You put a lot of time and energy into nurturing your leads. It's understandably frustrating when a deal won't close. You wonder what you're doing wrong and what more you can do to convert them.
There are many reasons why a prospect doesn't buy. It could be related to their budget or just poor timing. It could be that they haven't felt a connection with your business or don't understand what you do.
If you think a deal won't close, don't dismiss them as a lost cause. You've already invested the resources to generate the lead; you may as well attempt to close the deal. But how do you do this when your standard lead nurturing process has failed?
What to do when a deal won't close
This is where long-term nurture comes in. Long-term nurture is a process that encourages 'slow' or 'difficult' leads to convert. After the initial set-up, long-term nurture doesn't require much time commitment. It takes care of your slower leads while focusing on those leads that are more likely to convert within your given sales cycle.
What should a long-term nurture campaign look like?
Long-term nurture usually takes the form of an email campaign, similar to your usual lead nurturing campaigns but over a longer period. It should be automated and relevant to each prospect through segmentation and personalisation.
The length of your long-term nurture campaign will vary depending on your standard sales cycle size. Set an objective for your leads, such as signing up for a demo or purchasing. Once they've met this objective, remove them from the campaign.
Don't be too sales-heavy in these emails. After all, these leads are not yet ready to buy. Instead, use your long-term nurture campaign to provide value to your prospects.
Your long-term nurture campaign is an excellent chance to learn more about your leads. You can gain insight into their challenges and pain points by analysing their interactions and activity with the emails and content you send. You can even discover what's holding them back from buying.
Use this information to your advantage. Once you've learnt more about a lead, you can add them to a relevant campaign that's more likely to convert them.
What kind of content should you include in your long-term nurture campaign?
A long-term nurture campaign is your chance to put together something fascinating. These prospects have lost interest, and now is your opportunity to engage them and re-capture their attention. Focus on sending valuable, exciting content.
Tell a story
Stories are an excellent way to capture a lead's interest and develop a connection with them. Write about a case study or a personal account of why you started the business. With this kind of content, you can hope to elicit an emotional response from your prospects.
Give leads an insight into your business.
Send some content that gives leads a behind-the-scenes insight into your business. The more leads feel they know about your business, the more likely they feel compelled to buy from you.
Answer some FAQs
Your prospects may have several questions or concerns preventing them from purchasing. You can dispel some of their problems by offering answers to these questions and encouraging them to move further along the sales funnel.
Popular content
You can use your long-term nurture campaign to shout about your popular content. Whether this is in the form of blog posts, eBooks or even videos, choose your most popular content and re-purpose it as part of your long-term nurture efforts.
Some leads won't close within your typical sales cycle time frame. Long-term nurture is a great way to remedy that. Start piecing together an informative, engaging campaign and re-ignite the interest of your lost leads.
For more information on how long-term nurture fits in with your CRM and automation efforts, contact Flowbird today. Want to find out what you need to do to reach your sales targets? Try our calculator.