Best Practices for Internet Lead Acquisition
Ask yourself what you want to get from an online program before you start.
- What impression do we want people to have of our institution?
- Who do we want using our name and in what context do we want it to be used?
- How do we find and stop online predators from misusing our trademarked name?
- Are there any legal or accreditation requirements that need to be shared with our advertising agency and Internet media vendors?
- Do we want our lead vendors bidding in the search engines on our name or a derivative/misspelling of our name?
- Who is developing and proofing advertising copy to be used on our Internet advertising?
- Knowing the complexities and the fast moving pace of the Internet, what resources should we or our advertising partner devote to policing the Internet to ensure we are being presented properly?
- How do we attract enough interest to meet student population goals?
- Do the systems that we have in place guarantee that we follow-up on student inquiries in a consistent, timely and effective manner?
- What systems do we have in place to make sure outbound admissions calls are being handled properly?
- How do we handle inquiries from students who were responding to misleading advertisements done by 3rd party vendors?
Ask vendors questions first to avoid headaches later.
- How do they generate their leads? Have them describe in detail and walk you through their process. Test this process yourself.
- What types of traffic do they use for their sites (Search, email, display, etc)?
- Do they own all of the websites they use for generating the leads? If not, how many of the sites generating your leads are internally owned versus owned by 3rd party vendors?
- If they buy leads from 3rd party vendors, do they have the 3rd party host your actual form or is traffic passed on the back-end? Do your lead vendors have contracts in place with their affiliate networks requiring them to adhere to strict ethical and accrediting guidelines?
- Are they protecting against false financial aid offers?
- Are they avoiding promise of scholarships?
- Is there any implication of government funds or endorsement?
- Ensuring there are no implications of promised jobs or salaries?
- Are they only driving traffic through approved channels (no child sites, adult entertainment sites or job-related boards)?
- Are they preventing trademark, job/employment and financial-aid related keyword bidding?
- Do they utilize call center leads (where a call center rep submits the lead info on behalf of the prospect)? If the answer is yes, have they provided strict script instructions to call center for phone-driven leads (if applicable) to prevent violation of Title IV guidelines, financial aid discussions or incentivized promises?
- Will they pass sub-id tracking info representing their different sources to help you analyze your results?
- What are their return policies for leads?
- Are leads priced appropriately for how they convert?
Know what you are buying
- Work with lead providers you trust
- Clarify the type and quality of your lead channels; then price your leads accordingly (not all Internet leads are created equal)
- Understand your providers’ lead generation processes and systematically test them to keep up with changes
- Make sure the Internet traffic arriving at you lead vendors’ sites comes from reputable channels that do not mislead your inquiries
- Monitor that your school is presented properly
- Ensure legal agreements (IOs) clearly define:
- The type of lead, how the lead is generated, return policy, data ownership and termination of services schedules.
- Explicitly detail and include all your rules for compliance in your terms with vendors
- Compliance with all branding and accreditation guidelines
- Restrictions where ads can run (no site with objectionable content, etc.)
- If possible, explicitly list the sites or channels where leads will come from
- Include Keyword restrictions on use of your trademark names
- Reserve the right to withhold payment for leads if there is a compliance issue or violation of your key terms
Find an Internet lead management system or partner that can help you control what you accept
- Don’t waste time contacting leads that don’t meet your criteria
- Filter out bad data (missing fields, fake data, duplicates, etc.)
- Filter out leads that don’t meet your criteria (volume caps, zip codes, level of education, etc.)
- Notify providers in real-time about invalid (unacceptable) leads
- Consider 3rd party verification, data appending and/or scoring of data
Put the systems in place that ensure you contact leads immediately
- You are competing with other schools (and other marketers) for this lead’s attention
- Call within the first 5 minutes of lead submitting the form. (You are 10 times less likely to contact them after the 1st hour.) If possible, automate this process so lead goes directly to call center, outbound dialer or internal phone system on delivery.
- Send an automatic auto-responder email to every lead (monitor if these emails bounce, opt-out, report as spam, etc.)
Get credit for returns
- Vendors typically give credit for bad leads - take it!
- Providers need returns of individual leads so they can optimize their efforts
- Submit returns to vendors immediately
Track & report performance
- Track with as much granularity as possible (vendor, site, form variation, Internet traffic source, etc.)
- Make sure that providers pass additional tracking info (Sub-Ids and timestamps) for you to analyze data flow and source information.
- Reports should be updated in real-time
- Provide access to reports for your partners and vendors to help them provide you with the best possible inquiries
- Continually monitor and adjust your buys based on conversions and cost per start (be as granular as possible analyzing everything by sub-vendor and traffic channel)
- Use techniques such as adding additional questions, adjusting caps, adjusting geographical targeting by program or filtering criteria to improve the quality of poorly converting leads
- Continually review where your leads are coming from: Check placements, submit test leads and search for your school to see who’s advertising using your brand name
