Telemarketing Lead Generation Blog

Use of "Pain Probing" in Lead Generation and Nurturing Telemarketing

Posted on Jun 10, 2008 by Sharon Dahlhaus, Account Executive

Pain probing, you ask, what is that? It is an essential part of lead generation and nurturing telemarketing that helps uncover the “pains” or challenges your targeted prospects are experiencing. Pain probing is simply a line of questioning that makes the prospect think critically about their environment and the challenges they have with it.

For example,

• “How is that system working for you?”
• “What would you change about your business technology infrastructure if you could?”
• “With energy costs rising, how prepared are you to meet your company’s power and cooling needs in the coming years?”

The questions may be very specific to the focus of the telemarketing campaign or may be more general. Regardless, the calling agents must be trained to use pain-probing questions at the right time in a conversation and to tailor them to the topic at hand.

Understanding the problems a prospect or customer is having with their environment can result in more lead opportunities. These leads may be uncovered during the initial lead generation call as a result of encouraging the contact to really think about what causes them trouble as opposed to just robotically answering a survey. After a pain is uncovered, value propositions should be delivered. Then with the realization that they don’t have to simply live with the problem, the contact may agree to speak with an expert to resolve the issues.

Alternatively, prospects that have pains but are not ready to speak with a sales representative just yet can be nurtured. When nurturing a contact with specific pains, information should be provided to them to show them how their pain can be resolved with your solution. As you continue to stay in touch with these contacts and provide them with relevant information, you will position yourself as a trusted advisor. They will understand that you will be there for them even when they are not ready to buy. Thus, when they are ready to buy, they will turn to you first, resulting in even more lead opportunities.

An additional benefit to pain probing is the understanding you gain from your prospects. This understanding can be used to perfect your value propositions for future delivery to the market place. Honing in on the real life issues in your marketing materials, shows you are in tune with the current market and gives you an advantage over a competitor with dated topics.

Thus, pain probing assists you immediately while having a qualifying conversation with a single contact, as well as, over time with a set of contacts that are not yet in the buying stage but will be eventually, and with perfecting your messaging to the larger market.

Tagged: lead generation, targeted lead generation, lead nurturing, lead nurturing telemarketing, lead generation telemarketing

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