Ep 103: Maximizing Growth: Strategic Solutions for Handling Overflowing Leads with Hayley Denker

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Ever wondered what to do when your business is booming too much? Imagine facing an overwhelming influx of leads and not knowing how to manage them without turning off your lead generation. Join us as we tap into the wisdom of Haley Denker, a strategic marketing ace from Boston, who sheds light on how to maintain growth without halting your marketing efforts. Through her playful and metaphor-rich approach, Haley makes complicated marketing strategies easy to understand and implement.

Discover creative solutions for handling overflowing leads when your service capacity hits its limit. Haley shares her insights on providing potential clients with valuable resources and self-guided programs to keep them engaged while they wait. We also discuss the critical evaluation of pricing strategies, and the importance of taking calculated risks to sustain your business momentum. Tune in to understand why nurturing your leads is more beneficial than turning off your marketing funnel.

Finally, we delve into proactive recruitment and strategic marketing for consistent business growth. Through real-world examples from various industries, we highlight the need for businesses to anticipate future demands and continuously recruit talent. Learn the advantages of focusing on more profitable projects and nurturing referral sources to secure ideal clients. Plus, get tips on optimizing operations by evaluating and potentially eliminating less profitable services. Don't forget to share, review, and subscribe to our YouTube channel for more actionable insights!

Hayley Denker Marketing
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Chapters

• 0:00 Managing Excess Leads in Marketing
• 14:55 Strategies for Handling Overflowing Leads
• 19:37 Maximizing Marketing Strategies for Growth
• 37:21 Growing Audience and Engagement Through YouTube

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:47

Welcome to Tiny Marketing. This is Sarah Noir-Block and the podcast that helps B2B service businesses do more with less. Learn mean actionable, organic marketing strategies you can implement today. No fluff, just powerful growth tactics that work. Ready to scale smarter? Hit that subscribe button and start growing your business with Tiny Marketing. Growing your business with tiny marketing hey, hey, it is Sarah Noelle Block and you're listening to episode 103 of tiny marketing.

Speaker 1: 1:22

Today, we are talking about what to do if you have too many leads. Now, some of you might be listening to this and think I wish I had too many leads, but that actually happened to a client of my guest today, haley Denker, who is a friend of mine. We were in the very first coaching program I was in when I started my business. She was in it too, so that's how we met and she was telling me about this problem that she had. She was like I had this client and they were driving up like their big goal was lead generation. They didn't want to have to worry about money, but she did her job and they had so many leads they decided to turn it off. Turn off the fountain and you'll never guess what happened, but keep listening and you will find out what happened when they turned off their lead generation and why you should 1000% not do the same. So stay tuned.

Speaker 1: 2:25

Before we get into the interview with Haley, I want to introduce you to my friends at Mouseflow SaaS and B2B marketers. Here's something to think about 79% of users will leave your site within seconds because of a bad user experience. That's a lot of lost leads, but Mouseflow can help you fix that. With Mouseflow, you can track where leads are getting stuck on your site, be it abandoned forms, confusing navigation or even broken links in key areas like your signup form or a demo request form. With MouseFlow's heatmaps and session recordings, you'll easily understand the why behind the drop-offs and optimize those user journeys to drive more meaningful conversations. Journeys to drive more meaningful conversations. Visit gomouselowcom slash. Try and sign up to get a full feature, 12-day extended trial, no credit card required. Hey, girl, hey. Tell the audience who you are and how they can find you.

Speaker 2: 3:29

Awesome. Hi, my name is Haley Denker. I run Haley Denker Marketing. We are a strategic marketing agency in Boston and we help mostly service-based industries mid-sized companies scale and expand. We're most active on Instagram at Haley Jenkins Marketing, so if you want to come and hang where we try to be playful and shake things up and talk a lot about our coffee orders over there- your branding is so cute, by the way, this is not the topic of this episode, but I love the photo shoot that you did not that long ago.

Speaker 1: 4:09

Maybe within the last six months or so, the photo shoot that you did not that long ago, maybe within the last six months or so.

