personally

Dear bob. aww heck, I don’t know why you came here but this is horribly unprofessional and negative sounding, isn’t it? HOW ABOUT THIS? HOW LONG WOULD YOU LIKE IT IF I CONTINUE WRITING LIKE THIS? WHAT FI I MISPEL A FEW THNGS? thanx Chris

Writing professional sales lead responses is a topic all it’s own and I will cover it soon. Professional email responses that sell are spelled correctly, confident, polite, concise, accurate, personal, helpful, use proper punctuation, and follow a proper format. Seems like a lot in one email? It does not have to be. Besides, it is worth it if you want the sale. Here is an example of a generic, but proper, contact form email response:

Dear Mr. Smith,

Thank you for visiting http://www.leadoptimize.com/.

Lead Optimize: The Book will be out later in 2007 - probably the 3rd quarter. I can certainly update you when it becomes available and will add you to my update list now. For now, please enjoy the articles in the blog and website and always feel free to contact me with questions, comments, and requests. I always respond as quickly as possible.

Thank you,

Chris Denny

That email is short, addresses my lead professionally and personally, uses proper format (greeting, body, salutation), includes the domain name, helpful (by giving information and links), confident, polite, short, and is spelled correctly.

You might not care if responses from other sites to you are casual and unprofessional but most people do - even if they will not tell you. You are a professional - an expert in your field - so please present yourself as such. There are many classes on the topic of professional writing available all over the place. Check your local library, community colleges, or look for online courses. They are usually short - typically a couple of two hour sessions - and you will reap the rewards through more sales from your contact form leads.

Use Your Site as a Tool

Use your site as your sales material. Your website is like a powerpoint presentation you can show the world. Engage your leads with links back to your site. Get them to visit the site again whenever possible. Notice in the email reponse example above, I added links back to the site. The intention for the links is to be both helpful and engaging. Another way to use your site as a tool is more direct. Leads will often ask you a question that can be answered in detail with information available on your site. In this case, respond to the contact form lead with a professional email that includes a short answer, your questions about their project and needs (because your goal is to sell), and a link to the page on your site that contains more detailed information about her question. This brings your lead back to the site and gives her the answer she was looking for. You want to engage your customer - get her involved with your company. Make your website her source for answers and products. Additionally, using your site this way will save you time.

The idea is to engage the customer more in your site and your products/services. You want to ask the questions you would normally ask and close the sale as you normally would but it is always good to get your customers to your website. Use your site wherever it will help sell.

Upsell & Plug

“Would you like fries with that?” Upselling works. Not only does upselling add to the value of your sale but you can upsell products that set you apart from your competitors. American Pole and Timber is one of my clients. They have a product called 21 POLY which is a polymer coating to protect wood in marine structures. *21 POLY is an excellent upsell product because not only does it add to the amount of a sale but it adds excellent value and longevity to the structure being built and they are the only company (to my knowledge) who sell such a product - and they already serve a very niche market anyway. They mention 21 POLY and its 25 year warranty to everyone who is building something on or near water. People who like the idea of it are now sold on the company because 21 POLY is an obviously great value and *American Pole and Timber has it. What is YOUR 21 POLY?

*I do not make a commission from promoting American Pole and Timber or 21 POLY from this site but do enjoy promoting my clients’ sites where possible. Contact me if you would like guidance to Lead Optimize your site.

Some leads will ask about a competitor’s product. Tell them that product is a great product smart people buy that product (read Dale Carnegie’s “How to Win Friends & Influence People“) and mention your product and all the great features of it, too. Include a link to that page on your site and ask how you can help them.

You do not need to be salesy (in fact, it is better not to be) with your upsell or plug. If you prefer a subtle approach then go with that. A soft mention of a complimentary product is very effective. Sometimes, your upsell will be as simple as “would you like fries with that?” or “Are you interested in our *blank* service for $29.99 while we are there?” or “Since it will not affect the shipping charge, would you like to add a…?” You get the idea. If you want suggestions for upselling certain products or services, you can contact me and I will be happy to take a glance at your site and make a suggestion or two. I might even use your site as a case study for it.

Give time to your contact form leads. Respond quickly with a well-written, professional, and helpful email that leverages your site and your portfolio of products and services to engage your visitors and increase your sales. Your sales leads are given to you by visitors who decided it was worth their time and energy to contact you about your products so return the honor by giving them the attention they deserve.

Keyword Selection (and Negative Keywords)

Selecting keywords is tedious and time-consuming but careful keyword selection is well worth the effort. While selecting keywords, you need to consider all of the ways your customers request products. What do they call your products? How do they ask for them when they call you? You want to consider all the possible ways your potential customers might refer to your products and services.

