How to Convert an Inbound Lead to a Long-Term Customer

Inbound Leads come to you after the buyer finds out about you somehow — from a Google search, some press you got, a Facebook ad, at a trade show, or simply by seeing your product in another store.

They find you and reach out to you, versus an outbound lead, where you find them and reach out to them.

Converting them into a customer is just a matter of playing your cards right. Here is an overview of the process that we’ll cover in this post:

How to Approach an Inbound Lead

You never want to assume it’s a done deal just because the lead came to you. Even if they’re gushing with enthusiasm for your product, you still have to sell them on your pricing, your terms & conditions (T&Cs), and your customer service.

It is tempting to fire off a canned email response to an inbound lead, telling them how excited you are to work with them, and to please find your line sheet and new customer form attached. But I’ve seen far more leads go silent from this approach than respond with a first order.

Your line sheet is just a tool — it’s not going to sell your product for you. I’ve found that it’s better to hold off on sending them your line sheet, and to respond instead with a request to set up a meeting — in person if the retailer is local, by phone if not.

Pick a day/time, send a calendar invite, and if you don’t hear back, call them (or show up) at that time anyway. If they want to reschedule they will, but more likely they’ll realize they never got back to you and just go along with the impromptu meeting. Scrappy move, but effective.

When calling them, have an email ready to send with your line sheet attached. Once you have them on the phone, send the email and have them open it while you have them on the phone. Then break it down for them.

The reason for this approach is that 9 times out of 10, you will sense some hesitancy from the buyer when you run your line sheet by them. No matter how perfect your product is, something about it (or your pricing, or your T&Cs) will give them pause.

It may also just be inertia that is causing them to hesitate — far easier to do nothing than to take action.

In sales speak, when a prospect hesitates or otherwise expresses any kind of reservation about your product, it is called a sales objection. Your job as a salesperson is to tease out these objections, and then overcome them through your powers of persuasion and the various sales tools you have at your disposal.

It’s possible that they won’t give you any indication what the issue is, so you need to know from experience what the common objections to your product are, and then head them off as they arise. It’s far better to be with them in person or on the phone when they’re having second thoughts than for the buyer to have them on his or her own.

You have some powerful leveraging tools at your disposal, which we discussed in T&Cs: no minimum, free shipping, painless payment options, and exchanges for SKUs that don’t sell in their store. You have free displays to offer as well, and all that other snazzy collateral.

Pull out all the stops here — not all at once, but over natural course of the conversation.

The Beach Analogy

Imagine you’re trying to sell a friend on going to the beach, when all she really wants to do is lay inert on the couch. When she asks you why she should go, you wouldn’t say, “Because you have a car and I want to go to the beach.” Instead, you’d try to convince her that deep down inside, it’s something that she wants to do.

Maybe you would back the conversation up and say something like, “You sound exhausted. Rough week?” Then you’d listen to her tell you what her week was like: “So many mind-numbing meetings, I didn’t get the promotion I was angling for, I went on two miserable dates…”

Now you have something to work with. Maybe you’d commiserate and say, “Ugh, office jobs. Nothing worse than being trapped in meetings. You know what you need? Vitamin D! Good for the soul! What is more relaxing than laying on the beach, soaking up rays.”

“I don’t know,” she replies. “I don’t feel like moving. Besides, I haven’t eaten.”

“Tell you what,” you say. “I’ll pack a picnic and come to you. I’ll even carry you to your car. You can leave the driving to me. C’mon, I want to hear more about this promotion situation. I went through a similar thing a few years back and was able to turn it to my advantage. And let me tell you, I’m the queen of miserable dates.”

“Alright, I suppose…” she says.

Sold! Now you just need to seal the deal with some actionable next steps: “I’ll be at your place in an hour. Just grab a bathing suit, a beach towel, and your shades. I’ll bring sunscreen and a cooler. Oh, and don’t forget a good book. Any requests for picnic food?”

Note how in this scenario, you first uncovered the things that were pinning her to the couch (inertia and a crappy week). Then, you framed your beach day as a positive alternative to that. A more sharky salesperson might have tried playing to her insecurities: “Listen, you’re pale as a ghost. No wonder you can’t get a decent date. The beach will do you wonders…” She would quickly get wise to that and not trust you as a friend. Not a good way to build a lasting relationship.

Applying the Beach Analogy

Once you get the buyer on the phone or have them in person, start the conversation by giving them a quick rundown of the selling points of your product. Your selling points to them will be their selling points to their customers, so they want to hear them.

Bonus points for framing those selling points within the context of the specific store that you’re pitching to, which is why part of your preparation for any meeting should be to learn what you can from their website & social media. If you can get into the store ahead of time, poke around the shelves a bit. Which products do they carry that indicate that your product will do well there? Which products are similar to yours that you’ll want to differentiate yourself from?

