When it comes to making lists this time of year, nobody’s more skilled and experienced than Santa Claus. There’s even an unofficial holiday each December 4 to celebrate Santa’s list-making prowess. It’s called “Santa’s List Day,” and it’s apparently the day he starts compiling his famous naughty-and-nice lists each year.
But Santa’s not the only one working on lists right now.
If you’re a B2B sales or marketing director preparing any sort of lead generation or appointment-setting campaign, chances are you and your team are already busy developing your company’s ideal target list for 2024. But how can you be sure you’re reaching out to the right people, or that you have the most accurate and up-to-date contact information?
By some accounts, a list is as much as a 70% predictor of a program’s success—or lack thereof. Even if you’ve got the greatest offering in the world and your messaging is on-point, it’s not going to matter if you’re not connecting with the right decision-makers.
Outsourcing all or some of your list-building needs to an expert can go a long way toward helping with those problems and improving the productivity of your lead generation efforts. Unfortunately, Santa’s probably a little too busy to help right now, but if he were available, he’d surely have a few pointers to share:
1. Make your list … and check it twice (at least)
Even Santa knows a quality list requires thorough research and review before it’s ready for use. Developing a list of companies or organizations that might have a need for your goods or services is a good start, but it’s just that, a start. Before you can begin calling or emailing your contacts, you need to have the right data elements in place, and then be sure that the data is accurate.
That type of process can’t be done overnight, and often requires multiple list-building resources, analyses, and enrichments. Having a partner to help create, review, and enhance your list before your lead generation campaign begins can ensure you’re making the best use of the Business Development Representatives’ time and focusing on targets that are most likely to lead to appointments and other sales opportunities.
2. Find out who’s “naughty” and “nice”
For the purposes of this analogy, the “naughty” list is comprised of prospects who will have limited interest in your offering. Perhaps it’s because the purchasing decision is typically handled by another department within the company, or because your product just isn’t relevant to their particular pain points. Or maybe people with their job title are just too difficult to reach on the phone, no matter how hard you try.
The “nice” list, meanwhile, consists of prospects who are accessible and open to learning about your goods or services.
You might think you know which prospects fall on which list, but often, it takes a little time before any real trends start to emerge. Accumulating and analyzing the data after your lead generation campaign begins will help you learn which prospects are more likely to land on the coveted “nice” list (i.e. are more likely to buy), allowing you refine your target audience and achieve ROI-positive results.
3. Don’t limit yourself to one name per company, or phone number per contact
Just as Santa makes sure all children living in the same house are included on his gift-giving list, it’s important that all potential decision-makers from the same company are included on your lead generation list. Purchasing decisions involving complex B2B offerings typically include several different people—just because one executive says no to a video appointment with your sales rep doesn’t mean an executive in a different office won’t say yes, especially if it’s a larger company.
The more viable records you have per company—and the more phone numbers you have per contact— the better the chance you’ll have of reaching somebody and having a meaningful conversation. Sometimes, it even makes sense to schedule appointments with two different decision-makers within the same company, because it increases the chances of moving forward in the sales process.
4. Don’t be afraid to give your list a refresh
There’s a reason why Santa compiles his list on December 4. That still gives him three weeks to revamp his list if it turns out major changes are necessary before Christmas. (Uh, oh, looks like Johnny and Suzie weren’t so good after all!)
Companies engaged in lead generation campaigns should also be willing to revise their target lists if the results aren’t what they had envisioned. Often, leads are pulled from multiple sources, and it may take a little time before you realize which sources produce the strongest leads and which targets deserve the bulk of your attention. Or maybe, a tweak to your offering might require a slightly different audience, and you’d be wasting your time continuing to call on the original list. No matter how deep into a calling campaign you are, there’s always new data that can improve the quality of your list.
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Santa Claus might not be available to help with your list-building needs right now, but the team at VSA Prospecting is.
VSA has always understood the importance of building a quality list for our clients. Our multiple resources and commitment to detailed list analysis has helped companies from a wide range of industries continuously connect with their target audience.
Whether we’re creating the initial list ourselves based on an Ideal Customer Profile or enriching a client’s existing list, our goal is always to identify and focus on the prospects that make the most sense for you.
If you’re looking for help reaching the right prospects and setting appointments with high-quality leads, give us a call. Unlike with Santa, list-building is a year-round job for us.