Converting Leads: President of MarketingAnd Offers Solutions

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A scheduled twenty minute interview with MarketingAnd President and CEO, Sammy James, ended up lasting an hour.  This is what happens you speak with an expert and a true believer of innovative tools for online marketing.  As the interview continued, I began to recognize how various online businesses could  benefit from its approach. Thank you, Mr. James, for your extra time and attention.

MarketingAnd is an eclectic mixture of product and service — part software-developer, part consultancy, part provider, and part business partner. It is capable of working within an established agency-client relationship and can also provide its own expertise to clients.

What do they do exactly?

MarketingAnd organically augments the number of business leads a company receives and then increases the conversion rate from lead to sale. The main difference between MarketingAnd and other lead/conversion companies is that MarketingAnd doesn’t broker lists or teach sales tactics. Its strength lies in converting visitors into leads, and leads into sales. Think of cultivating the low-hanging fruit.

Why go out and buy leads when you can simply convert the ones you already have?

Most of the time, consumers are researching due to their lack of knowledge towards specific products or services. For example, if I move from a condominium to a house, I’d have a lawn to care for. My limited knowledge in lawnmowers would lead me to various home improvement websites where I would be known as a prospect, or lead.  This is where MarketingAnd comes in, providing the necessary tools to engage visitors like me one-on-one.

Sammy James will be the first to tell you that he is a huge advocate of accountability. Thus, it’s no surprise that MarketingAnd’s suite of tools measure, qualify, and quantify. As the company expanded, it partnered with larger institutions (universities, health care companies, automotive dealers) that possessed their own marketing capabilities but didn’t track leads, cost-per-call, cost-per-sale, call volume, or closing ratio. MarketingAnd has the tools to address these issues.

One of these tools is called Form to Phone. In an Internet sales cycle, leads go from extremely hot (ready to buy) to ice cold in a very short time.  Form to Phone helps establish a quicker response time. Here’s how it works:

  1. As soon as a prospect fills out a form and hits the submit button, your phone rings (wherever you are) and you’re given the person’s name and the reason for his or her inquiry.
  2. You press “1″ and are instantly connected to the prospect via the number he or she provided on the form.
  3. You engage the prospect in dialogue – before your competitors even have a chance.

Form to Phone also alleviates what is known as call reluctance. Call reluctance is a phenomenon where a salesperson experiences a heightened level of anxiety or apprehension before calling prospective client.  It could be so overwhelming that it decreases the total number of sales calls made and can render the salesperson useless. Because the sales cycle depends on volume and repetition, every call not made is a potential loss. Form to Phone is effective because it calls the salesperson with a lead. All the salesperson has to do is hit “1.”

Is MarketingAnd successful? According to Mr. James, its client-retention rate is between 90%-95%, and some clients have seen sales increases in the 300% range. If this seems like an appropriate fit to your business, research MarketingAnd first-hand. If you are in the higher-education business, its sister company, Get Starts, specializes in educational system needs.

Jeff Louis: Strategic Media Planner, Brand Project Manager, blogger and aspiring writer. To contact Jeff, leave a comment or contact him on Twitter or LinkedIn.