The retailer will have objections, whether stated or not. Overcoming those objections is the other half of the battle when it comes to your pitch.

For the unstated ones, maybe you say something like, “Now I know what you’re thinking. I’ve got 50 different craft beers in my cooler, why do I need 51?” Or, “These monocles are quite expensive, I’m not sure I can sell these.”

As in our beach analogy, show the retailer that you understand where they’re coming from and why they’re on the fence. Then, present your product as something that will sell and that they truly want on their shelves. Assuage their fear of buyer’s remorse with your low-risk Terms & Conditions, and overpower any hesitancy that remains with a fear of missing out.

By getting in front of them or having them on the phone for your pitch, you have the opportunity to gain their trust through the personal connection that you are starting to forge. They are hearing your voice, seeing your face, forming the impression that you’re organized, professional, and trustworthy — the decent sort of person that they like doing business with. Give them that much-needed sense that you will be a pleasure to work with.

We established in a previous post that your product isn’t a solution to anything. Unlike most of the sales advice you see out there, you can’t probe around for the buyer’s pain points and frame your product as the solution to their pain. But you can be a lot less painful to deal with than your competitors, and in that respect, you are offering a solution.

Sealing the Deal

You’ve given them your spiel, overcome their objections, and convinced them that they want your product on their shelves. Now what?

The iron isn’t getting any hotter. Tell them you’d love to stock them up for the weekend.

Of course, there’s the little matter of paperwork. At some point, you need them to sign your T&Cs and complete a credit card authorization form that gives you permission to keep their card on file and charge it going forward. Your state may also require you to collect a Resale Certificate (form ST-120 in New York) from every business that you wholesale to.

However, you don’t want to ruin the moment by telling them they need do some paperwork.

So here’s what you do: for the first order, take a credit card over the phone (or in person). Done. Once your beautiful product is flying off their shelves, they’ll be happy to do some quick paperwork before placing a reorder.

You can either email the paperwork to them, or send them a link to a secure web form. The latter is probably the better option for ease of use. Whichever you opt for, complete as much of the work for them as you can, and make it clear which fields they need to complete.

What If They’re Not Yet Ready to Order?

If at all possible, don’t let them think on it. Remind them that they have very little to lose — you have little or no minimum, and little or no shipping fee.

If you need to, sweeten the deal. Hit them with a time sensitive opening order discount — good for 10% off of your first order, this week only!

Sometimes they’ll insist that they need more time. Maybe they’re planning ahead for their next buying season. Find out when that is, get at them as soon as it’s time, and follow up relentlessly. In the meantime, send them occasional reminders that you exist and are a fun, relevant brand: news items, product updates, etc.

What if They Require Samples?

You probably noticed that I left samples out of my conversion process. Samples are expensive and they slow the process down. Inbound leads are already interested in your product — more often than not they won’t require samples, so it’s better just to leave them out of the conversation altogether.

If a buyer requires samples, please refer to my Samples Pack post. Email the buyer the day that the samples ship so that they know to be on the lookout. Send the samples to the buyer’s attention, keep an eye on the tracking, and email the buyer when they arrive, letting them know who signed for them.

In the case of an inbound lead, the buyer is already interested in your products, so you have extra leverage. There are a couple tricks you can use to ensure your samples don’t disappear into the void, while increasing the probability of converting them into a customer:

1. Charge for the samples and then credit them that amount towards their first order.
2. Charge shipping for the free samples. Require that they provide a credit card and a Resale Tax Number so that you have this information on file and there are no obstacles if and when they decide to place their first order.

First Delivery

So you nabbed an opening order…congrats! Now, pack that first box with extra care, and include anything that will help them sell it: special handling instructions, product knowledge sheet, displays.

Don’t forget to follow up on their first delivery. How does everything look? Do they have everything they need? Any questions/concerns?

Set reminders for yourself to check in with them in a week or two to see if they need a resupply.

Your work has just begun now that you’ve converted this lead into a customer. Now it’s time to grow them into a long-term partner.

Final Word: Let’s Be Real

Buyers will never reveal their full decision process to a salesperson, so there is no magic formula that works for converting every inbound lead to a customer.

Brace yourself for a lot of lost opportunities that will be a complete mystery to you. You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it place a first order.

Nevertheless, being proactive (rather than passively emailing them info) will drastically increases your chances of conversion.

When it comes to leads of any kind, you never know which ones will turn into solid accounts, so you just need to motivate yourself to keep trying new things. Think of it as hedging your bets. Some of your surest bets are going to be the ones that fall through, while some of your longest shots will be the ones that pay off.

Keep your head up, keep experimenting, keep learning from your mistakes, and keep tweaking/improving your pitch.