Speaker 2: 4:20

It's a long time. I actually had a really hard time with our branding and I hired somebody and I just wasn't like getting there and I decided that I just wanted to be able to have the freedom to be playful. So I gave myself, I met with my team, we gave ourselves some like guidelines and stuff, like brand ideals, and then we were like, if we get sick of this font in six months, we have we give ourselves permission to change it. So just that permission helps us to be really playful. So, yeah, we did our diner photo shoot, which was awesome.

Speaker 1: 4:52

Yes, it's the cutest thing I've ever seen, and now you're. I noticed that in your copywriting too. You're playing with oh, and I got that the card in the mail. You're playing with the whole food diner theme.

Speaker 2: 5:08

Yeah, yeah, I love that kind of. I feel like I speak in metaphors all the time. I love like using a concept like a diner, and then talking about in terms of strategy I talk about a recipe all the time. I love, I love that kind of marketing. I feel like it's fun and playful. It gives us a bit of structure so that then we can run wild and then, I think, in terms of communicating, it puts things on like a level playing field, I think, as marketers or any kind of like industry expert. When you get really excited about something, you start talking as an expert and then people who don't really get it or they're not an expert they start to not understand. I love being like it's just like when you go to a baseball game, or it's just like when you I try to put it in layman's terms so that people understand.

Speaker 1: 6:11

Yeah, and it makes so much more sense. I get called out by one particular client of mine all the time, like I don't know what that means. That's what they're always telling me. I'm like, oh shoot, okay, let me backtrack a little bit and make this work for you. So I love that you preempted You're doing that already.

Speaker 2: 6:33

I get called out because I do it too much. Here's Haley and her metaphors again I have all these, but anyway.

Speaker 1: 6:42

But it makes it easier to understand. So when we were chatting on our pre-call, you were telling me about a client you have in the plumbing industry who wanted to turn off their marketing because they had too many leads and they couldn't handle it. So that's what we're digging into today. Can you just lay the foundation of what happened?

Speaker 2: 7:05

Yeah, I think so. Usually our, the clients that we work with come to us because they're looking to really grow, they're looking to open a new location, launch a new service, somehow. They're looking to really like level up, they're looking increase their service area to include five more towns. So we're used to marketing strategies that are we want to double your business, we want to really get you a lot of eyeballs on your brand, and we worked with a smaller business in a local town that didn't necessarily have those big lofty goals. They were just looking for smaller business in a local town that didn't necessarily have those big lofty goals they were just looking for I can't even remember actually what their intention was when they first reached out.

Speaker 1: 8:00

But I remember that they wanted more leads from our call, but it wasn't like an excessive amount, it was like they wanted consistency, yeah they wanted more leads and I know they wanted like a certain like brand image.

Speaker 2: 8:16

They wanted to be proud of their marketing, which I loved that. But we got them to capacity and so when they told us that they were like we literally can't take on any more business, I love hearing that because for me, growth first of all yay.

Speaker 1: 8:40

Second of all but growth opportunity.

Speaker 2: 8:44

So, okay now, what are we going to do? This is like the best place to be in. Are we going to hire? Are we going to offer a new service? Are we like what are we going to do now? And they were like, oh no, we're going to turn it off, yes, kind of what prompted our conversation, because I was like, oh, my goodness, wait, but you're good now. But this has been the result of what we did eight months ago. What happens if you turn it off in eight months?

Speaker 1: 9:18

Right, you turn off the faucet and the leaves stop coming.

Speaker 2: 9:24

Yeah, so it was. When we work with clients, we are really looking for an ongoing relationship and try to make sure that we're doing that, education that this is a partnership. This isn't something that, unless we're not a good fit, but if we're a good fit and we're getting you good results, this should be a long-term partnership, because if you get like you just said, if you get like you just said, if you turn off the faucet, it's gonna dry up. So what's the plan? Yes, what's. And when you reach your first goals, and then what's the next goal? What's the next goal? We want to partner with you in that. So, yeah, that's what we were talking about is what happens when you're, when you have too many leads. Well, let's talk about that.

Speaker 1: 10:13

Let's talk about the first thing that you brought up. What are your options for when you've brought in too many leads? You talked about new offers or hiring. Can you explore those a little bit more?

