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Are you looking for a marketing strategy that will bring you more leads and customers who stick around for the long term? In this post, we’ve got you covered.

The standard formula for many businesses is to develop, sell, and repeat. This is not a bad formula.

You start by developing a marketing strategy. Then, you sell your proposed products or services. Finally, you repeat this process for business sustainability.

However, it’s essential to know the underlying procedures within these three steps. A fuller understanding will help you bring hot leads and long-term customers to your company.

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Here are seven ways to get more leads and customers for the long term:

Introduce a New Marketing Scheme to Gain More Leads and Long-Term Customers

You might already have a marketing practice in play. Perhaps your organization focuses its marketing efforts through cold calling. However, that’s not the only way to go about it. Start by introducing a new campaign to help your business rake in more leads and long-term customers.

For example, consider adding SMS and ringless voicemail marketing techniques to your current advertising practices, perhaps using separate systems for each marketing exercise.

Alternatively, consider an app like Mojo Dialer for sending texts and dropping ringless voicemail messages to your potential customers. Such an app can reduce the costs of starting a new marketing campaign.

Here are a few benefits of SMS marketing to help you get started:

• It’s a quick way to send marketing materials to targeted lists
• It has the potential of letting you gain higher open rates than other marketing practices such as sending emails
• SMS marketing is a non-intrusive way of advertising your brand
• Text messages are direct and to the point

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For comparison, here are a few advantages of using ringless voicemail marketing:

• Similarly to SMS marketing, ringless voicemails are non-intrusive to the receiver
• The service doesn’t charge consumers for receiving voicemails
• Companies offering ringless voicemail marketing apps and services use contact lists that are compliant with specific rules and regulations
• You only pay for what you send

These two marketing practices will help boost your leads and therefore your customers. And these are just two of the benefits your company will receive from using an app like Call Cowboy.

However, you can’t forget to nurture your leads. Otherwise, your cold leads will stay “frozen.” Instead, maintain people’s piqued interests to make them loyal customers of your firm.

Use Lead Nurturing to Drive Customer Loyalty

Many companies fail to nurture leads. Entrepreneurs and marketers know how to generate interest from targeted audiences. But without nurturing those leads, people’s interests fade and you can lose the sales you might have had from those leads.

The goal of lead nurturing is to build trust for your brand among your target audience.

Keep in mind, however, that lead nurturing is not hard selling, which can seem intrusive and cause potential customers to lose interest.

Here are three simple techniques for nurturing leads:

Personalize Your Approach with Both Leads and Customers

“First impressions last,” goes the old saying. In other words, the first few seconds of introducing your brand might be the most significant time. Within those few seconds, you can either gain or lose a lead—or a new long-term customer.

Most people prefer to talk to friendly and trustworthy-looking people during business transactions. So make sure your first point of contact doesn’t appear automated, even if it is.

Personalize your messages. They should sound as if you’re talking to a friend or relative. Include your lead’s or your customer’s name at the beginning of the message.

And instead of pushing products onto the people in your audiences, make statements that sound like suggestions.

Educate Your Leads to Turn Them into Customers

Saying your potential customers need your product or service might be easy. However, aligning the benefits of your products with your leads’ interests might be another story.

Importantly, educating your leads is perhaps one of the most crucial steps to closing long-term sales.

Therefore, give your lead the information he or she needs. Educate your prospects by raising their awareness, leading them to consider the transaction and helping them to decide.

Also, don’t forget to include any new offers while you’re in the nurturing phase of the sales cycle. When you do, you will further the possibility of gaining a long-term relationship with that potential client.

Set up a Schedule

Many marketers make the mistake of emailing marketing materials every day to targeted contact lists. However, many leads and customers might find this move annoying. Consequently, they’ll consider unsubscribing to your newsletter before long.

Instead, set up an optimal schedule for sending your marketing messages to your contact list. When you do this, you give recipients some time to digest the information you sent to them earlier.

After nurturing your lead, assess if the consumer or business entity is ready to become a long-term client. For a better assessment, create a score sheet to track each accomplished objective from your lead-nurturing campaign. Then, if the lead achieves a high-enough score, you’ll know it’s time to close that sale.

