Episode 19 – Part 1: Improve your conversion rates and grow your sales with Simon Bath, PinLocal

The following transcript is autogenerated so may contain errors.

Matt Nally  

In this week’s episode, we’ve got Simon Bath who is the CEO of iPlace Global so thanks for coming on.

Simon Bath  

Hey, good to see you again.

Matt Nally 

Do you want to give us a bit of background as to who you are what you do?

Simon Bath 

Yeah, absolutely. So I’m the CEO at Iplace global, and one of our brands and products is a proposition called pin local, and pin local effectively manages the customer discovery for surveying, for removals and for our conveyancing channels.

Matt Nally  

Awesome, awesome. So provide leads. That’s on a paid basis or exactly that.

Simon Bath  

So hey, imagine this scenario. Matt sat on his sofa tonight gets his laptop opened in Google’s I need a surveyor in Woking. What typically would happen is that the Google results would show a number of our assets, either in the paid ads or in the organic search, Matt would click on one of those would fill in the details of his surveying requirements for his potential home move. And that those details would then pass over to us and Matt would be presented with a number of quotes from really high respected, good quality surveying firms that would then contact Matt, after the form submission to then convert that lead into a job.

Matt Nally 

Awesome. Okay, so that ties ties nicely actually into the first topic I’d like to cover which is the key to converting leads, I suppose. We have this from a general aspect. So how do you convert any lead, but obviously that could include leads through a local, for example, what in your experience is the key to converting leads and getting a higher conversion rate?

Simon Bath 

Absolutely. The number one key is to contact that home mover as soon as possible. Love the fact that somebody has taken the time to go on to a surveying comparison website means they’re in the journey. They’re not tire kickers, we’re not that bored, that we sit at home and start filling in lead gen forms for surveying. So absolutely, the key to conversion is contact that whole mover as soon as possible. Now, depending on the size of your business depends on the scale of the business, there’s certain ways that that can be achieved, that can be achieved through an automated email, that can be achieved by an SMS, we see great conversion from SMS, or that can be achieved from an old fashioned telephone call. But absolutely the number one key to lead conversion is immediate contact.

Matt Nally  

Yeah, I think that actually ties in with a few studies we’ve we’ve read, which comes down to And interestingly, I know we didn’t discuss this before the call, but we did a lead response study, I think back in 2020. So the context is everyone’s just coming out of lockdown. So perhaps they’ve had a bit more time. I think it was it was around half that responded within an hour. So the there’s, you know, if you’re if you’re then any later than the hour, then you know, you they’ve already spoken to a number of people already. And I suppose the context that as you’ve got less how you can add in the conversation?

Simon Bath 

Absolutely.

Matt Nally 

What is it for you that this makes the speed so important?

Simon Bath 

I think it’s the market has changed considerably. Across all parts of the home moving journey. Historically, we were referred our services, we will refer to our surveyor we referred our mortgage broker, we referred our conveyancer, but actually, what we see now is that behaviour has changed and the home mover feels empowered to do their own research, to understand that difference between level two or level three to understand, you know, what they need in the journey. And so they’re happy to do desktop research, we spend an inordinate amount of time on our phones on our laptops, on our iPads. And these comparison sites, such as the ones that we hosted in local are more prevalent, and I think, you know, it’s a competitive market. And the the referral partners I guess, is still going to try and win that referral. So if you’re buying leads direct from the consumer, number one is to contact them as soon as possible to have the best chance of winning that job.

Matt Nally  

Yeah, and stay and then what what can you do this from your experience? What can you say within your initial response, whether that’s via phone or email to stand out better. Because you know that say there’s for surveyors, they will get in touch it within the first 10 minutes. What can you do with it to make the quality of a response better?

Simon Bath 

Yeah, it’s really good point. And I think what we’ve seen definitely since the return from the pandemic, and from, you know, remote work, and is that immediate contact still is very important. But it’s about then scheduling a relevant time to discuss, you know, so if the, if somebody takes a phone call at work, it’s not trying to force the sale or the conversion at that point. But actually understanding Hey, is it better for me to give you a call, you know, later on when perhaps you’re home, or when you pick the kids up, or when you’ve done dinner or tomorrow morning, on your way to the office. And that builds a sense of empathy into that call, so that we’re not trying to just force that lead conversion down at the first attempt. It’s about building trust, essentially, in the brand. And if you can build that trust through empathy and understanding when the best time is to talk, we see that as a really good aspect to conversion.