Speaker 2: 10:29

Yeah. So my very first suggestion to this company and something that we did with another company that was in a similar place was we said let's look at your recruitment marketing strategy, let's pivot and let's put our efforts into recruitment. The job market today is so different than it was even two years ago. But five years ago, 10 years ago, oh my goodness. You really can't just put up a job ad and expect that to attract as many applications as you need to get a really qualified hire. Depending on your industry, but especially these service-based industries hair salons, plumbers, electricians it can be really tough. So, looking at job descriptions, looking at your career page on your website, doing some proactive engagement and outreach, is there opportunity on your social media to start and showcase your workplace culture, because that's also great for branding. People want to hire who has a great workplace.

Speaker 2: 11:38

There are all of these places that you can turn up the dial in terms of recruitment and a lot of people with recruitment again can be similar to marketing in that you think like career pages.

Speaker 2: 11:54

For example, you have a great career page and the only call to action is apply now, but what about someone who is passively looking and thinks maybe I want to apply there someday. Or maybe you're a hairdresser and this salon says you need a year of experience but you're still in cosmetology school. Is there a way that you can engage that interested candidate that you somehow got their attention? Can you engage them in some way so that you stay top of mind when they are ready? Can you have maybe a separate email list for further nurture and engage them? There's all this opportunity in your recruitment marketing strategy. If you're at the point that you have too much business and you need to focus on hiring, there's more to do than popped into my head is having a newsletter specifically for candidates so you can nurture them for when you're hiring your next role or when they're more ready for it.

Speaker 1: 13:06

That's really smart. Funny, I have an HVAC client that I am doing a culture campaign to help them with recruiting. This summer we're launching that project but same boat they're having a really hard time recruiting just because the market is difficult. People are like this with money, luring people to different directions.

Speaker 2: 13:34

Yeah yeah, people to different directions. Yeah, yeah, I. Actually I have a lot of contacts in different recruitment agencies for various reasons and because we another service of ours is that recruitment marketing and I said most recruitment or staffing agencies prioritize those white collar positions and I, if there was like a plumber or an HVAC specific recruiter oh my gosh, yes. Or stylists, like there's a whole untapped industry here.

Speaker 1: 14:09

Yeah, the service industry is so hard to fill those spots. Yeah, so I think there's an opportunity for a new kind of recruiter for that industry. It's so hard to fill those spots.

Speaker 2: 14:16

Yeah, so I think there's an opportunity for a new kind of recruiter for that industry.

Speaker 1: 14:22

Yeah, 100%. So anybody listening, maybe that's a business you should launch. I know, I know I can pinpoint people on my email list that are recruiters and have their own business. So we're talking to you. Totally Okay, so you can increase your marketing towards recruiting and just try and hire more so you can maintain getting those extra leads and increase your money. The other option is more or varied offers. So what kind of offers would fit if you're at capacity?

Speaker 2: 15:05

It really depends on your industry, like for a plumber, for example. That can be really difficult because usually you meet someone, like in an emergency case, but I think it's. I think the way to go about solving this problem and figuring out some kind of different offer or wait list that would work for your company is to go back to your kind of core brand values and think about what would be really of service to our client right now. How can we still serve them even if we can't service them right now? So I know, when I was still freelancing, before I launched my agency, I was at a point that I was at capacity and I had some people reaching out and it just felt terrible to not be able to help them. And while I put them on a wait list, another thing that I had in place was some of my favorite either books or podcasts or articles, so that, depending on what they were specifically reaching out about if they were really looking for social media help or email marketing I had a couple of resources to send to them to say, unfortunately, we're on a wait list. We'd be able to start whenever that would be In the meantime. I found this really helpful, just so that I felt like I was still serving them in some way. So that would be what I would encourage people to look at.

Speaker 2: 16:41

Is there something that you can create if you're a service provider? Is there a guide? Is there some kind of smaller, more passive offer? Even think about what. How can you set yourself up for future success? What would you love if your ideal client knew right now yeah, is there some kind of oh, do this pre-work while we're on a wait list so that you stretch it out?

