In the process of determining qualified leads, certain leads might not be worth the time and effort of your sales team. Disqualified leads may not have the budget or the ability to purchase today. However, they aren’t a complete loss – there’s still a chance you can convert them into a lead at a later time.
While identifying the reasons for their disqualification, it’s important to segment them to keep your future sales pitch concise. Here are a few ideas to help transform your dud leads into renewed opportunities.
Subscribe them to your newsletter
While it may not be worth the effort of your sales team, it may be a good opportunity for your marketing team to initiate the dialogue. For example, by adding their contact details into an email database, you may be able to bring a lead back by sending out email newsletters that provide value such as product updates or discounts. Converting even a single disqualified lead may be worth the effort.
Create a Google remarketing campaign
While your disqualified leads may not be a perfect fit for your business right now, this doesn’t mean they won’t become a better fit later on. By including your disqualified leads in your Google remarketing campaigns, you’ll keep your business top of mind with previously engaged customers. This works especially well for leads that may have more budget at a later time, or have time-sensitive reasons for not being a qualified opportunity.
It’s important to focus your remarketing ads on the perceived value. Otherwise, you may oversaturate them, or worse, turn them off completely from your offer.
Create a Facebook custom audience campaign
Similar to Google remarketing campaigns, Facebook’s custom audience allows you to load your disqualified leads into a specialized ad campaign. While disqualified leads are browsing Facebook (or external partners via the audience network), you’ll be able to keep your business top-of-mind by serving ads that may one day convert from disqualified to qualified.
Add them to a marketing automation funnel
Automation helps continue the dialogue with your customer until they’ve become a qualified lead. Automation funnels that extend beyond a one-week time frame can work well for disqualified leads by sending them automated and systematic emails over the course of a few weeks or months. While your cold lead may not be the ideal buyer right now, by keeping them engaged with your business through automated emails that provide value and ask feedback, you may be able to convert into a warm lead. For example, automatically sending out a feedback survey after 30 days provides valuable feedback and establishes a new channel of communication. Those with time or budget constraints work best with this type of method.
While it can be discouraging to recognize a lead as cold, never say never. A lead that may not appear a good fit for new business will not always stay that way. By keeping your disqualified leads engaged, and including them in new or existing marketing campaigns, it’s always possible to create new opportunities from previously engaged users.