Are you properly greeting your customers, in-store and online?

Once you understand who you ideal customer is in your local market, you then need to have systems in place to capture information on potential customer as they reach out to interact with you.

Lead capture is such an important aspect of your business and could be its own Masterclass.

1. What is lead capture and how does it work online and in-store.

2. Ways to capture leads online.

3. What do I do once I capture a lead?

4. The profit is in the follow up.

What is lead capture and how does it work online and in-store.

Last time, we talked about how to define and focus in on the market of potential scuba divers in your community. Lead capture is the next step of finding out who those people are.

The reality in the scuba industry is that there are people who are curious about scuba diving and interested in learning. They typically check you out online, look at your reviews, look at your schedules, your pricing, everything. Sometimes they get the answers they are looking for and proceed with contacting you, sometimes they don’t get the answers they want and they check out the next dive shop near them.

You are great at greeting customers when they walk in to your store.

• A customer walks in your store.

• You greet them, “Hello, What bring you into our dive store today?”

• They tell you they are interested in classes.

• You. say, “ I am Alex, what is your name?”

• “It’s so nice to meet you” and you continue in a dialogue about your classes and their needs.

• Before they leave, capture their Name, Email, Phone, what classes they are interested, and any other details you can remember from the visit in to your Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software, excel spreadsheet, etc (if you are thinking of using a Post it Note, we need to talk!)

You are missing the opportunity to greet your customers online. Let’s chat about how this conversation goes online.

Ways to capture leads online.

There are several ways that you can capture leads from customers who are shopping around your website.

1. Chat widget that initiates a text message conversation. (you collect name and phone number.)

2. Lead Magnet (A lead magnet is a FREE Resource or Guide and shoppers will give you their name and email address in exchange for it.)

3. Newsletter signup. (You collect an email address.)

4. Start your Scuba Diving Training for FREE now! (This generally involved creating an account for your certification agency and getting instant access to a trial of the course materials.)

Here is a sample breakdown of how you can greet your online shoppers and start a similar conversation to the one you had with the in-store customer.

• A customer comes to your website.

• You greet them with a chat widget.

• You offer them a FREE Resource or Guide. (This is called a lead magnet and they will give you their name and email address in exchange for it.)

• You deliver the FREE Resource via email and you continue the conversation with an automated Welcome Series of Email.

Your customers are shopping around online first. Please treat your online experiences with care. Your website should offer answers and next steps. You should enable conversation that doesn’t require a phone call or an email. Customers want instant answers to their questions and its your job to make the online experience seamless and informative.

If your customers need to call you to schedule a class or trip, there is room for improvement.

What do I do once I capture a lead?

Once you have contact information and a name, now what? You need to get this information off of the sticky note and into a CRM or spreadsheet in order to manage follow up and reminders. The 1st step would be to add your contact to an email list for a welcome series of emails. Below is an example of a Welcome Series. These emails can be targeted towards new customers or it can be more general for your store.

If you don’t have an email address, you will need to add reminder to call and text as a means of follow up.

(Side note: I have had great luck with physical snail mail follow ups. These can be post cards, packets of store related information. Photos with notes on the back make great post cards.)

• Welcome Series Example.

  • Welcome to my dive shop.

  • Are you new to scuba diving or look to get in to a refresher or advanced class?

  • When wads your last dive? We offer easy, group, travel.

  • We host a monthly happy hour. We want you to join us.

  • Welcome to our store. Here is a summary of what our current customers are saying about us.

The profit is in the follow up.

It can take up to 29 interactions with your dive shop before they commit to signing up for a class, trip or buying equipment.

The goal with lead capture is to absorb these potential customers into your content ecosystem and continue to reach out.

You can start with the welcome series. Continue to send them email newsletters after the welcome series ends. Invite them to join you at a dinner or dive club meeting.

Managing your leads can get away from you. I recommend a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) tool. A CRM allows you to write custom notes, schedule follow ups, and keep track of potential customers. However you keep track of the leads you capture, you need to keep following up.

and following up.

and following up.

I encourage you to take some time and evaluate where in this “hourglass” you are winning and where you may need some extra focus.

Over the next 8 weeks, I will be diving deeper into each of the above sections. I will provide examples and activities that could take place in each of the different sections.

One simple way to be thinking of about this concept in your business is to answer the following the question:

Where do I currently need more customers? Open Water? Advanced? Specialties? Travel? Equipment?

This question alone will tell you a lot about what is going well and what area you need more focus. Please reply to this email and share with me the answer.