Prioritize Engagement

Being in a long-term relationship with your clients means you shouldn’t leave them to grow cold after completing the sale. Instead, give your customers additional ways to transact with you.

Also, be proactive. Engage with the customer even after you have made the sale. Proper engagement can open new opportunities. In turn, it can increase the value you gain from each sale.

For example, let’s say you notice a customer walking around your store holding a shopping list. You walk over to her, knowing you want to introduce a new item to her.

However, when you engage with her, she tells you that particular item is not on her shopping list. All the same, you briefly describe to her value of the product and its benefits to her.

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As you play out this scenario in your head, notice that your emotions become involved. See yourself growing energized as you explain the benefits of the product to your customer. Your positive emotions can help to close that sale.

Besides engaging with customers personally, you can also engage through the Internet. In fact, social media may well be one of your most powerful tools for communicating with leads and prospects.

Therefore, use your business’s social media page to your advantage. Post relevant topics that allow your follower base to post comments and share their posts. Also, don’t forget to answer their questions.

Moreover, don’t rely on chatbots too much, as your leads and customers might think you have no time to answer their queries directly. In other words, maintain that personal touch.

Be a competent, reliable, and friendly businessperson whenever you engage with your prospects and clients. These three characteristics will help build the trust that is vital to long-term business relationships.

Maintain Excellent Customer Service

Excellent customer service is also essential for attracting loyal customers. Therefore, your business-to-business (B2B) or business-to-consumer (B2C) marketing campaigns should follow excellent pre- and post-sale customer service protocols.

So be sure to hire sales representatives who have a genuine desire to help your leads and customers with their comments, queries, and suggestions.

You can improve your company’s customer service relations by doing the following:

Understand Your Products and Services Inside and Out

Your salespeople need to know what you’re selling in order to provide excellent customer service. Additionally, they must know how to answer customers’ questions. Therefore, every salesperson needs to be aware of both the common and uncommon questions people in your audience might ask.

Greet People with a Smile

There is hardly anything more discouraging to a prospect’s interests than being greeted with a grumpy face. So always remember that excellent customer service starts with a smile.

Even better are warm personal greetings followed by firm handshakes.

Don’t Forget to Say Thank You

After spending time talking with your lead or client, don’t forget to say thanks. A simple “thank you” will let your prospects and customers know you value their time as well as their money. You might also get a “thank you” or “you’re welcome” in return.

Finally, make sure to show respect to your leads and customers. Don’t let your emotions get the best of you, especially when you’re speaking with irate individuals.

Listen to customers’ complaints and answer respectfully. Handle each situation properly, and you might regain an irritated person’s trust.

In other words, always remember to treat your clients like people and not businesses. Put yourself in the shoes of your prospects and customers when talking to them. If you don’t want other people to treat you unjustly, then you shouldn’t give unwanted stress to other individuals.

Reward Loyalty

Don’t assume your customers will continue to buy your products and services as long as you offer new stuff regularly. Also, don’t fall into complacency while you’re receiving your client’s hard-earned cash through your sales to him or her.

Instead, reward your clients with extra incentives because of their loyalty. Encourage long-term and repeat business by offering perks such as discounts and exclusive deals.

For example, a loyalty card can help you gain repeat transactions by letting your customers earn points with each sale. The consumer can then use the points for discounts on additional purchases from your company.

A loyalty program is an excellent way to tell your consumers that you want them to stay. This bonus may also help you build a business ecosystem consisting of individuals and organizations interacting with each other in positive ways.

Look for Business Partnerships

Many companies don’t consider targeting other businesses for their marketing campaigns. Perhaps, your organization, too, is focusing only on B2C marketing. However, B2B marketing can help you gain more hot leads and long-term clientele.

Your image of an ideal customer might already be another business. If so, consider also partnering with with firms that offer products and services that complement your own. Such a relationship can help both firms reach new audiences.

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For example, your company might be offering fitness clothing and apparel. If so, you could partner your business with a gym or lifestyle center. This can help expand the reach of your brand.

You might set up a kiosk in the gym to help sell your products. Conversely, you could offer a free water bottle to gym-goers with each new membership subscription.

