In our last post, we discussed the imperative of being the first to call, and of making contact with qualified leads quickly while they are still searching for properties, and not hours or days later. This action alone can dramatically increase the number of qualified leads which convert into valid prospects and clients.

We are often asked by our new customers for advice on which lead management process is the best. Our answer is, "It depends." It depends on your company's culture, your promises to agents regarding leads, your willingness to initiate new processes, the quality and experience of your sales staff, and the resources available to manage leads.

If I were a broker and setting up an automated lead management system, one of the decisions I would have to make is whether to send leads instantly to my agents, to qualify them first in-house to filter out the obvious tom-foolery, or to have my in-house staff incubate leads until they are hot and ready to buy or sell a home. Let's look at the pros and cons of these three options in more detail.

Send all leads immediately to your agents

By sending all leads immediately to the sales staff, a company is able to put the lead into the hands of a qualified expert that can answer any questions posed and move the lead along the sales pipeline. After all, this is what you pay your agents to do. This process has no out-of-pocket cost, and smaller companies may not be able to afford staff committed to lead qualification and incubation.

One common approach is to create an "eTeam" of your best agents who have demonstrated their commitment to fast response and consistent follow up and have taken a pledge to do so with the leads you assign to them. Even so, we recommend that companies using this approach have a system for holding agents accountable. As Peter Drucker said, "If you can't measure it, you can't manage it." Or as I like to paraphrase this, "If you don't know what is happening, you sure cannot manage or improve it."

The downside is that agents are busy people and very often are not able to immediately make that critical first contact within 30 minutes – or even three hours. And it is easy to forget to make those repeated contact attempts. In fact, the primary reason that 75% of leads are abandoned in three days is "The lead did not call me back."

We know that agents, as business men and women whose income depends on closing sales, are some of the world's best lead cherry pickers and will often concentrate on hot leads to the detriment of those who would become clients four, six or even twelve months from now. Agents almost universally believe that Internet leads are poor quality because the majority of them are in the "just looking" stage or have not submitted legitimate contact information.

If you truly trust in the professionalism of every agent to whom you assign a lead, or if you cannot afford staff to qualify and filter leads, then sending them to your agents is a legitimate option – and much better than letting leads sit in your inbox unattended.

Qualify, then assign all legitimate leads to agents

The middle ground is to have in-house staff pre-qualify leads and then pass only those representing honest opportunities to your agents. This has several advantages.

You ensure that every lead is responded to promptly. Sending agents only real leads increases their opinion of the quality of your company-generated leads and the value they represent to the agent. Agents who should be making connections with new prospects and closing sales do not waste their time running down worthless leads.

A negative, of course, is that you must have the licensed staff available to speak to and qualify every lead received. And this means that they respond to leads instantly. This cannot be the 17th priority in their job description. Hence, neither the broker nor sales manager, who always have more pressing issues to deal with, are appropriate candidates, or the busy or part-time receptionist. A common approach is to assign these to your relocation staff, or to press into service a rookie or semi-retired agent who is paid a minimal wage or small percentage of resulting sales from those leads that close.

Another issue is that you may need staff available 12 hours a day. A good automated lead management system allows you to process leads using different processes at different times of the day so that after-hours leads are either sent directly to a list of trusted agents or held until morning.

Qualify and incubate all leads in-house; assign only when the prospect is ready to transact

Many of the largest brokers have created whole departments dedicated to managing leads. They instantly qualify every lead, assign the hot ones to an agent, and incubate those representing future sales themselves until these are also hot enough to pass to an agent. This is common in other industries and has the highest rate of lead-to-prospect-to-sales success. The main requirement is a lead volume big enough to justify the cost, or a pre-existing staff that can take on these duties without much added expense.

The advantages are that a professional staff is dedicated to turning leads into dollars. They respond instantly, qualify and filter the leads. Those that need long-term incubation are put into an email and personal contact campaign handled by this staff. Your sales pipeline is always full of future prospects that will constantly drip out of the funnel. Since this represents over 80% of the potential income from your lead generation investment, you are assured that your lead ROI is maximized.

This method need not be expensive. Many companies recoup the cost of this program by charging a "referral" fee for the leads, or paying a reduced commission on company generated and incubated prospects. Most agents are more than happy to take a prospect that needs no incubation and is ready to buy or sell now dropped in their lap in exchange for a fee. The company converts the maximum percentage of leads into dollars, and every prospect an agent receives is practically a guaranteed closing. This is the proverbial win-win scenario.

An adjunct to this methodology is to hire an outside company which will qualify incoming leads for you. Those that need immediate attention are forwarded to an agent while those needing incubation are sent to the in-house staff.

Summary

All three of these scenarios work best when matched with a flexible automated lead management system to organize and track the process. One thing that all three have in common is the need for a system that will ensure instant lead distribution, long-term incubation, and that holds agents accountable for following up with leads. ProspectConverter is designed with modules that address each of these scenarios or any blend of them.

No one process fits every company or team. Your staffing, the experience of your agents, lead volume, and company culture will be the major factors in determining which best fits your situation. However, having any program in place is an improvement from relying on emailing leads to agents as you find the time and then praying for results.

For More Information

• See '4 Lessons in Lead Management'
• Explore Lead Management solutions in our Product Directory