For instance, gluhwein is a traditional German drink made of wine. You add spices to any red wine, heat it, and drink up but it goes by multiple names. Some people call it mulled wine and have no idea there are other names for it. Others simply call it “hot spiced wine.” If your product site is about gluhwein, you might miss unthinkable opportunities if you do not look into other names for your product. Listen to how people refer to your products when they call you. The question usually begins something like, “I am looking for…” They are the people who think you might have what they want but are not sure because they call it one thing and you call it another.

Use keyword phrases. Searching is becoming more specific as people become more sophisticated search engine users. Most searches are composed of multiple words (i.e. “keyword phrases”); often more than two. Use keyword phrases in your PPC ad marketing and integrate them into your site in a way that adds value to your content. Using the gluhwein example, you might use phrases such as “gluhwein spices” or “how to make mulled wine.” Many - maybe most - of the most successful PPC ads I have ever set up utilize keyword phrases.

Understand the keyword matching system of your PPC program. Be clear about how your PPC program matches your paid keywords to searches sent to their servers so you will get what you expect from your ads and maximize your click through rates. Most PPC search engines allow you to set up keywords for broad match, exact matches, phrase matches, and negative/excluded matches. The various PPC search engines generally work in a similar fashion. This is how Google explains their keyword matching options (from Google Adwords):

Broad Match - This is the default option. If you include general keyword or keyword phrases-such as tennis shoes-in your keyword list, your ads will appear when a user’s query contains tennis and shoes, in any order, and possibly along with other terms. Your ads will also automatically show for expanded matches, including plurals and relevant variations. Because broad matches are sometimes less targeted than exact or phrase matches, you should create keyword phrases containing at least two descriptive words each. You can also try the Keyword Tool and the other three matching options to further refine your targeting. Finally, keep in mind that other advertisers may have bid for the same broad-matched keyword combinations that trigger your ads, increasing your actual CPC amounts. Using exact, phrase, or negative matches can help you keep your costs low.

Phrase Match - If you enter your keyword in quotation marks, as in “tennis shoes,” your ad will appear when a user searches on the phrase tennis shoes, in this order, and possibly with other terms in the query. For example, your ad will appear for the query red tennis shoes but not for shoes for tennis. Phrase matching is more targeted than broad matching, but slightly more flexible than exact matching. To ensure your ads are as targeted as they can be, you may want to include at least two descriptive words in your keyword phrases.

Exact Match - If you surround your keywords in brackets-such as [tennis shoes]-your ads will appear when users search for the specific phrase tennis shoes, in this order, and without any other terms in the query. For example, your ad won’t show for the query red tennis shoes. Exact matching is the most targeted option. Although you won’t receive as many impressions with exact matching, you’ll likely enjoy the most clicks, because users searching for terms in this manner typically want precisely what your business has to offer.

Negative Keyword - If your keyword is tennis shoes and you add the negative keyword -red, your ad will not appear when a user searches on red tennis shoes. You can apply this option for a keyword at both the Ad Group and campaign level.

and you enter/submit the keywords like so:

• keyword = broad match
• [keyword] = exact match
• “keyword” = phrase match
• -keyword = negative match

Spend time discovering, setting up, and managing your keywords and keywords phrases. It will be time will spent and will pay off. If you have any questions, feel free to contact me.

Write Better PPC Ads 

The copywriting rules for your PPC ads are similar to those for your page copy.  Effective ads include the following:

• Clear content – best to use keywords
• Benefits to the reader
• Call to action

Small changes to your ads can make a huge positive or negative impact on your click through rate so pay attention to your changes.  It would be best to track the effects of each change you make to each ad but doing this with dozens of ads can really drain your number one resource – time.  The main points here are to pay attention to what you are doing and write clear ads using keywords, claim your benefit(s), and ask your readers to act! 

You will see me repeat this throughout the site, blog, and book:  To generate sales leads from your website you need to create a certain amount of momentum.  The idea is based on an old sales principle.  If you get your prospects to say “yes” once, you will be able to get them to say it again and again.  So, get them to say “yes” (essentially) to your ad, then “yes” to your landing page (by continuing to read), then “yes” to your call to action, then “yes” to your form.  When you write your PPC ads keep that chain in mind.  Visualize how your visitors should flow through your site to your contact form submit button and write accordingly. 

PPC ads shoud be targeted.  Do not try to shotgun your audience with an ad that will please everyone because few people will click on it.  Write your ads for your target. 

Now that you have the lead, the sale is up to you (or your salesperson).  We will cover closing sales more later.