Manually entering contact information into a database is a tedious and distracting task to busy sales professionals. Focused on that month's target and existing deals in the pipeline, crucial contact information is often entered inaccurately or not entered at all. That partial or missing contact could have contributed to a future sale or marketing effort - but, as is, the potential is wasted.
Even the best sales management processes supported with the best lead tracking tools will often fail because of the human element behind them.
Lead Capture – Key Issue
Even though Lead Tracking and Sales Force Automation tools can help automate most elements involved in the lead follow up process, they rely on a manual process to get leads into the system. Typically most leads are found on web pages or are delivered by email. A human has to physically transcribe the lead data into the lead tracking or SFA tool. If lead volumes increase, then manual data entry can become problematic and the rest of the fine-tuned, automated system breaks down as well.
Typically sales professionals spend 25 percent of their time in manually entering prospect information into their contact manager. Automating this process results in increased time for sales calling and campaigning.
Do you spend a considerable portion of your time manually entering leads into your contact manager? Does it leave you with little time for more important activities, such as selling?
Automated Sales Lead Capture technologies eliminate lost leads and establish a strong, complete understanding of your prospects from the start. By automatically recognizing and reading the contact information on Web pages, online directories, in e-mail signatures, documents, spreadsheets and so on, this technology eliminates manual data entry -- including line-by-line cut and paste.
These solutions increase your daily productivity by helping instantly move prospect information found on web sites, email and other places into where you need it for immediate follow-up.
Reuben Bernard is curently employed as a Marketing Specialist at eGrabber Inc. He has an MBA in Marketing and 6 yrs of experience in online marketing, content development, branding and lead generation.