Speaker 2: 17:10

Maybe, if you're a provider like us, is there some like onboarding work they can do self-guided? If you can't start working with them for another two months, is there a two-month kind of self-guided program they can take themselves through, so that you're still you're setting yourself and them up for success? I think there's an opportunity to be creative when you have too many leads and you just have to have that mindset of opportunity and not saying no, not turning that funnel off. That's the worst thing. So how can you nurture them? Can you put them in a different pool? But the third thing that I'll say about if you have too many leads, especially if all of your leads are converting, maybe it's time to raise your prices.

Speaker 1: 18:06

Yes, that's what my coach always says If you're at capacity, raise your prices. You're too cheap.

Speaker 2: 18:13

Yeah, I think it's an opportunity to say are there some clients that are taking up a lot of your time, that and usually those are the ones that are on your like, lowest level offering. So don't be afraid to. If you're at the point where you're at capacity, don't be afraid to shake things up a little bit, because again, it's that like stagnant turning things off that I think can be so detrimental.

Speaker 1: 18:37

Yeah, that's a really good point. It didn't pop into my head until you said that, but yes, my coach says that all the time. That's the sign that it's time to raise your prices. Yeah, okay, let me see. I just want to make sure that we hit all of our points how to pivot when you have too many leads. We talked about recruiting. How to prepare ahead of time so you don't have to turn off your marketing. Did we really get into that?

Speaker 2: 19:07

No, I think it's one of those what comes first, the chicken or the egg? And this is about, as a business owner, taking some risks. And I think this is when a whether it's a business coach or a marketing partner can help you look at your analytics and your trends and your capacity so that you can forecast some things. And I know for me it's always valuable to again going back to recruiting, to have some general recruitment marketing, to have some leads out there about potential fires, so that, at capacity I know I already have three girls that I've been speaking to who've been interested and working for our company I can reach out and say we're hiring and so that can be a quick transition. Don't wait until you're at capacity to say, oh, maybe we should have a career page on our website. Yeah, start caring for these things.

Speaker 2: 21:16

And, especially if you're investing in marketing, support your marketing's when you're working. If you're working with a Sarah, your marketing's going to work, you're going to get good results. Prepare for them. Prepare for those good results and say, all right, when we reach these goals, do we have the infrastructure to support them and what will the next step be? I think a lot of people are afraid to think that far in advance and to plan or to put their eggs in one basket, but slowly just start to at least have the backup plan of all right. When we start to get at this point, when we're at 80%, that's when I'm going to start posting a job on Indeed and start some recruiting.

Speaker 1: 22:09

Yeah, that is spot on the HVAC company I was telling you about. They filled up. They were booked to capacity for an entire year at the start of the year, booked in January 2024 through January 2025. Wow, and that's when we started looking at these other projects like the culture campaign to bring in more people, so it could work for them.

Speaker 2: 22:42

Yeah, I think I don't know what it is about, about I don't think it's a lack of planning, but maybe it's a belief in the results or something that things are going to work.

Speaker 1: 22:58

Yes, that's where it boils down to is like you hope for the best, but you also don't want to let yourself down or build yourself up so much that you think that you're going to be in a position you're not going to end up in and disappoint yourself. I think it really comes down to that.

Speaker 2: 23:20

And I think too I know for me personally you push a little beyond capacity and sometimes that's required, like you push a little beyond capacity as long as you know that there's going to be some relief, that there's going to be a new hire or there's going to be whatever that relief is for your company. But don't be complacent with capacity. I take a lot of inspiration from one of my clients. They're a private home care agency, my clients they're a private home care agency and their model they have caregivers who are taking care of elderly, a lot of very critically ill patients, and when a patient dies, that client is gone, and then so the company needs a new client. So they're constantly I know this sounds a little bit morbid, but they're constantly losing clients because of the nature of their job, and so you always have to be getting new. You can't say, great, we're at capacity, someone's going to pass getting new. You can't say, great, we're at capacity, someone's going to pass away tomorrow.

Speaker 2: 24:40

So it's this constant need to keep finding more, and I think there's something, there's something to learn about. That is is even for the plumbers. People are going to move away. One bad experience and they're going to go to a different plumber. Someone loses their job. There's all these different reasons why you might lose a client and you have to build that into your plan. So you're always looking for more business.