In this scenario, the business entity might be your long-term partner in achieving more sales. It can also be a win-win situation for both companies.

You gain more sales by way of your kiosk. In turn, the gym attracts more clients, since people understand that there’s more to the membership than just using the exercise machines.

Create Free Trials to Gain Leads and Long-Term Customers

Many consumers think of the prices of products or services before they consider their worth. So let your leads and customers experience your brand without asking them pay a cent.

Free trials help promote benefits such as:

• They create a lasting impression to a targeted audience
• Also, they give prospects a chance to compare products for free
• They invite prospects to get acquainted with and become excited about new technologies

However, don’t offer free trials with your only thought that of gaining more sales.

This marketing strategy needs careful planning for it to be successful. So consider the following factors before you attempt to offer free trials:

Limit the Free Trial Period

The free trial period should be limited. For instance, if you’re offering an online website maker, consider a seven-day trial period for users to “test the waters” of the service. If the new site owner likes using the features, then they can keep using their new website for a subscription fee.

Offer Only One Product or Service

You don’t need to showcase all your offerings during the free trial period. If you’re selling a product line, put up only a single item for prospects to try for free. And if you’re selling a service, let your leads test just a few of the features for a limited time.

Calculate the Costs to Your Bottom Line

Ensure that the free trial won’t be too expensive for your company. For instance, consider putting a decent-quality foundation out as a tester on the shelf of your cosmetics store. If a customer wants to try a higher-quality foundation, you can offer them a more expensive foundation for a discounted price.

Importantly, don’t put a product or service on a free trial period if it challenges your profit significantly.

These free trials may help you boost your hot lead and long-term customer acquisition. This marketing strategy may also assist in showing your prospects that your business doesn’t only care about cold, hard cash. Instead, it shows how much you value your long-term business relationships with your clientele.

Create a Sustainable Business with Hot Leads and Long-Term Customers

Improving your hot lead and customer base can be challenging if you don’t know how to go about it. But following these guidelines will help you have more leads and boost your customer count. Let these tools help you reach business sustainability as you increase your sales in the years to come.

Featured image from freepik.com

Innovative technologies can help companies in the apparel industry gain insights into their business processes. In fact, apparel ERP, meaning enterprise resource planning software designed specifically for the apparel industry, is an ideal solution.

Exciting Changes in the Apparel Industry

These are exciting and challenging times for businesses in the apparel industry. For one thing, social media wields a powerful influence. For another, consumers have changed. People want to buy whatever they see. What’s more, they want it right now!

But innovative technologies, such as ERP software designed specifically for the apparel industry, can help companies in the apparel industry gain insights into their business processes. This helps them to become more efficient and more competitive.

Let’s take a look at some of the most important benefits of using apparel ERP software.

1. Business Planning in the Apparel Industry

Forget about big, complicated spreadsheets. As we all know, these are tedious to update and difficult to share. Instead, turn to ERP software. It will provide you with a single, centralized platform that will improve how you use your resources, leading to more efficient operations.

RELATED ARTICLE: THE IMPORTANCE OF PLANNING IN PROJECT MANAGEMENT

2. Managing Manufacturing, Importing, and Contracting Activities

An apparel ERP solution will help you manage all the manufacturing stages of your product’s life cycle. Whether you are an importer, a domestic manufacturer, or you use domestic contractors, ERP software will help. This is because it allows you to track materials, overhead, labor, and costs for all your production activities.

From initial design and engineering to quality and cost management, you will be able to stay on top of any production issues. This frees you to create realistic schedules, maximize shop floor throughput, and optimize resource investment.

3. Managing the Apparel Supply Chain

Today’s leading apparel companies demand an apparel ERP system that will help them easily manage raw materials as well as finished goods.

For example, a good apparel ERP system will seamlessly adapt to scheduling changes and supplier delays by reallocating projected inventory. This in turn minimizes negative effects on your customers.

Further, a good ERP system will enable you to create domestic and offshore orders, optimize your supply performance, increase visibility into the complete procurement-to-payment process, and more.

