i3results Lead Nurturing Study
Overview
In today’s competitive, higher education marketplace, quality lead generation is critical. However, ensuring that the leads perform is paramount. Universities face strategic challenges as Internet leads continue to dominate their media mix and conversion rates continue to decline. This begs the ultimate question: How can a university increase conversion without increasing staff or the marketing budget?
The i3results solution is an innovative, lead nurturing strategy designed to produce an immediate lift in conversion and then sustain it through consistent tracking and refinement. Increase the number of qualified leads and minimize the cost per lead—comprehensive, consistent lead nurturing and conversion tactics.
Forrester Research reports that companies that follow mature lead management processes have closing rates higher than their competitors who do not stay in touch with qualified leads.
The goal of lead nurturing is to immediately establish a relevant, consistent dialogue with prospects during peak interest. The i3results solution directly and consistently positions a university in front of the lead, keeping the university as part of the consideration set.
In today’s environment, prospects inquire to several schools, all of which are calling the student by phone, but very few are establishing a dialogue using a mix of current and traditional media. From the moment a prospect inquires, i3results will distinguish your university from the others.
Innovation + Intelligence = Increased Conversion
Lead nurturing requires a consistent, strategic vision. With the i3results solution, universities will continue to convert at current rates, experience an increase in immediate conversion, and through this long-range strategy, they will convert those additional “not ready yet” inquiries.
The formula for successful lead nurturing includes a combination of integrated direct mail, email, and phone call communication. The messages must be relevant, customized with the university brand, and personalized with frequent and varied content that is designed to elicit an inbound call or establish a bridge of familiarity with the prospect.
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Client Profile
The client is a recognized, non-profit, public university offering more than 20 online certificates primarily to a post baccalaureate audience. Almost 90% of their leads are generated via PPC, CPL or organically.
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The Challenge
The university lacked a sufficient admissions department to handle the influx of online lead inquires for the multiple programs being offered. This unfortunate shortage of dedicated personnel needed to make outbound calls to the generated inquiries was, in effect, risking the opportunity for a major source of university revenue.
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The Solution
i3results deploys and manages an integrated, multi-media, direct response lead nurturing solution that focuses on establishing a dialogue with the prospect and elicits action. The execution consists of a automated and personalized sequence of custom, follow-up messages that regularly remind the prospect of their inquiry, the benefits of the program they inquired about, and ultimately lifts conversion.The lead nurturing campaign was established in June 2009. Conversion at that time was approximately 1%. Upon campaign launch, the admissions team experienced an immediate jump in conversion to 3.04% during the summer and fall quarters of 2009, and a secondary jump to 5.06% by winter 2010-11. The campaign continues to provide significant conversion increases with an overall increase of approximately 4.9% to date since the campaign launch.
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The Results
- A predictable and traceable marketing strategy that delivers conversion results
- Immediate results and lasting impact through consistent refinement
- Increased return on marketing investment
- An overall increase in the lead-to-start rate, yielding substantial additional revenue.
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What the Future Holds
Technology is an ever-evolving component in the i3results solution. We are always looking at ways to exploit technological advancements that will potentially boost conversion in our lead nurturing strategy. Moving forward we are testing the areas of Social Media, targeted landing pages and Quick Response (QR) Codes. These current tactics are based on successful market segmentation and specific lead behaviors. These innovative tools are easily integrated into our strategy at no additional cost.