To Build Trust in AI Receptionists, You May Need to Tell Customers This
By Yaniv Masjedi, Chief Marketing Officer at Nextiva
24 Nov, 2015
Post by
Jeff Dworkin
As “fall trade show season” wraps up, it is now time to follow-up with all those people whose cards you collected or badges you scanned. At one particular show this year, I was doing some research into a topic that was new to me, so I allowed my badge to be scanned by a number of vendors. What I quickly realized is that most of those companies have no idea of how to follow-up after a show.
A badge scan or a business card collected at a booth is not a Marketing Qualified Lead and should not be treated as such, that is, forwarded to a salesperson who is going to try and close a sale. I visited a lot of booths and spoke to a lot of people at that show. Assume I have no idea of who you are. Unless we had a real conversation in that booth and someone tagged me as a Qualified or Hot Lead and scheduled specific follow-up action I should be put into a nurture campaign.
The first follow-up email should come very quickly after the show and feature a concise reminder of what you do. Remind me of why I engaged with you at the show. Give me an easy way to reply to you and request that a salesperson follow-up with me. That way, if I truly am a hot lead and in desperate need of your product or service, all I have to do is click a single link and self-qualify so your salesperson can immediately contact me.
You should also have a second call to action that will allow me to further engage with your company and/or your content. If I click that link, then I have started down the path to being an MQL. If not, maybe I was only interested in the tchotchke that you were giving away in the booth. I won’t respond to any of those nurture emails and quickly be dropped into your long-term nurture campaign.
Remember that the goal of marketing automation is to relieve your salespeople from those simple and/or repetitive tasks that don’t really contribute to the top line. Initial booth follow-up is a great example of this.
