The Outbound Audit: The Importance of Timing in the Lead Equation

At RevBoss, we pride ourselves on getting the right message to the right person at the right time to generate leads for our clients. 

With reliable prospecting tools, a well-defined ICP, and a clear offer/reason for reaching out, “right person” and “right message” are a cinch.

It’s the timing part that’s hard to nail down in the world of B2B outbound.

A fair few of our campaigns rely on event triggers that might indicate a current need — a fresh marketing hire, recent funding, or an upcoming merger, for example. Depending on the offer and the industry, we can sometimes rely on seasonality as a predictor of engagement, too — like with retail marketers and Black Friday.

But what if you can’t find indicators that the timing’s right? When you’re reaching out to people at the top of the funnel, it means taking a lot of shots in the dark.

We’ve started to take some of the guesswork out of timing by targeting prospects who visit our clients’ websites. In this case, inbound activity becomes the trigger, and it’s a promising one.

Prospects who have looked into you online are almost certainly trying to fix an immediate problem — making them far more likely to say yes to a meeting than someone who’s never heard of you and may or may not be encountering the pain points you solve.

Here’s an example of how this works in practice.

Traditional Cold Outreach vs. Strategically Timed Outreach

Our client — let’s call them Jenna Maroney & Co. for any 30 Rock fans out there — specializes in helping brands develop and manage influencer marketing campaigns.

Their highest performing email went to marketing titles at health, fitness, and wellness brands.

This message achieved a lead rate of 1.57% and a 3% reply rate, thanks in large part to impressive credibility and the prevalence of influencer marketing in the health and wellness space.

Metrics that high were an outlier for Jenna Maroney & Co. — until we started aiming our outreach at prospects further along the funnel.

Now we use a B2B tool to identify their website visitors and run them through a basic qualification process. The visitors that are a good fit receive the message below:

Because the prospect already has at least a surface-level awareness of Jenna Maroney & Co. from browsing their site, our follow-up to them is simple.

It doesn’t draw attention to the fact that we know they were on the website (“saw you looking” might come across a little too creepy and opportunistic), and it doesn’t overwhelm them with details.

It’s meant to be a gentle nudge, reminding them of something they were already thinking about and giving them an easy opening to ask questions and explore next steps.

For this campaign, Jenna Maroney & Co. has seen a 2.5% lead rate and a whopping 10% reply rate.

That’s the power of being able to make an educated guess about a prospect’s priorities over a wild one.

The Takeaway

It’s hard to perfectly time a cold email, and yet timing is at least one-third of the lead equation. 

To improve your odds of engagement, try adding mid-funnel outreach into your marketing mix. 

Prospects who have been to your website — even past warm leads who turned cold — are already further along in the buying process than most.

Adding them to a direct, low-pressure email campaign is a great way to line up more sales opportunities while you work on top-of-funnel brand awareness and demand generation.

Need An Honest Outbound Partner?

Our outbound email campaigns are informed by years of experience building sales pipelines for companies with a desire for steady growth. Schedule a call with us to find out how we can help you win more clients.