Conversational Marketing

Chapter 9 Step Four: Filter Out the Noise and Target Your Best Leads

The most common objection I hear from companies when it comes to having real-time conversations with their website visitors is: “Our marketers and salespeople will end up wasting their time talking to a bunch of random people who are never going to buy.” And when you look back at the history of using messaging (also known as “live chat”) on your website, it’s easy to see why these opinions persist.

Using earlier iterations of messaging technology, companies were able to engage with website visitors in real time, but there was no way for them to fine-tune the flow of conversations. Once the conversation floodgates opened, they remained open, and for companies with high volumes of website traffic, the marketers and sales reps responsible for managing all of those conversations soon became overwhelmed. While some of the people starting those conversations were undoubtedly leads, identifying them among the sea of existing customers, free users, and random visitors, all of whom were chiming in via messaging, could feel like searching for a needle in a haystack. There was simply too much “noise” drowning out the signal.

Today, you no longer need to use messaging as a one-size-fits-all lead generation channel on your website. And you’re no longer obligated to offer it as a communication channel to every single person who drops by. Instead, after you get messaging up and running, you can evaluate how many conversations ...