If you’ve taken the plunge in the past few months to start your own business then you are not alone. During every recession there is an increase in the number of new companies formed, for some they just pick up their address book and contact old customers but for others they need to start from scratch to generate sales leads.
There are hundreds of free marketing applications which can help support the sales process but most of these “free” offers are just a short term trial before you have to pay.
Our team work with numerous start-ups and understand that one of their biggest challenges is budget (or lack of) so we’ve put together a list of free applications we use ourselves on a daily basis to generate sales leads.
CRM, database development and sales prospecting
Having a CRM that is both easy to use and has some great functionality is really important for any new business and the application we prefer is HubSpot.
It has a totally free tier which allows you to:
Store contacts and record prospecting activity
Easily segment prospect data
Track prospect activity on your website
Run a sales dashboards and sales funnel for sales prospecting
There is a paid version of HubSpot which gives loads more functionality but the free version should be enough to get you started.
Get creative
We all know that the right picture or illustration can sell your service better than loads of words so we recommend two applications that are a must have for any start-up.
Canva is a web based design application that can be used to create anything from social media post images through to an animation for your website. They include plenty of templates and functionality with the free version and also you don’t have to worry about watermarks.
Another free creative resource is Pexels. You can download free to use stock images and videos for nearly any theme as well as export the images into your Canva account for use on your design projects.
Generating inbound sales leads
If you have taken the time to build your prospecting database and LinkedIn connections then it’s time to start generating some inbound leads.
HubSpot free allows you to send 2000 customised emails a month and also create and manage your paid media advertising. Using the built in functionality you can:
See how your prospects interact with your website
Target them with more specific content in the future
In addition we also recommend using Hootsuite which allows you to manage three social media accounts at the same time as well as schedule posts and view mentions all in one place.
Measurement and performance monitoring
So you have researched and built a prospect database; created a really engaging asset; generated inbound sales leads with emails, PPC and social media; now you need to measure campaign effectiveness and see what you can do better next time to create even more sales leads.
There are a number of applications which will help you measure performance of your campaigns including:
If you would like to talk to one of our consultants about how we can help you reach your target audience, generate valuable sales leads and convert them into business call 01625 403199 or complete the contact form and we will get back to you.
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