Scaling a Lead Gen Agency – In Just 7 Minutes with Deepak Shukla

Resources/Links:

• Visit Peal Lemon Leads’ Website: https://pearllemonleads.com/

Summary

Deepak Shukla’s the Founder of The Pearl Lemon Group. He bootstrapped the company from $0-20k per month in less than 6 months! He attributes much of the growth of the company to various lead generation activities. Deepak’s passionate about not only implementing lead generation campaigns for clients but also empowering them by teaching them how to generate qualified leads.

In this episode, Deepak shares how he takes care of lead generation needs so that your team can focus on what they do best and focus on scaling.

Check out these episode highlights:

• 01:29 – Deepak’s ideal client: My ideal client is a company that’s got 2000 pounds plus to spend, has a developed sales team that can regularly, actually, close the leads that we bring in.
• 02:04 – Problem he helps solve: Getting actually quality leads that actually booked into their calendar for an appointment.
• 02:55 – Typical symptoms people experience when trying to solve that problem: No shows, number one, for an appointment. Number two is the company or the lead doesn’t know what the actual business actually does. Number three is that the leaders is S-H-I-T, it’s a freelancer or an outsourcer, or someone’s trying to sell them something. Issue number four is the lag time between when a company says I’ll deliver you need and then it takes three and a half weeks before a lead comes in. And the number four is very poor communication, in that, a lot of agencies have a lack of transparency as to how they actually generate leads, and that leads to a lack of trust.
• 03:24 – Common mistakes that people make when trying to solve that problem: Not having a funnel to put people into..
• 04:59 – Deepak’s Valuable Free Action(VFA): To improve the quality of leads, use LinkedIn Boolean Search within Sales Navigator..
• 06:44 – Deepak’s Valuable Free Resource(VFR):Visit Peal Lemon Leads’ Website: https://pearllemonleads.com/
• 07:38 – Q: “What’s the one unique thing that you do, Deepak, those other agencies don’t?” A: Use voice notes, and video. If I’m doing lead generation for myself, close a ton more, if I follow up with a voice note after automation say, ‘Hey, Travis, what’s up dude?’ I just thought I’d pop you a little voice note on LinkedIn to say hello.

Tweetable Takeaways from this Episode:

“To improve the quality of leads, use LinkedIn Boolean Search within Sales Navigator.” -@deepakpshukla1 Share on X

Info about our correspondent host:Travis has a background in sales, marketing, and strategy, and left the corporate world several years ago to start his own agency. As a copywriter by trade, his biggest skill is putting the right words, in front of the right people, at the right time. Travis has developed go-to-market strategies for grassroots apps to Fortune 500 and helped optimize up to $50k per day in Facebook Ad spend for one of the biggest startups in Asia.

Transcript
(Note, this was transcribed using a transcription software and may not reflect the exact words used in the podcast)

Travis Bennett: 0:09
Hi everyone and welcome to another episode of Marketing The Invisible. My name is Travis Bennett and I’m rocking it to you out of Yangon in Myanmar, proving you really can be anywhere in the world and build a successful business. I’m joined today by Deepak Shukla. Deepak, a very, very warm welcome.

Deepak Shukla 0:24
Hey, thank you for inviting me on and happy to be here and excited to talk about lead generation.

Travis Bennett: 0:29
Awesome. Awesome. Where are you hanging out today?

Deepak Shukla 0:31
You know, well, I’m in a place called Costa Coffee in Berlin, London, testing out this app that I downloaded with Appsumo that apparently kills background noise. And you can hear me at the moment which is great, but that’s where I am.

Travis Bennett: 0:46
All right. If it doesn’t work, we can give nowhere a kick up the butt afterwards, right?

Deepak Shukla 0:49
Exactly, exactly.

Travis Bennett: 0:51
Yup. So, for those of you who don’t know Deepak, he started the Pearl Lemon Group, and he’s bootstrapped his newest company which is the lead generation arm of that into 20k per month, in under six months. Most of that burning from his ability to generate new leads to the business. He’s passionate about getting new leads and creating the campaigns for clients to do that, but also teaching other people into how to get these leads themselves. So, the title today is “How to Scale a Lead Gen Agency”, and Deepak is going to explain everything in just seven minutes. I’m going to start the timer and we’re going to jump right into question number one, who is your ideal client?

Deepak Shukla: 1:29

My ideal client is a company that’s got 2000 pounds plus to spend, has a developed sales team that can regularly, actually, close the leads that we bring in

and is very receptive with feedback loops as to how a call went, what was an issue with targeting and an industry I’m agnostic on. But as long as they can close leads and they can provide regular feedback, and they’ve got a budget and they accept that the best lead comes after the six to eight-week period, then I’m happy. That’s the client I’m after.

Travis Bennett: 2:04
Cool. So, then what’s the problem that you’re solving for these clients?

Deepak Shukla: 2:08

Getting actually quality leads that actually booked into their calendar for an appointment.

A lot of people are funny with what a lead is. A lead isn’t someone who says, maybe, not sure, or I’m interested. A lead is someone who books in for a meeting, and understands what the company does, and has a general need for their service. But maybe picking a provider, exploring it more broadly, and going through a tender process, or something of that ilk is what I consider a lead to be. And that’s a big problem that companies face that they get poor quality or an inconsistent kind of lead that comes through.

Travis Bennett: 2:42
Okay, and that kind of lead into the next question. We’ve got five minutes 30 on the clock, so we’re doing really good. What’re the symptoms people experienced when they start facing your problem? You said they’re not classifying the leads properly; they don’t know how to manage it.

Deepak Shukla: 2:55
Yes.

