Stacks of Business Cards? Turn them into Business

Attending a meeting with the purpose of meeting leads that will turn into business? At the end of a productive conversation you will likely exchange business cards and at the end of a day at a good meeting you will have a stack of business cards to turn into contacts in your Sage ACT! database.

Now we will walk you through the best way to turn those cards into leads you can track easily in Sage ACT!

The process looks like this:

1. Collect the cards
2. Capture the information on those cards
3. Manipulate the data
4. Get that info into Sage ACT!
5. Send a "Thanks" email to everyone you met that day
6. Go out for dinner

Once you have your cards collected you need to transfer the data from the cards into a format you can use in ACT!  You have abundant options that all include some form of scanner.  While we highlight only a few here you can call us if you need to know more.  If you would like to avoid working with a spreadsheet as an intermediary you might try WorldCard Pro (updated link 11/16/2012), which will scan directly into Sage ACT!  After a lead hands you their card you simply scan it directly into ACT! with the scanner and skip to Step 5.

Other scanners will give you a neat list you can save into a spreadsheet, which is also the way you would get data from card swipes you may have rented at a larger event. Here we will show you how to manipulate that data to expedite the process of communicating effectively with those leads before they have returned to their hotel room.

On your list of scanned leads you will want to add a couple columns to import into existing fields in your Sage ACT! database.  In this example we will add the Referred by field and the  ID/Status fields as columns on our spreadsheet.

Put in the values that represent your actual situation.  Here we use our event name "ConnectionSphere 2011" as the referral source and "Lead" as the status.  On your laptop you may simply import this list directly into Sage ACT! from either MS Excel (Sage ACT! 2011 or higher) or a CSV file format.  From the File menu, select Import... and use the Sage ACT! wizard to speed the process along.

Once your contacts are imported you can do a quick lookup by Referred by Equals ConnectionSphere 2011 to retrieve your list:

Now all you do is kick off a quick email blast with a template you created in advance.  We like Sage E-marketing for ACT! because it is built right in and can create a "Call List" within your ACT! database.  Send your email to the Current Lookup and your new leads will be impressed with your attentiveness when they get back to their hotel and see your email waiting for them.

Now... where are we off to for dinner?

For more information on automating your lead collection and communication processes, don't hesitate to give us a call.

Bevan Wistar, ACC

Zip City

503-381-5654