In the past, sales leads were obtained by presenting content to the general public and waiting for interested customers to react. Approaches like cold calling, TV ads and social media ads are examples of this. With search engine marketing however, the potential customers are the ones initiating contact. A person looking for a service online is one who is ready to buy. So when someone like this clicks on your ad, it makes them a hot prospect. It goes without saying then, that paid search campaigns have a huge potential to drives sales forward, if handled right.

Utilising conversion tracking to analyse and accordingly adjust your advertising strategy, optimising your landing page to improve your user experience and thereby your quality score, and using site links to add additional calls to action and enhance click through rate, all play a part in helping to boost your PPC lead generation. However, this is only a job half done. Your next step should be helping your sales team to effectively convert paid search leads.

Too often, even the best paid marketing fails to provide a good return on investment. So when you do everything right, from carefully selecting your keywords to thoughtfully developing your advertising approach, what stops those high-intent leads from translating to profitable sales? The answer is simple. There’s not enough time and resources spent on educating sales staff about the importance of these leads and the proper way to manage them.

Paid search leads are looking for something and now, and if you’re not careful to handle them well, they’ll soon be your competitor’s for the taking. Here’s how you can help your sales team close more leads through effective pay per click management and thereby build a more profitable business:

Align your message
The first step in converting PPC leads is to communicate with your sales team and ensure that they are well informed about the message delivered through your paid search ads. Your customers are online looking for solutions to a problem. When they click on your ad or reach out to your sales team, they are expecting that specific problem to be addressed. A sales team that tries to push products or services different from those promised by your marketing, will only result in irate customers and lost leads.

Be quick to respond
It’s important to keep in mind that someone looking at your service online is also checking out your competitors. Your sales team needs to be able to convince such prospects that your company is the way to go, and the quicker you respond, the better are your chances in doing so. Delayed responses only allow them more time to scan the competition.

Leave your sales team hungry
Many times, sales reps take on more leads than their teammates and focus only on the ones that seem easy to close. While this may up their sales, it decreases your sales-to-lead ratio and that means a great loss on wasted prospects. Assign leads to them in such a way that they have to ask for more. If they don’t, that means they have too many.

Be persistent
Lastly, it’s important to keep calling. Only one fourth of all internet leads are successfully contacted. A good rule is to span eight to twelve contact attempts over a two week period, if you are unable to reach your lead at first. Trust us, all the added effort will pay off!