B2B Prospect Lists

Mailing Lists for Hardware Stores

Direct marketing and telemarketing are core components of sales strategies focused on hardware stores. But to close deals, you need to develop great leads -- and high-response-rate business mailing lists are the right tools for the job.

A good B2B sales strategy must be flexible enough to accommodate changes in the marketplace. Just when you think you've found the perfect strategy, the market shifts, forcing you back to the drawing board.

Hardware Store

To dominate in sales to hardware stores, segmentation is a must -- and lead targeting is one of the areas in which lead lists excel.

How to Tell If You Have a Good Lead List

Quality lead lists share several characteristics that are essential in selling to hardware stores. Right out of the gate, you'll want to look for lists that are created from expansive databases. For example, Experian Business Services has a current database that contains contact information for more than 14 million active U.S. businesses. For sellers to hardware stores, a large database increases the pool of prospects that can then be sorted and filtered for specific criteria including location, business size, years in business, etc. Since lead quality has a significant influence on conversion, you'll also want to focus your efforts on providers that are well established and reputable.

Increasing Operational Speed

When skillfully applied, lead lists can increase the speed and efficiency of your sales cycle.

A shortage of hardware store contacts can impede your sales cycle. Since you can't afford to let sales, marketing and other core functions come to a standstill, you'll need to create a steady stream of contacts for the organization. Top lead list vendors are capable of producing geographically precise lead lists in a matter of minutes, further enhancing the speed of your operation.

The Role of Mailing Lists

It's a fact: lead lists give your company a competitive advantage. In many companies, lead generation is a major barrier to greater market share. When sales units are required to compile lead lists solely from phone books, online searches and other sources, lead quality suffers.

But quality, third party lead lists offer a steady stream of contacts that have been compiled from multiple sources. In most cases, the lists are updated on a regular basis so sales personnel always have the most recent and comprehensive contact information for prospecting and other sales activities.

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