8 Useful Tools for Identifying and Connecting With Prospects
Posted: February 26, 2013
[caption id="attachment_11217" align="alignright" width="500"]
Image from Hubspot[/caption]You know you need connections to start a business. Take the first step and reach out to grow your connections. Don't know how to start? Here are some tips to figure it out.
[caption id="attachment_11217" align="alignright" width="500"]Image from Hubspot[/caption]You know you need connections to start a business. Take the first step and reach out to grow your connections. Don't know how to start? Here are some tips to figure it out.
Ah, the elusive prospect. You know they're out there in need of your service or product, but it can be tough to uncover them at the right time in their search. So how do you find them? And once you find them, what the heck do you do with them? Just poke 'em with a stick?
First of all, that's a veritable "no" to the stick thing. And fortunately, there are a handful of tools available to help you identify prospective customers and find out what topics and content are most interesting to them.
I've compiled a starter list of some of the prospecting tools I've used most often in my career -- some free, some paid -- along with some tips on how to address prospects in a helpful, prospect-focused, inbound way.
HubSpot’s Prospect Report
I’m going to start out with HubSpot’s Prospect Report here because it’s probably the most thorough tool on the list, though it does require a HubSpot subscription. The Prospects Report does a nice job of giving you a sense of not only where your prospects come from, but also what they’re interested in and what contacts you have in common. That way, the first call you make to them doesn’t have to be so cold.
The Prospects Report works by showing you the company name or IP address associated with any website visitor you have. You won’t get the names of people until they opt-in by deciding to contact you or filling out a form on your website, but the nice thing is, the Prospects Report gives you a sneak peak of what they may be interested in.
In the example below, for instance, you can see that the company had two unknown visitors from West Nottinghamshire College -- the second line item in the image below. We also know that those visitors came to the site looking for "e-commerce statistics."