Matt Nally 

Awesome. Okay. So on that point, obviously, people get up during the day they’re searching, but as you say, they could be sitting in the queue at the school gates, and they’re just filling in a form on their phone. So they’re not quite ready for a call. But equally, I suppose a lot of people might search that night after work, did you? And therefore, I suppose point out to come into my head is that automated response? I think there can be a misconception around that. IE is not personal. And no, it’s not. But it buys you that time to be able to get in touch when the customer is ready. But on that note, of all the searches you see through the system, you might not have the stats to hand but you know, how many are actually during the day, during office hours, and how many outside of that, in terms of rough split, you might not be available?

Simon Bath

Yeah, there is a there’s a strong waiting towards the evenings and strong waiting towards weekend, especially for Spain, it feels like a bit of an admin part doesn’t even feels, you know, identifying the property, the excitement of getting the property, and then you kind of got to get into there have been well, I need I need a surveyor, of course I do. I need a conveyance, you know, and then down the road, what I need to remove is gonna be don’t really get excited about those three things, they tend to be in the periods of, you know, the evenings or the weekends, there tends to be a sorry, a stronger waiting, although lead distribution across all of our assets, and our our sites would be relatively even throughout the day with slightly picking up in the evenings and weekends. And again, that leads back to that immediate contact, hey, if you have the resource, if you have the capacity, the capability, then definitely some ads of ours lead conversion attempts, will will give you great results over competitive quotes a call.

Matt Nally 

And in that automated response. From your experience, there’s better things you can put in there to buy that time. Is it worth mentioning the fear at that point without maybe not having the chance to discuss it? Or does the fee help to keep the customer warm, are there other things that you can put in there to keep that warmth and engagement ready for a phone call?

Simon Bath 

Yeah, where I’ve seen it work really well is where it’s essentially validating what was put in on the lead form, because then that, again, builds that sense of trust that, hey, if there’s a consistency of data that’s been passed through, absolutely confirm the price with a knowledge of the information that the firm has already received, they can commit to this price, again, that shows a level of transparency and consistency with the lead gen originator. So again, just about being very succinct, except that the device that that home move is typically the readout on is a mobile phone, don’t flooded with too much information, too many page scrolls, really succinct re state the data that was on the original lead gen form and absolutely have the price front and centre, they’ve come to a comparison site, because they are price sensitive. So it’s important to make sure that the price don’t hide behind that price. You know, have it have it up there have it front and centre

Matt Nally 

that actually ties in with something we discussed in our first season, the broadcasts with someone from from a marketing background, which is it’s not just the content that you put out, but the way you display it. And the layout being so important. So you mentioned about not having reams of, of content and endless scrolling. And it’s all about how you write it better, but structure it so that it feels easy to go through. And it’s more engaging than just a big block of text that no one wants to read. So yes, that’s just as important, I think.

Simon Bath

Absolutely 100% We get overloaded with email communication. And it’s important to make sure that you have that ability to stand out, Hey, you can get into the terms and conditions you can get into everything else and the point where it’s relevant, but the whole mover when they’re making that decision at that stage. don’t get to see that that level of detail.

Matt Nally 

So very good points. Actually, there’s lots of stuff you can strip out to focus on more, more key bits. And I think the final, the final part of me is what you touched on earlier, which is the SMS route, because that’s proven to have a much higher open rate, isn’t it?

Simon Bath

It really does delegate the evolution of digital comms, right? We used to be overloaded with SMS and then it kind of came out of favour, which means that now, I personally can say that every time I receive an SMS, I look at it. Because it feels strange. It’s it’s not WhatsApp. It’s not an email communication. So yeah, don’t discount SMS is a cheap and easy to use, but actually a great enabler for conversion.

Matt Nally 

Yes, it’s an interesting point. It’s a bit like getting a leaflet through the door. You don’t get the very much now so it stands out of it. Yeah.

Simon Bath 

Yeah. Yeah, it’s, like I said, I always read my SMS, it’s typically tend to be from just a few providers. But I always I never have any unread SMS as well of unread emails and WhatsApp and everything else.

Matt Nally 

Yeah, sure. I’m a bit similar. Actually, I don’t like having the unread icon on my SMS. But I don’t care on my email, it can keep going.

Simon Bath 

There’s something in that then. Definitely.