“There is a difference between no lead and no interest in the market.” You have to understand the thing from the customer’s point of view.
I am listing a few of the points which feel there is a huge gap
The phone doesn’t ring. But you keep looking at it in faith.
You keep checking things that don’t help.
Your Team has nothing to do.
Your Old client becomes your only lifeline.
You panic and try random things.
You start doubting the decision itself of starting the business.
If this is your situation, then you are not the only one who faces this situation its irony of every study abroad consultant who start their business without understanding the external factors.
When you don’t know what to aim for, where will you take the shot? Don’t blame yourself for the situation you are in right now; I have been there at that place. So I can tell you what the situation was and how to improve it.
Let’s be honest, there are 3 major situations
Nobody wants this ( Demand Problem)
Nobody’s finding us (Visibility Problem)
They find us, but we lose them (Conversion Problem)
If you are able to label the situation correctly, you can find the solution for it as well.
Let’s understand the case one by one.
- Nobody wants this ( Demand Problem):-
Let’s understand first what is Demand in the business.
Its a market-driven influence on the availability of goods and the production and service of goods with consumer interest and their buying ability.
There are three types of Demand which majorly contribute to your business success.
Declining Demand :- If your customer is showing less interest in your product or service. lose interest in your product/ service or choosing competitors over your business, then your business is in the declining stage of demand.
Excessive Demand:- If the customer is demanding more than you can serve in your business, then this scenario will come under excessive demand.
Irregular Demand:- If the sales are uneven due to a lot of factors like natural calamities or seasonal effects on your product. Then this will lead to irregular demand.
There are multiple factors which are contributing to the demand of your business.
Price of Product / Service:- The price of your product or service will decide its demand of it.
Buyers’ Income:- The demand directly depends upon the paying capacity of buyers who are interested in the product.
Consumer Preference:- Consumers will decide the preference for their product, which will eventually increase the demand for the product.
Consumer expectation for Price Change:- There is a sudden change in the price range if your consumer thinks there will be a price change.
- Nobody’s finding us ( Visibility Problem):-
In a business, there is no problem as trust its Visiblity problem with most of the business. So if you are facing a trust issue with customers.
There are two types of visibility issues
Market & Brand Visibility.
Internal & Operational Visibility.
Market & brand visibility- if your website or a local listing is missing, then you have a visibility issue for the business. This will lead to your attention being grabbed from the business. As all of us are living the era of the internet, we have a shorter attention span.
Internal & Operational Visibility- If your business is not have a single dashboard that will provide you with a clear picture of people’s performance, Sales, marketing, and other heads at one go, which will give you a detailed picture of where your business is going.
But in general, it boils down to the 3 major segments.
Product Visibility- The company that is not visible on the internet to prospective customers, be it on a website, social media, or any other platform, which would give visibility from a product perspective.
People Visibility- When we talked about people Visibility its more about the founder or team who will represent the brand or product. Are they creating anything online to promote the product? Because in today’s world, people are buying mostly from personal brands. So company who are driving their sales with a personal brand will have more chances of success compared to those that are not.
Commercial Visibility- It’s about the companies that are merely focusing on revenue but not the pipeline of the Product/service. As a founder, we only focus on the sales but neglect the Marketing efforts, product demo, refusal rate etc… this all factors should be considered to make it commercially viable from all angles.
- They find us, but we lose them ( Conversion Problem)- If the visitor or prospect find you with your social connections or website but they dont buy from you that means they are simply giving you the below reasons why they are not buying from you.
Trust issue- they are not sure whether or not you will deliver your promise.
Clear Positioning- What you trying to say vs what is being told is huge difference.
Not Fit for each other- In some cases everything is perfect but you and your customer are simply not right fit for each other. As your product is simply not aligned with what you are tying to solve a problem.
When you are running any business and aware that there is issue in the business while growing it. As we know, there are lot of problem occurs it could be few of which I have listed below.
The most consultant are thinking about the problems in the wrong way.
