Alright... just one more time with the gimmicky top 5 title.  I promise.  For those that didn't read my post last week I talked about ways to generate more leads.  If you followed my advice you should now be seeing a significant increase in your web leads and any vacancy troubles have all but evaporated.  (Okay that might be overstating reality somewhat).

I hope you'll come along with me over the next month or so while I talk about all the steps from lead generation to move-in.  I think I have some insights to offer and hope you will agree.  At the minimum I can help you waste 5 minutes now before you do something that might be considered important later. 

Driving leads is nice but without a good way to manage them, working them can be difficult.  Today I'd like to ask you the following question: What are you doing to manage your current leads?  I hope by now everyone is utilizing a centralized structure for your lead management.  If you aren't here are just 2 reasons out of thousands why you should be:

1. Where are your advertising dollars going?  Sure you can login to every ILS site you use (what are there 400 different ILS sites to choose from?  Sure seems that way doesn't it?) and look it up.  You can pull your reports in your accounting system but how accurate can those be?  If emails are going to each property's email address who is making sure they are being entered correctly or at all?  
2. Does everyone onsite share an email lead address?  Who checks it?  Do the properties check it consistently?  Are they being answered in a timely manner?  There's no easy way to know.

What are some of your options to centrally manage your leads?  I know of three great ones.  CallSource and Lead2Lease are the industry norm.  In house we developed our own system.  I am not chest pounding but I am saying that it is possible to do with some patience and a few months.  It can save you on those recurring monthly expenses.  If you don't have the IT staff in place to take on the Do it Yourself challenge than the other two are excellent products.  These systems can get all of your leads to flow into one place and can get them to each site's dashboard (and into your accounting system)  Plus they can work wonders in helping you work your leads (the details of which we'll get to next time)

So great, you've got a centralized system going and you're happy with it.  Last week I mentioned driving more leads and gave ideas to do so.  Without leads you have no business.  But is the way to the promised land just driving more and more leads?  Not always.  Pull up your prospect listings.  On that list (I hope it's a long one) how many prospects could you feel confident in saying were worked appropriately and effectively?  

Lead nurturing can bring better benefits than just driving leads can.  What is lead nurturing?  According to startwithalead.com it's "The secret to successful lead generation, and in turn marketing, in the business-to-business space today is process.  This process, that converts more inquiries into qualified leads and qualified leads into sales, is called lead nurturing.  Lead nurturing is all about having consistent and meaningful dialog with viable prospects regardless of their timing to buy."  While this concept is used more frequently in B2B sales it can easily be adopted to our industry.  Here's a good article which can help out.  Establish a relationship with prospects who might not be ready yet or have seen other properties.  Build that trust that might pay off in 2 months. 

Without further ado ... here are my 5 ways to manage your leads effectively:

1. Learning your audience.  Do you find that certain types of prospects require more time?  What types are they?  Older, younger, different educations, moving from certain zip codes?  Do you have the reporting to show you that college educated people require more follow ups or always seem to be in a hurry?  Is it true that most people around 36 years old begin their mid life crisis?  Most definitively YES.  These types of metrics can allow you to target how you respond or how you handle certain leads.  It's one thing to just fire off an email within 2 hours (statistics show that most web leads are dead or on life support after 48 hours) and then move onto the next one but its another thing to try to understand your prospect.
2. If you have had an interaction with your prospect (such as a phone call or email response) try to get as much information as you can (without sounding over zealous).  Having more information about a prospect (looking for washer/dryer, wants a patio) can help keep your staff excited about them.  4% of all email leads are converted industry wide so it sure can get frustrating.
3. Learn how to spot the bad ones. How long do you hold onto leads?  When is enough enough?  Do leads at a certain time of day (ie. late at night) end up rejected more than not?  
4. Don't be afraid sometimes to back off your lead driving efforts (minimize your CraigsList posting for example) and give every existing lead your full attention.  Call, send a letter, if you've sent 3 emails from your account send another from someone else's.  ("I couldn't help but notice that you haven't responded")  Spend some time getting to know what your current crop of prospects are telling you.  You might learn a lot.
5. Lastly, "measure everything you do". How quickly do properties respond?  What are they saying?  How many follow ups is each lead getting?  What times of day are more leads coming in?  (Are you staffed appropriately at that time?)  

Talking about managing leads is a topic I would consider "Boring but important". You cannot work your leads effectively if you have a disorganized method of managing them.  Once you solve the organization problem are you analyzing and executing them as best as you can?  Are you putting the best effort into every lead knowing that the next one could be your next move in?  Sometimes the answers lie within.

In the next series I will try to give you some excellent tips, some you've maybe never heard of, to help you with one of the most important words of all.  CONVERSION.  Until next time...  

Thanks to Image: Filomena Scalise / FreeDigitalPhotos.net for the Photo.