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3 Reasons Why You Shouldn’t Wait to Implement a Lead Scoring System

Illustration Of 3 Reasons Why You Shouldn'T Wait To Implement A Lead Scoring System

Even today, when so many brands have enormous tech stacks full of SaaS tools designed to help streamline and improve every aspect of their business’s marketing and customer acquisition process, most don’t have a lead scoring system. 

There’s plenty of lead-tracking and sales-driven software in the mix. Most brands also have detailed analytics and sales forecast data. But what they’re lacking is a tool that effectively and reliably helps their team to quickly identify the highest value leads in the pipeline before they even send the first message. 

The sheer amount of data that’s available in this day and age and the technology needed to process it (so that you can figure out what data matters and what doesn’t) is unparalleled, making lead scoring software more powerful and accurate than ever before.

You don’t want to wait to implement a lead scoring system, even if you’re not sure that you need one, and in this post, we’re going to discuss three reasons why lead scoring software should be a top priority.

How Lead Scoring Software Works 

Before we dive into the reasons you need a lead scoring system, let’s take a look at what exactly lead scoring software is.

One of the reasons so many brands don’t have a lead scoring tool in their tech stack is because they aren’t familiar with what the tools can do. This is partially because lead scoring first came to popularity over a decade ago, before the necessary data, computing power, and technology were really available to help these tools deliver on their promises.

Now, though, lead scoring tools can be incredibly powerful.

Here at Breadcrumbs, for example, we can analyze all the data you have on your customers and then identify your best revenue opportunities. We’ll let you know who they are, what they’re doing with your business, and how often or frequently they’re doing it. 

A Screenshot Of Breadcrumbs Lead Scoring System

Timeliness is a core part of our lead scoring system model, allowing you to identify buyers the second they’re ready to make a purchase. Your team will know approximately how long they have to move for the best chances of a conversion and who they should be reaching out to. 

Now with that being said, let’s take a look at three reasons why you can’t wait to implement a lead scoring system, even if it wasn’t at the top of your to-do list.

1. All Leads Are Not Created Equal 

If you have any business, sales, or customer-facing experience, then you already know this fact to be true. While all leads are welcome, they are not all created equal, and you shouldn’t value them equally, either.

Even in my very small business, I know that clients who come to me with the expectation of “immediate results” are typically not going to be a good fit; content can drive some immediate results, but it typically can also take six to twelve months to see the full depth of the content strategy.

I’ve learned that customers who don’t understand this will get frustrated after a month or two max, even if they are warned ahead of time. 

All businesses are going to have certain types of ideal clients, and some that are lower value. And they’ll also have leads that have little to no chance of converting. 

You may know, for example, that your best leads come through referrals and organic search traffic. They typically belong to certain industries or have certain job titles. They may ask about certain services or even use certain language during an initial inquiry.

These are all individual cues that can help us immediately assess a lead’s potential value, and lead scoring does this all behind the scenes.

Why You Shouldn’t Pursue All Leads

There’s this very popular idea in the market right now that the best way to win customers is to treat every single lead as a potential customer.

That sounds great in theory, right? 

While it may sound great in theory, it’s just not practical. It’s completely unscalable that you’ll try to engage with every website visitor courtesy of a chatbot or that everyone who fills out a site form or downloads a lead magnet gets a phone call. 

When you’re working on a small scale, it’s possible, but not as you grow. The costs go through the roof as you need to keep more staff on hand just to try to appeal to all users even though only a segment would ever actually become customers. The operational costs are eventually unmanageable, and your efficiency and profit margins are eventually and inevitably destroyed.

Lead scoring prevents this. It helps you quickly determine which leads are worth pursuing. AKA, which leads are eventually most likely to become not only customers but high-value customers. 

Breadcrumbs’ lead scoring system allows you to differentiate between different segments of your potential buyers. Who will actually become a customer instead of just window shopping, and who will retain for the long-haul and at higher values? This is information that your sales team can use to make the right moves fast so you can land more of your target clients.

2. “Perfect Data” Doesn’t Exist… But Correctly Interpreted Data Does 

Sometimes people think that they don’t have enough data to fully take advantage of a lead scoring system yet. Or they worry that the data isn’t organized, or up to date, or synced enough to be useful.

Here’s the reality: The notion of “Perfect Data” really doesn’t exist. There’s no such thing. Data is constantly in flux because your business is changing, the market is changing, your audience base is changing, and this is all happening with natural customer churn rates. 

You really don’t need a ton of data to inform lead scoring; you just need relevant and up-to-date data. Strong data hygiene can help you there.

Plenty of lead scoring models—including the fancy ones that tout machine-learning attributes and AI-driven models with black-box attributes—are really only looking at somewhere between four to six data points that drive the core aspects of their predictions.

You don’t need an overwhelming abundance of “perfect” data. You just need the right data and the right tools so that it can be correctly interpreted.  

By our own estimates, over 95% of data is actually irrelevant when it comes to lead scoring. So even if your data is in flux, that’s okay; data is going to be evolving continually in some way on a constant basis for the entirety of your business. We’ll connect to the data source that you already use (we’ve currently got HubSpot, ActiveCampaign, and Marketo, with more coming!) to make this even easier for you.

A Screenshot Of Breadcrumbs Lead Scoring System Sources

This is no reason to put off lead scoring when it can help your business right now, especially since tools like Breadcrumbs make it possible for you to make more sense of the data that you already have. And especially since you’ll never actually reach “perfect data,” meaning that you’d just be putting off a tool that can help your business indefinitely.

3. The Sooner, The Better 

You know that lead scoring can help you sell more, and tools like Breadcrumbs can even help you get the most out of whatever data you have on hand (imperfect though it may be).

There is no reason to wait.

The longer you wait to find and implement a new lead scoring system, the longer you’re keeping your sales team from having actionable and reliable data they can use to sell more. This means that you’re losing out on profit and potentially even clients every day that you wait, potentially while chasing the wrong clients in the meantime.

Keep in mind that lead scoring goes behind identifying who in your pipeline is a high-value lead. We can also help you identify different high-value traits or segments you may not have even realized were there. This allows you to start optimizing your entire funnel more effectively, improving the efficiency of the entire customer acquisition process. 

And, as you start getting those initial benefits, remember that momentum will work in your favor. The amplified benefits of the continued process, including ongoing learning and optimization, can take your business and your revenue to unprecedented levels.

Since time is truly of the essence and your potential to convert existing leads decreases the longer you wait to contact them, make time to implement a new lead scoring system ASAP.

A Screenshot Of Breadcrumbs Lead Scoring System

Set up Your Lead Scoring System Today

If you don’t have a high-quality lead scoring system in place yet, you should make moves to change that ASAP. The data analysis that lead scoring tools like Breadcrumbs can offer now is exceptional, and instead of vague forecasts, it gives you real, actionable data that your team can move on right now.

A reliable, high-powered, and automated lead scoring system can revolutionize how your team operates in the best way possible, increasing efficiency alongside heightened profit margins. We’re all about revenue acceleration, and choosing a strong lead-scoring software is the first step, so don’t wait.

There’s no time like the present to select and set up your lead scoring system. Book your demo with Breadcrumbs to see how we can help you today.

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