4. Accurate and Updated Data

The data in the apparel ERP software is accurate because it is continuously updated in real time. For example, it logs and monitors data in order to guarantee that no data manipulation of any kind can take place.

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Moreover, an effective ERP solution provides comprehensive statistics on revenues and expenses. This lets managers know which areas need adjustment.

5. Improved Productivity

It’s difficult to estimate how much duplicate and otherwise inaccurate data gets communicated in the apparel production process.

However, software automates operational tasks and provides easy access to information. This saves time and significantly reduces the risk of human error. You’ll have accurate information that you can access from any location and at any time. This will undoubtedly improve your organization’s productivity.

6. Reduced Costs

Apparel ERP software will centralize your data and integrate various operations across all departments. This will inevitably lead to reduced costs.

For instance, if a certain fabric is used in the making of several different garments across a number of divisions, an ERP solution will help you calculate the total amount of fabric you will need.

Moreover, ERP software will help you improve flow and communication within your organization. For example, when all key product data is centralized, you will save money by sourcing only the right amounts of materials and making more precise forecasts.

Image from apparelmagic.com

7. Apparel Inventory Management

You need to meet the demands of today’s omnichannel market.

However, manual tracking of items across offline and online channels can lead to miscalculations and errors. This inevitably leads to loss of profit.

Therefore, fashion retailers, brand owners, and companies working in the wholesale apparel industry need to have an accurate and up-to-date overview of their inventory. This enables them to optimize their stock levels.

To this end, ERP software designed specifically for the apparel industry provides a consolidated overview of your inventory. It does so by sorting merchandise into various categories, such as style, size, color, price, vendor, and so on.

This significantly decreases the time you spend on ordering and distribution. In short, ERP software will enable you to maintain optimum inventory levels and allocate resources to areas that need attention.

8. Higher Levels of Customer Satisfaction with Their Apparel Purchases

Today’s businesses need to provide customers, suppliers, and sales representatives with multiple channels of communication. For example, consumers want to use email, phone, or the Internet to place orders quickly and easily. Moreover, they want to access product and order information conveniently.

However, providing multiple means of contact and managing the flow of information can be a real challenge. On the other hand, an apparel ERP solution will provide consistent service levels and access to real-time information however and wherever customers demand it.

9. Financial Information Management

An apparel ERP system will enable you to leverage timely and accurate financial information while reducing operational and maintenance costs.

Good ERP solutions are flexible enough to change and grow along with your business. Moreover, they will provide advanced functionality for managing even the most complex financial operations.

10. Report Generation

An apparel ERP solution will enable you to compile reports quickly and efficiently.

Use it to create summaries and operational overviews. This will save you time and still give you a clear picture of what is happening in your company, all the way through manufacturing processes to the availability of certain items in your warehouse.

Final Thoughts

Technology has become vital for all modern businesses, and the apparel industry is no exception. ERP software in the apparel industry centralizes data from all departments and functions within an organization.

You can easily use this centralized data for designing, manufacturing, and supply chain management. Moreover, an apparel ERP solution monitors and controls the company’s operations. It drafts query responses, plans, schedules, and tracks orders, and predicts data with great accuracy.

As a result, you get a clear view of business procedures. This in turn leads to reduced costs, time savings, and increased productivity and efficiency throughout your organization.

For more articles about running your business efficiently, be sure to browse our blog.

Forex expert advisors, or forex bots, are a groundbreaking development in the world of forex trading. Besides saving traders time and effort while trading, forex bots have enabled novice traders to participate in the foreign exchange market.

Feature Photo by Artem Beliaikin from Pexels

Notably, all of these bots function on MetaTrader and other trading platforms. These bots leverage complex algorithms to track and analyze trade positions. In particular, the forex bots conduct a thorough analysis of the market after which they open or exit trade positions. Ultimately, the point is to ensure that every action and decision that the forex expert advisor takes results in profit for the trader.

Ideally, forex robots enable traders to achieve profits easier than they would without them. The primary function of a forex bot, therefore, is to initiate and to close trades in a way that the trader will earn a positive return.

