The topic of tonight’s #retechchat was Online Lead Incubation. Among other things, there was a wide range of discussion about forced registration (& lack thereof), conversion rates, and follow up strategies.

Here’s a great tweet from Jeffrey Douglas that resonated with me on the topic of conversion strategies:

@jeffreydouglass: You can choose to build something of value in the universe or you can choose to trap someone – both work #retechchat

Being the marketer (not salesman) that I am — I’m in Jeff’s camp. Even though I’m not in the business of selling houses like many of you, my marketing approach is always to reach potential clients looking for real estate websites by creating valuable resources such as this 30 day real estate blogging strategy rather than “trapping” potential clients by withholding information they want prior to making a decision about their website. This approach takes longer and results in fewer people to speak to, but the result is potential clients who qualify themselves rather than needing to to be moved from unqualified to qualified. To me, there’s value in only having to only spend 1 hour with someone rather than 6 hours. That said, conversion tactics that involve requiring contact details to access certain pieces of information can and do work.

Here is the text document that I saved for those who want to browse through the entire discussion: Download it HERE (best to use TextEdit on a Mac from what I hear).

Alternatively, you can view the discussion on TwapperKeeper under the #retechchat hashtag.

And lastly, if you’d like to vote for next week’s topic – that can be done here.