Speaker 1: 25:13

Yeah, you never know and you can do the math. You were saying forecasting. You could also forecast retention, based off of your past experience. So you know what your pipeline needs to look like. It's not a sweet mystery. It doesn't change that much, right? Okay, let me see. The last thing that we had on our list was other marketing goals to prioritize. When leads is no longer your number one, would you say. Recruiting is probably top of that list.

Speaker 2: 25:47

Yep, I would say recruiting. And then another thing that we've done with a lot of our clients that's been really great in that same line of increasing your prices is looking at an opportunity for what kind of projects do you want more? So, if you're using the plumber example, if you're getting a lot of clogged toilet business and you're looking for more, we want to do complete basement renovations. On nurturing referral sources, so, are there interior designers? Are there general contractors that are really high end and work in the neighborhoods you want to work in? How can start to create some content and partnerships and campaigns.

Speaker 2: 26:37

That's nurturing those kinds of relationships, that's getting their attention. It's going to be a different strategy than if you're trying to directly reach a potential client. Trying to get the attention of a referral source is a great kind of marketing pivot and can work with a lot of industries, because then you'll start to get more of the kind of projects that you really want to get. And in the future, once you've hired because once you've hired you're now looking to fill a lot more yeah, you're getting more easy referrals from this referral partner. That can just send you more of the ideal clients. So that's another pivot that I think is often overlooked.

Speaker 1: 27:23

Yeah, that is a really good point. I in the B2B service space. It's so heavy in referrals that that's where I start is building relationships with potential referral partners and collaborations and then going, just starting with the borrowing other people's audiences and then expanding out for new ones. But that makes so much sense in that B2C service space too. Another thing to look at is which one of your offers is the most profitable and is there anything that you should be eliminating? Look and see, is any of your offer that's selling really, really well? Also like not bringing in that much money Because I found that happens too.

Speaker 2: 28:16

Yeah, it's a really great place to be in. Of the, I have too many leads. It's a really good opportunity to, like, you're saying, do an audit and say now, at this point, so now we can be. One of my mentors said what is it? You start off as a market taker and then you turn into a market maker, meaning that in the beginning, you're taking all of the opportunities that are being put in front of you because you're trying to, like, really build, and then you get to a point where you get to pick and choose and you get to really decide and create the market that you want. Yeah, rather than turn things off, it's a really good, to your point opportunity to pause, audit, strategize and see where you want to go next.

Speaker 1: 29:06

Yeah, yeah, I love that. Is there anything that you want to leave the audience with Any final thoughts?

Speaker 2: 29:15

I guess the only other point, one thing that I would really look at, is see if you can pay attention to your client journey at this point too. How long does it take from someone who is just aware of you to when they're first booking their service? Because I think people assume all right, we're going to turn it off because we're busy right now. But what you're turning off right now might be your results in three months, might be your results in six months. And what if you hire someone and then need that business?

Speaker 2: 29:49

So what is your customer acquisition cycle like? And if you slow down your marketing now and that means your results will dip in six months, is that okay with you? I would pay attention to that too, because I think a lot of people forget and think that it's immediate. Oh, we're not going to post this month on social because we're so busy, but that has nothing to do with what you're actually seeing in business. So I would be realistic about how long it takes so that you can make a really informed decision about where to pull back and where to put your attention.

Speaker 1: 30:29

Yeah, you have to be super conscious of that. I know like in the B2C service space it's shorter because it's usually some sort of emergency that has sparked the call. In the B2B space it can be years. I've had people on my list for years and then they're fine, like I'm at a place where I can hire now, and then they approach me about it. But there was a long. There was a long relationship building process.

Speaker 2: 31:01

Yeah, it's another opportunity to to see what we think about what's working and what doesn't work. You might think someone that's been on your list. Oh then my list isn't working, it's not converting. But if it just takes a long, a little bit longer you're, then you can't judge between. If you send out one email, no one book, that doesn't really mean anything for your cycle.

Speaker 1: 31:27

No, Someone I met in 2019 is finally like hey, I've been following you, I love everything that you're doing and I can finally work with you. Yeah, I love that. It's been a long time.

