If you want to win the marketing game, here’s a tip: focus on closing the sale not getting the lead. One of the challenges with Internet marketing today is that sometimes it gets so many leads, most companies don’t have the resources to follow-up. So if you do have leads, you want to make the most of them, and follow them through. A B2B survey is a tool that can help you do that.

Using surveys in your lead generation process can get you quite a few benefits:

• Qualified leads
• Personalized future contact with that lead
• Correct identification of your target market’s decision makers

Also, you have the opportunity to collect important information about your product’s market and the people you’re trying to sell to. To be more precise, by using a B2B survey you can:

1. Identify the needs of your target audience

Find out what their problems are in regarding to your field of activity and propose a list of general solutions your company has, that might resolve their issues. Ask them to select the one they find more appropriate to help them overcome their challenge.

2. Effectively size your solution

After identifying what is the solution your prospect needs you have to determine the size he needs it in. You should try to find out the timeframe he or she wants the solutions to be implemented in, or the number of users his company would provide. This helps you with qualifying and prioritizing leads.

3. Collect contact information

This includes direct contact information, as well as indirect contact. You are interested in getting more personal contact information, but he’s not the only one you’re interested in. You also want to know what he reads, where he searches for information and how they research for products or services.

A useful piece of advice would be to conduct your survey online. You are guaranteed to get a higher response rate, as it takes a lot less effort to complete an online survey.

If the survey is conducted efficiently, a very important benefit is that you can use the information given to you to establish further communication with your perspective clients. Personal contact is easier, after the initial was made. You can use this opportunity to better introduce your services or products and finally close the deal. And if you don’t succeed at this, you’ve gathered important information regarding your target market, so you win either way.