The Desert of Arizona
Sunny 65 Degrees – 6:10 a.m.
I’m working on a new lead campaign for a client right now. What that means is that I’m working through a long list of variations of ad creative and specific slices of a target audience.
Lead generation is not a mechanical, propeller head, type of pursuit. It’s an art. You mix creativity with analytical and strategic thinking, a deep understanding of the emotional condition of the person you are trying to reach, plus a small amount of technical facility.
Out of that mess comes success if you work long enough. But it’s a tall order. And that’s why this part of your business is easy to ignore.
The fact is, it’s just easier NOT to do it.
Out of the gates with this particular campaign, things started off, as they normally do!…slowly. $28 per lead.
Not exactly anything to write home about now is it? Well, not in the business I’m working in. But you have to start somewhere.
24 hours later, things were moving in the right direction: $4.50 per lead.
What changed?
The ad didn’t change. The group the ad was put in front of changed.
Why did the new group (in the exact same industry) work better?
In lead generation, “WHY” is a dangerous question. The dangerous part isn’t the asking of the question though. The dangerous part is that if you answer it, you might actually start believing what you say!
The key is no assumptions, no attachments, nothing but clear thinking and clear seeing.
When you assume, you lose.
When you assume, you insist about what should be happening that isn’t.
When you assume you know ANYTHING, you miss seeing almost everything.
There’s not even much you can take from one campaign to the next. Each one exists in its own world, in its own time. It’s a unique puzzle that requires a unique path to the goal.
So you just expect that from the beginning so you don’t get disillusioned and quit.
Realistic expectations provide an ENORMOUS source of power if you set them correctly.
For example, the more I accomplish in business, the clearer I become about one thing:
How little I truly know.
The difference now from 15 years ago is that these days, I actually KNOW how little I know. This makes all the difference.
Lead generation is a fork in the road.
You can choose to “pay” now in the form of some thinking and some work, or you can choose to pay later…when you wake up with no leads.
The choice is up to you.
If you want to do the work now, you might be interested in this.