So, problems typically are no shows, number one, for an appointment. Number two is the company or the lead doesn’t know what the actual business actually does. Number three is that the leaders is S-H-I-T, it’s a freelancer or an outsourcer, or someone’s trying to sell them something. Issue number four is the lag time between when a company says I’ll deliver you need and then it takes three and a half weeks before a lead comes in. And the number four is very poor communication, in that a lot of agencies have a lack of transparency as to how they actually generate leads, and that leads to a lack of trust.

Travis Bennett: 3:31
Okay. So then when they start trying to get these leads coming in, what are the common mistakes that people most, what do they typically make? What are people doing wrong when they start trying to bring leads in?

Deepak Shukla: 3:42

When you bring in leads, I think the common mistake is not having a funnel to put people into.

So, one thing would be to make sure you have a confirmation email. Make sure they have an SMS reminder, make sure that you have a sequence that involves them learning a little bit about the person they’re going to be speaking to. That will reduce the amount of no shows, differentiate you, and leads for, or make for a better sale. That’s a big part for processes, post-booking an appointment. People forget, people don’t turn up, people have only one touchpoint. And then a second big one, I think it’s a mistake, is when you do targeting, a lot of people lie on LinkedIn Sales Nav. So, don’t just rely on LinkedIn Sales Nav, like people will put like they have 15 employees when really, it’s three of them. And then seven freelancers or just seven dot accounts. So, use a third-party source as well to track companies perhaps by revenue. And that’s another thing that we do that gets rid of a lot of garbage.

Travis Bennett: 4:43
Okay, so then question five, building on the device which you’ve already given, which is really powerful. What’s something else that you can tell the people listening as to how can they improve the quality of leads that they’ve got coming in. We’ve got three minutes on the clock, so we’re doing really well.

Deepak Shukla: 4:59
Okay, brilliant.

So, to improve the quality of leads, use LinkedIn Boolean Search within Sales Navigator.

So, one of the things that I might do is I might target, so I went to a University of Warwick, which is Ivy League in the UK, so I might run searches based on other Ivy League Universities of Warwick. Plus, I’ll run a filter based upon personality type. People that are disruptors, innovators, or consider themselves entrepreneurs, can list things like that in their profile. So, you can run keyword searches based upon personality type, or the presence of a keyword in combination with your job title. That’s how we’ve been able to book appointments with the train line or with buy VP’s at GoDaddy for big companies, simply because of that kind of in makes it feel like you’ve got a little bit of a connection. That’s number one. Number two is that you should connect channels. So, build out a sequence. So, when I say that you can also visit someone on LinkedIn, then you can send them a LinkedIn connection request, then you can send them a sequence, then you can email them after. And it’s not that hard to do. People think that that sounds complicated, but guys, you know of automation tools, use it if you want to. Export the damn email and put them into a follow-up funnel-like, you know, 10 days later, and you’ll generate 10% more leads just by virtue of getting them on two platforms. So that’d be the other thing that people often don’t do. They stick one channel, the only channel.

Travis Bennett:6:27
Okay, that’s right. It’s very good advice. Building on that, do you have a free resource that you can direct people to that maybe they can learn a little bit more about what you’re doing and they could get further help with the problems they’re facing? Maybe on your landing page or something like that, they’ve got something they can check out?

Deepak Shukla: 6:44
Yeah, I believe so. On Pearl Lemon Leads, if you go on to the site.

Travis Bennett: 6:49
Yeah, pearllemonleads.com. Yup.

Deepak Shukla: 6:51
Yep. Exactly. Pearllemonleads.com, there will be a pop up that appears and you can, on there, get access to our actual lead generation force, as to how you can generate leads. I’m saying, it’s, yeah. Yeah. So, I’m saying basically is go to the website and you’ll see a pop up appears, get our lead generate. And it’s a 14-day email campaign that talks you through how you can ultimately start generating leads.

Travis Bennett: 7:16
Perfect. So, if anyone looking for more advice, and more help on this, pearllemonleads.com. Sign up on the pop up and they can get 14 days of emails and support to get started, which is really cool. So, we’ve got 30 seconds left, we’ve done perfectly on this interview today. What’s the one question that I should have asked you, that I didn’t, that you think could help out our audience?

Deepak Shukla: 7:38

What’s the one unique thing that you do, Deepak, that other agencies don’t? So, the answer to that question would be that guys, you know, use voice notes, and video.

If I’m doing lead generation for myself, close a ton more, if I follow up with a voice note after automation say, ‘Hey, Travis, what’s up dude? I just thought I’d pop you a little voice note on LinkedIn to say hello. Listen, your company looks really interesting. I will admit that you are part of an outreach campaign. But hey, heyhoo, who cares? That’s fine. I still love to do business with you and have a chat with you. Let me know if you’re free next week. Let’s catch up.’ Authentic, no bullshit email like that, when people know, especially if you’re marketing a marketer. That automation campaign has got me far further than trying to do something that seems a bit disingenuous. So, know your audience and also change the medium.

Travis Bennett: 8:33
Perfect. Perfect. And that’s seven minutes. Deepak, thank you so much for your time today.

Deepak Shukla: 8:37
Thank you. Thank you. It’s really good. It’s been a whirlwind.

Travis Bennett: 8:39
Thanks everyone for listening. Cheers guys.

Tom Poland: 8:42
Thanks for checking out our Marketing The Invisible podcast. If you like what we’re doing here please head over to iTunes to subscribe, rate us, and leave us a review. It’s very much appreciated. And if you want to generate five fresh leads in just five hours then check out www.fivehourchallenge.com.