Channel First thinking than Diagnose first approach- Here the consultant is alway prone about the thinking should i do about Meta ads or Google ads or offline campaign but rather they dont talk about that people in near by area dont know they exits as a consultancy . Because the channels are mere the distribution partner than the demand generation one.
Source quality of lead Vs Source Volume- Every consultant want more of the leads while scaling their campaign but no one want to understand more about the source of the lead and quality of the lead. If we really understood the problem its always not about the volume of the leads but how many we convert it and which source its giving us the maximum results.
Lead Sources are merely ask to do a conversion Job. As a consultant, you are most worried about the conversion of leads but while doing it we tend to focus on the sources which are more effective but need more effort in the first few months where in later days you can get the more cost-effective conversions from them.
If we summerize this above situation in a nutshell, it would be considered an awareness problem.
Demand Problem- There is a demand problem where your consultancy is operating as they are not aware of your existence. This will be driving you to the local / Regional leads.
Distribution Problem- Your message and offer is good but not reaching it to the right audience. You need to find the right channel to distribute the content, offer, and message.
Conversion Problem- You are getting the leads but not getting the conversion, which means it is a conversion problem for you in your journey.
Now you understand the problem and solution for the Lead sources for your study abroad consultancy business.
Now i want to share the complete roadmap of the lead source journey.
Search-Based Leads ( High Intent):- This are the leads are usually high in intent as they have already decided to go abroad for their study purpose. Most of the platform are like
Google Ads
Organic SEO
GMB – Google My Business
Bing Ads
Youtube Ads
Play Store / App Store ads.
2. Local Directory Based- There are multiple directory who are registering the business for you on their platform and provide you with leads from your local area. The advantage you will get from this directory is that this leads can come to your office and do the physical meeting and get it closed as early as possible. I will be sharing a few platform which provide local leads.
Justdial
Indimart
Sulekha
Collage dekho
Shiksha
- Social Proof & Comparison Content:- There is a list of posts which can help you get ranked for this keyword. Eg like
Top 10 education consultant + city
Quora Answered
Reddit Thread ( GRE / Toffel/ GMAT )
Trustpilot Review
Linkedin Posts - Paid Social – Now there are a lot of channel which can provide you with consistent leads for your social campaign. As these are paid channels, mastering any channel can provide you with a more predictable and scalable path for getting guaranteed admission.
Meta Ads (website visitors, lookalike audience, Competitor page engagement, Video testimonial ads )
Youtube Ads
Snapchat Ads
Reddit Ads
Linkedin Ads - Referral And Word of Mouth- When you are doing the business you get the most out of your previous student who had taken the service from you and got settled now.
Incentivize the Referral
Alumina Network
School & College tie-ups
Coaching institute (IELTS, GRE, TOEFL, prep center)
Real Estate Agents/immigration lawyers.
Cross-referral from other agencies. - Webinar, Fair & Events- There are multiple levels we can generate leads through the offline events.
Webinar for the upcoming intake
Country-specific counselling fair
Industry collaboration.
Country/university specific webinar - WhatsApp & message-based- There are leads which we can generate with the help of existing campaign with the proper follow up mechanism.
Whatsapp followup
WhatsApp community and broadcast list
WhatsApp group run by coaching community. - Content to lead- this lead formats are the content based which are created by your team where they will create the content to generate the curiosity in the viewers mind and in the exchange for that we get the high intent leads.
Country-specific comparison guides.
Free profile evaluation guide
Cost Calculator ( Hostel cost, food cost, etc)
Email newsletter for promoting podcast interviews. - Offline & Traditional Event- Even in the digital era, we get a bunch of people who are consuming the other medium as well.
Hoarding & banner near coaching institute
FM Radio Ads
City-based local paper print ads
Most Aware- Now you know how to get the best leads for your consultancy business. Then its very easy to find the qualified lead you dont chase them infact they chase you. Better to focus on creating your digital presence and reviews and testimonials from students who went through you.
So you don’t have to look for more leads, but the qualified and more educated ones. And it’s your job to educate them.