It’s funny how often marketers shun tried and tested, reliable strategies that bring in new customers much more effectively than other, more elaborate approaches.

It’s almost always the case that businesses will spend much more to acquire a new customer than to get an existing customer to purchase again OR to stop an existing customer from defecting to the competition. (My theory is that customer acquisition marketing tends to be a lot “sexier” than followup communications, so acquisition gets more of the attention).

In much the same way, I often see people mothballing their BEST marketing methods in favour of risky, untested lead gen tactics that produce anything from half to 5% of the results of other strategies.

Of course, this isn’t done with any masochistic intent to deliver sub-par results.  It’s just that we humans seem to have a “love of the new” and think we have to be constantly re-inventing our marketing approaches in order to gain traction.

If you take your eye off your metrics, even for a minute, this is a very easy trap to fall into.

Case in point: I recently consulted with a retail chain with a fairly substantial web channel.   We analysed where all new customers and sales had come from over the last few years and found the metrics somewhat lacking in detail.    Most of the “active” lead generation activity that had been conducted appeared to be rather expensive, requiring at least a year of loyal custom by the new customer to pay the initial marketing expense.

One method that had been tried, but didn’t have any hard metrics associated with it, was enclosing printed referral request cards with orders.  I asked the client about this and the general consensus was that the referral cards were producing a few leads but that the cost was probably not worth it — that’s why they were discontinued for a year or so.

I persuaded the client to try another batch of referral card marketing, and the results were staggering — it was about 500% more cost-effective than ANY of their other active lead generation methods currently in operation.

I had to agree — this simple referral card marketing techniques was one of the most “un-exciting” marketing strategies they were deploying (not a “2.0″ to be seen anywhere!).   But it was also the most profitable.

Having got a handle on firm metrics associated with lead generation, the client is now sending referral request cards to customers no less than 6 times per year.    We will continue to monitor the results on an ongoing basis, but the campaigns will continue until there is something better to replace them.

What about you? Have you become bored with the lead generation methods that worked well for you in the past?  Try resurrecting some old favourites — you may be pleasantly surprised by the results!

2008 has been a big year so far — can you believe it’s more than 1/3 over?

I’ve been flat out team building and working on some exciting internet consulting and lead generation projects for clients as well as a few “side projects” including information marketing, and as a result content production and blog posts have suffered.

I’ve recently started creating more content on generating, nurturing and converting more leads online — here’s a brief introductory video on Exponential Internet Lead Generation strategies for product and service businesses. This is the first in a series of three - the other 2 will be posted here shortly.

Here’s a brief summary of the topics I cover in the video:

1. Your Selling Philosophy
2. Your Lead Definition
3. Your Lead Generation Map
4. Testing and Tracking
5. Optimization Strategies, and
6. Integrating Lead Generation and Sales Functions

Episode 1: Introduction To Exponential Lead Generation On The Internet

Press “Play” to listen.

Download a FULL TRANSCRIPT of the video in PDF format here

More profit-boosting resources:

• If you’re a Small Business Owner: Discover how to multiply your website profits with the Marketing Results Gold Internet Consulting Program.
• If you’re looking for an Enterprise-level solution for improving web profits: Read more about the Marketing Results Platinum Internet Consulting Program.