Building a healthy pipeline of prospective clients is an essential part of maintaining business momentum. Yet identifying, contacting and following up with leads takes time – something that presented a serious challenge for this busy non-profit organisation. So they asked us to lend a hand…

Setting out the challenge
The client, an apprenticeship and IT training charity, asked us to help them build their pipeline of prospective clients and attract quality new leads. Our brief was to find and approach new companies where the client could place apprentices and train existing teams or new hires.

Communicating the client’s proposition
It was clear from the outset that this client has a fantastic proposition to approach potential leads with – specifically that apprentices inject vital new skills, ambition, ideas and enthusiasm into a business. Companies that take on apprentices benefit from this injection of energy and skills, but also enjoy the satisfaction of helping an apprentice progress in their career.

Based on this simple but compelling proposition, we planned and delivered a targeted campaign to identify potential leads and secure valuable new prospects for the charity. This involved:
• LinkedIn updates to promote the charity’s expertise and the benefits of hiring apprentices.
• Email outreach to build wider awareness.
• LinkedIn outreach to connect directly with priority leads.
• Telesales calls to start a conversation with priority leads.
• Exploring local network connections to deepen the charity’s relationship with local businesses.

How did we do?
Across 40 hours of activity, we generated 49 new opportunities for this charity. We should point out that ‘hit’ or ‘success’ rates for this type of work can vary a lot, but that’s a particularly impressive result. After communicating our client’s winning proposition, many of the targeted companies responded asking for more information, which shows the power of a clear, compelling message.

Another interesting takeaway: in this case, we found that LinkedIn messaging generated a higher volume of opportunities, yet the telesales calls generated higher-quality opportunities. This analysis will be useful for future campaigns.

Struggling to find time to build and maintain your sales pipeline? We can do the heavy lifting for you. Chat to OCTOPUS about creating a robust pipeline of quality sales leads.