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In compiling a list of the best forex bots as we head into 2020, we considered a number of properties. First, a good bot has reliable execution speeds to avoid missed opportunities and maximize returns. Secondly, the best bot can handle several currency pairs to capitalize on favorable movements. Third, best bots are secure, guaranteeing the safety of the users’ accounts. Other properties that we considered include trade accuracy and general reliability.

Below are arguably the best forex bots heading into 2020.

RoFX: Forex Finest

The forex market is full of swindlers and finding a genuine service is not easy. However, a detailed RoFX review tells you that you can never go wrong with this forex robot. RoFX performs better than expert traders do. As such, you are assured of a comfortable margin, whether you are a newbie or an expert.

Additionally, RoFX stands out as one of the leaders in terms of automating trades. This bot is the brainchild of experienced software developers and traders. The forex expert uses artificial intelligence to study and analyze the forex market to provide reliable trading opportunities.

The use of artificial intelligence allows the forex robot to execute trades automatically. 

This expert advisor also uses neural networks to execute trades profitably and ensure continuous improvement. A user-friendly interface means anyone, even those with limited trading experience, can leverage RoFX to generate consistent profits.

Learn2trade

With Learn2Trade, a trader is likely to experience up to a 93% success rate in terms of consistently profitable trading. Just like RoFX, Learn2Trade is reliable, providing forex signals. In addition, the bot comes with trading courses through which traders can hone their individual skills.

Similar to RoFX, Learn2Trade communicates with the trader via Telegram, providing signals and any other information that might be of relevance. Further, you have the option of getting your money back if the system fails to live up to your expectations in 30 days. 

BinBotPro

BinBotPro is an automated FX trading system that leverages artificial intelligence to offer signals to forex traders. In addition to signals, the bot analyzes the market, offers insights from extensive market research and uses insights to anticipate price movements in the market.

This bot performs similar functions to RoFX, like determining when to enter and exit trade positions. Further, BinBotPro makes it easy for traders to earn profits from binary options. Like RoFX, BinBotPro enables traders to earn close to 200% in returns from their investments.

Odin Forex Robot

This bot ranks among the best. Odin Forex robot leverages a trading strategy including take profit and a tight stop loss. This achieves two objectives. First, the user earns profit from every trade, no matter the size. Second, the trader’s account remains safe from a margin call.

Additionally, Odin protects traders’ accounts from snooping activities by forex traders. Particularly, forex brokers cannot hunt the stop levels of the user’s account to undermine the trade position. Similar to RoFX, the bot supports more than 22 currency pairs.

FXSignals

When it comes to accurate market analysis and credible signals, FXSignals and RoFX are your go-to systems. Interestingly, traders can leverage signals from the bot whether they are trading automatically or manually.

Due to the accuracy of the signals the bot provides, traders can enter or exit positions without suffering losses. This is especially helpful in a fast-moving market. Additionally, this tool leverages stop loss and other mechanisms to ensure that the trade’s exposure to risk is at the bare minimum. 

Photo by Burak K from Pexels

Most importantly, FXSignals is easy to use. Together with RoFX, the bot tops the market as the best choice for traders whose knowledge of the forex market is scant.

Vader Forex Robot

This forex robot comes loaded with more than 30 features through which users can generate numerous trading strategies. In addition, Vader utilizes the Gryphon Trading Engine to enhance the profit margin that one earns from a successful trade.

Further, users can leverage the Fibonacci strategy to time the market in the most accurate way. With this bot, users have access to more than 20 currency pairs.

Big Breakout EA

All trading bots discussed above leverage complex algorithms, but not the way Big Breakout EA does. Unlike the other bots, Big Breakout EA utilizes an algorithm that is dynamic. It adapts to the different movements within the market.

Similar to RoFX, Big Breakout EA is ideal for close monitoring of the market. It tracks the resistance and support levels of the particular currency pairs. Therefore, it can initiate or close trade positions in the most profitable manner.

Additionally, this trading bot follows a tight stop loss tradition such that the chances of a margin call are almost insignificant. To ensure that the user maximizes profits, the bot uses a trailing stop-loss order. It offers support to multiple currency pairs and works with all lot sizes.

So, there you have it. These top-functioning forex bots are available for your market trading needs. Use them to their fullest and your market returns are sure to benefit.