Know your prospects. Identifying the attributes of prospects that become qualified opportunities sets a framework for replication, and allows marketers to gather tools for building rules around which prospects should remain under marketing’s control.

Gather information. Now that you know what data you need to capture from prospects, you need to assess how and when you are going to capture it. This is a sensitive time, and great consideration must be given to avoid overwhelming prospects and to ensure information that is gathered is accurate. A variety of campaigns may be necessary.

Score your prospects. In a successful systemic lead nurturing program, prospects are organized into a “lead taxonomy,” a lead scoring process that is complicated and involves collaboration and agreement between sales and marketing. The lead scoring itself must be executed using a lead management platform, such as Eloqua (LIFT is a deployment partner) to avoid arbitrary judgment by individuals.

Create variable content. Hands-on nurturing requires successful communication with prospects. Understanding the type of content needed for moving leads along a buyer cycle requires one-to-one content, often in multi-phase, multi-touch campaigns, that engage and move leads towards a sales close. LIFT is an expert in dynamically variable creative, an advanced and rarely achieved combination of data and content that ensures personalized authenticity, relevance and unforgettable impact. We know how to fill gaps in the buyers’ knowledge that is required to move them along; design offers that show them what it is like to be a customer to inspire a close; and create offers to tempt them financially.

Measure leads. Lead nurturing is not a one-time activity: the best marketers learn as they go, readjusting boundaries, rules and information collection strategies as necessary. Specific metrics must be put in place in order to assess the conversion of marketing qualified leads (MQLs) into sales accepted leads (SALs).