Five ways to determine which are good prospects

All prospects are not created equal; some are more likely to turn into sales. To avoid wasting time, you need to weed out the poor prospects and concentrate your efforts on prospects who will yield a return on your investment of effort, money and resources.

The following five steps will help you distinguish good prospects from bad prospects:

1) Define your target market precisely. Break your market down by demographics ie geography, market, company employee size etc. This will enable you to focus on the prospects that match your target audience.

2) Assess need, budget and the prospect’s purchasing authority. Ask basic questions that will allow you to determine whether a prospect is ready, such as:

What's the timescale for this project?
Who else is involved in making the decision?
What's the budget for the product or service?
How will the decision be made?
Is your company ready to purchase if the right product or service is found?
If you decide that our product or service meets the need, what will the next step be?

3) Ask for a “yes” or "no." Conventional thought says that as long as the prospect hasn't said "no," then the sale is still possible. However, when it comes to rating prospects, get a decision, even if it's no. It’s better to find out sooner rather than later that the opportunities of closing a sale are slight.

4)  Evaluate the prospect's financial position. Creditworthy prospects are better than high-risk customers. Stable prospects are better than customers going through widespread changes. A company that is merging or downsizing may delay buying decisions.

5) Develop a sales lead scoring system. Rate prospects by a letter or number grade, based on the possibility of closing the sale. Concentrate on A or B prospects, and upgrade or downgrade the other prospects as circumstances change.

Internet Marketing

Internet marketing, also known as web marketing, online marketing, or eMarketing, is the marketing of products or services using the Internet.

The Internet has brought many unique sales benefits to marketing, one of which is lower costs for the distribution of information and media to a worldwide audience. The interactive nature of Internet marketing, providing instant response and encouraging responses, is unique to the medium.

Internet marketing is often considered to have a wider scope because it includes digital media such as the Internet, email, web banner ads etc. However, Internet marketing also includes digital customer data and customer relationship management (CRM) systems.

Internet marketing brings together creative and technical elements of the Internet, including design, development, visual creativity, advertising, and sales. Internet marketing does not simply include building or promoting a website, nor does it simply mean placing a banner ad on a website.

Effective Internet marketing requires a comprehensive marketing strategy that emphasises a company's business model and sales goals with its website usage and appearance, focusing on its target markets through the considered choice of advertising options, media, and design.

Internet marketing also means the considered placement of media during the different stages of the customer engagement cycle, using search engine marketing (SEM), search engine optimisation (SEO), banner ads, email marketing, and Web strategies.