MDF Goes Beyond
Bonus Leads
By
Mar 14, 2005, 16:00

Leads are the lifeblood of any organization, but some leads are more valuable than others. The least valuable lead is what publishers call a “bonus” lead. These are names of people who have responded to someone else’s lead (a competitor) or someone else’s press release, or an editorial from a similar company. These are normally easy to identify from their coding scheme. Bonus leads are handled differently in every organization – some ask us to ignore them, while others want any lead they can get.

One of our reps noticed that her client, who wanted bonus leads, was getting scores of duplicate leads, for all different products. The business rule put into place for this client was that duplicates for the same product should be eliminated, but duplicates asking for different products should be honored. This meant that a person responding to all ads in a publication, even if only one of them is in response to your ad, will be sent a fulfillment package specific to the requested product, and the lead will be sent to the field rep for follow-up. The cost of fulfilling these leads becomes expensive when you factor in the cost of the collateral and postage as well as the salesperson’s time and effort.

The MDF rep suggested an exception to the business rules for bonus leads. In addition, she met with our programmers and helped them to identify the bonus leads programmatically so that the system can isolate the bonus leads into their own dupe elimination program. This way, any tire kickers (traditionally the least valuable lead) can be responded to in a timely yet cost efficient manner for the first request; after that, their names are culled out of the fulfillment of material and the lead notification process for subsequent requests.

Companies depend on good leads in order to grow the business. The sales force depends on the marketing and/or advertising department to provide them with a steady stream of leads. If the salespeople lose confidence in the leads they are provided, the integrity of the program can be compromised. MDF often partners with our clients using our experience and knowledge to provide guidance and suggest ways to streamline the process.


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