Lead (target lead) is a potential client, who responded to marketing communication in some way.
The term “lead” is used to designate a potential buyer or any contact with him or her, which has been obtained for subsequent managerial work with the client. “Lead” is also a term used in management theory to describe the methods and practices used to attract new potential customers.
Lead generation means marketing technologies that allow to generate interest of potential buyers and forcing them to request information about goods and services, leave their contact details for further work with potential buyers (leads). It is a marketing approach designed to attract new potential buyers. Lead generation technologies are widely used because they allow to significantly:
- simplify the sale;
- reduce the sale process;
- reduce risks in sales, making them predictable.
The objective of obtaining leads is either the further development of interaction with a potential client or sale of a database of leads to buyers of information about the potential interest of the target group to a particular supplier of goods or services.
Lead capturing is the process of capturing leads’ contacts. Ideally, the first result of communication with a lead (a potential customer) is the need to get contact data, in order to subsequently work out the interaction with the client. Registration of leads refers to the management of fixing of the potential customer’s response to the marketing offer of the seller (producer).
The next stage is lead nurturing, which involves convincing a potential client (due to keeping him or her informed by persuasion) to purchase a product or service by the company’s managers. As a result, there is a transformation of potential buyers into actual ones as well as possible sales into actual ones. This type of management is called lead conversion.
Lead qualification is a term of B2B marketing, meaning evaluating lead prospects, depending on their compliance with the established criteria demanded from the most typical clients of the company. The goal of qualifying leads is to distinguish the willingness, desire and the ability of the contacts to buy.