Speaker 2: 31:40

Yeah, but that's such a testament to really good marketing and branding and your messaging has stayed consistent and on point and really speaking to this person, throughout you haven't alienated them at any point because they weren't ready. I think that that's such a great testament to successful nurturing.

Speaker 1: 32:00

Yeah, kudos to you. I love that story. You don't have time not to be. If you want to retain the audience that you have and build a new audience, you have to stay on top of it. And it doesn't have to take a ton of time. I spend about four hours a week on my marketing. That's it.

Speaker 2: 32:38

We talk a lot about marketing for impact because, to your point, a lot of people are like looking at their likes and their comments and thinking that's it. And I said one great case study was our, our hair salon client. They, their engagement, was decent, was okay, it wasn't anything we were super excited about, but we would consistently hear that every time a client would come into the salon, they would bring up a post. Oh, I saw that. Well, they were constantly talking about it and I said the fact that what we're doing on social is translating to conversations in real life, that's it, that's the magic. They're talking about that product and buying it. That's what we want. We want that over a, we want that over a cool comment.

Speaker 2: 33:39

Yeah, and I find that myself too, my social will go through ebbs and flows of being like really interactive and then sometimes not as interactive. But then when I see people in real life or I'll meet people or I'll be at an event and someone I don't know is, oh my gosh, I know you and it's just the best feeling to know that it's translating to real life and people are like taking your messages to heart and that's, it's intangible. It's not really being seen, but that kind of feedback is just better than anything as a marketer.

Speaker 1: 34:16

Yeah, and I'm with you. I have said for years the money's in the lurkers. I have never had anyone who engages with my content work with me one-on-one. It is always the people who talk about my content on a call later or DM me that is actually paying Like they're reading but they're not engaging, not the people who typically buy.

Speaker 2: 34:43

I am writing that one down. The money is in the lurkers. I'm going to quote you Really good.

Speaker 1: 34:51

Yeah. Engagement While it looks nice, it's great vanity, it doesn't equal money. Yeah.

Speaker 2: 34:59

Awesome point.

Speaker 1: 35:01

All right, we will wrap it up right here, because my people love short episodes and they're like keep it under 30. Fine, I will. How can people work with you so?

Speaker 2: 35:18

we actually are launching a just launched a new service which essentially has been our onboarding for our retainer clients. So we work with our retainer clients, where we're effectively your entire marketing department. So if you're ready to like offload everything, we can help you there. But if you're really just looking for some strategic support, we're now offering our three-month onboarding as a brand positioning package. So we do everything from social listening, competitor research, client interviews, client surveys. We do a big collaborative workshop with you to go over your voice, your tone, your ideal client personas and then we end up with this like 30 page brand strategy that we hand over to you. That will help you make decisions. If you're going to have, if you're going to hire a social media manager or you need a copywriter or graphic design, you have this brand Bible to give out and to help you make all of your marketing decisions. So we're super excited about that and you can find all of our information at HaleyDenkerMarketingcom.

Speaker 1: 36:39

Awesome, and the links will be in the show notes so people can just go boop, boop and click.

Speaker 2: 36:46

Thank, you for joining me.

Speaker 1: 36:48

You're welcome. Before you go, I want to give you a big fat thank you, because tiny marketing is not as tiny as it used to be and I know it has to do with you. Ever since I started asking you to share episodes with friends, it has just grown and grown and I love you so much and appreciate you. And thank you for sharing tiny marketing with your friends and your colleagues. You're amazing. Now, for everybody else who isn't doing that, share, share with your friends and write a review, subscribe, follow and, if you didn't know it, we also have episodes on YouTube this season so you can watch the interview video footage also. So go subscribe to the YouTube channel too.

Speaker 1: 37:43

I just hit my hand on the desk, but maybe editing has canceled that out, and I will put the link right down in the show notes so you can just boop, boop, boop, click a link and follow me on YouTube. All right, I will see you next week. You love all things tiny marketing. Head down to the show notes page and sign up for the wait list to join tiny marketing. Head down to the show notes page and sign up for the wait list to join the tiny marketing club, where you get to work one-on-one with me with trainings, feedback and pop-up coaching that will help you scale your marketing as a B2B service business. So I'll see you over in the club.