Leads: To Buy Or Not To Buy - That Is the Question

Any fan of the movie Glengarry Glen Ross knows that lead buying in the real estate and mortgage industry is big business. There are thousands of websites designed to capture prospective customer information in hopes that the website operator can sell those leads for a profit. I should know, my company generates thousands of leads per day for a variety of advertisers including debt relief counselors, auto loan companies, payday loan and installment lenders and small business financing companies. 

Blake: You got leads. Mitch & Murray paid good money. Get their names to sell them. You can't close the leads you're given, you can't close sh*t, *you are* sh*t, hit the bricks pal, and beat it, 'cause you are going *out*.

Shelley Levene: The leads are weak.

Blake: "The leads are weak." The f*cking leads are weak? You're weak. I've been in this business fifteen years...

Some lead buyers have a bad experience their first time. They take a risk, part with a portion of their precious marketing budget and buy some leads. Then reality sets in. They start calling leads and they experience bad phone numbers, disinterested customers, bouncing email addresses, etc. Yes, there are crappy lead providers in the marketplace just like there are crappy lawyers, doctors and teachers. 

Like any other aspect of your business thay you are not expert in (accounting maybe or website design), it takes time to learn the ins and outs of something before you can make an educated decision about whether it is right for your business. Educate yourself about the lead generation business first and then go on the hunt for potential vendors can might be a fit for you.

Here is a brief tutorial about buying leads to grow your customer acquisition including important industry terms defined and the risks and rewards of different types of lead programs.

The tutorial includes tips for effective lead management, different lead pricing types, types of payment plans you can arrange with lead generators and some alphabet soup definitions of key terms like CPM, CPC and CPL.