Lead generation is one of the most important aspects of running your business. Nothing sells itself. You have to sell it. You also can’t just sit around and wait for people to come just because you built it. At the risk of repeating myself, you have to sell it. If you are in business for yourself, you are in sales. And to sell anything, you have to have leads. You could get sales through word of mouth. But that is not a great strategy. There are serious disadvantages to relying on word of mouth advertising that are seldom discussed, including the following:

• One satisfied customer has limited reach.
• One unsatisfied customer tends to spread the word a lot more effectively.
• You can’t track how well the advertising is doing.
• You don’t know when you get negative feedback that is harming your business.

Word of mouth advertising is a double-edged sword. And the negative edge is sharper than the positive edge. What you need is a way to generate good leads that allow you to follow up quickly. There is simply no substitute for proper lead generation. The good news is that technology can help you with lead generation in powerful ways. Here are three.

Responsive Lead Generation Services

If you are not good at generating leads, there is no need to worry. Few people are. That is why you will want to use a lead generation service that can provide you with great leads. A good example of responsiveness is the way Networx Reviews are handled by the company. They are able to see reviews, often in real-time, and do immediate follow up. They also implement strategies based on the reviews to streamline the process of improving their service and benefit all parties concerned.

This type of responsiveness was not possible before the advent of modern technology. Before, it would take too long to see feedback. Most feedback not given directly to the company could not be acted on because companies didn’t know about it.

These days, review sites are easy to monitor. That is just one of the ways technology has eased business processes globally. Many companies have learned how to use social media to offer real-time technical support at the exact moment when people are at the peak of their frustration. This has been massively successful. That kind of responsiveness is being used to make lead generation a lot better as well.

Immediate Follow Up

If you get a paper lead and follow up as quickly as you can, you are probably still too late to get the sale. That is because it takes time to compile leads the old-fashioned way. By the time you get them, they are already old. Leads work best if you can follow up within thirty minutes of the request being made.

When you get leads sent to you electronically, they are service requests that have just been made by the potential customer. They are actively looking for a service provider at that moment. Their request is forwarded to you right away. That is how good lead generation services work. Once you get the lead, you have to respond right away. The person is actively looking for service. If they do not get a quick response, they will look elsewhere until their need is met. Technology allows for immediate follow up on hot leads.

Bad Leads are Easier to Filter

Sales managers will tell you that there is no such thing as a bad lead, just bad salespeople. They know it isn’t true. There are definitely bad leads. If you get a paper list of leads, a high percentage of them will be filled with inaccurate and outdated information. Thanks to technology, there are ways to verify and track changes to phone numbers and addresses so that you end up contacting the person you are intending to reach. Bots can also be filtered so that you are not paying for bogus leads. If a genuinely bad lead slips through, they are easy to verify and remove from the list. It makes it far more likely that you will only ever pay for good, active leads.

Lead generation is one of the hardest parts of doing business. Technology has made it much easier with responsive lead generation services, immediate follow ups, and fewer bad leads.