How To Generate Leads with 23 Tried & Tested Ways

What Are Leads In Sales?

A lead in sales is a prospective sales contact, whether a person or a company, who demonstrates an interest in your product or service. 

Generally, leads are generated through a recommendation from current customers or as a direct reaction to marketing or media exposure. Normally, a company’s business division is in charge of lead generation.

Knowing how to generate leads is an essential skill for sales and business growth. It gives you a constant stream of prospects to feed your sales pipeline.

Imagine what it would feel like if every time someone visited your website or walked into your store they were ready to buy something from you right away. That is exactly what happens when you know the secrets of generating leads!

An example of lead generation in action is when an IT supplier or channel partner exhibits at a trade show in the hope of catching the attention of prospective buyers in attendance. Each request for additional supplier or partner data constitutes a lead, which may progress into a sale.

Leads in sales may contain a variety of pieces of information. It could be as simple as a person’s username and email or information about the potential customer’s role in their corporation and expected buying time frame. 

Lead generation endeavors and lead management practices can have a significant impact on a business’s marketing success. To that end, the majority of firms work to establish efficient lead generation, qualification, and distribution management.

But before you qualify them, you have to find leads. 

How To Generate Leads For Your Business – 23 Ways That Are Working Right Now

Here are 23 ways to generate leads in sales and smash your targets in 2022:

1 Conduct webinars

How do webinars create leads? The webinar is among the most effective methods for differentiating your business from its rivals.

This type of digital content enables you to reach your customers and produce new leads in a variety of ways. It allows you to build a relationship with prospects on the strength of your company’s unique competencies and technology, and the desire to offer it.

According to studies, webinars are an excellent way to gain a deeper understanding of your visitors’ motivations and how you can provide them with better bargains.

As reported by BeaconLive:

82 percent of participants will complete post-event assessment questionnaires; 55% will attend the live event, and 73% will register for a webinar following a message from a company they trust.

As a result, if you’re having difficulty producing high-quality material that produces leads, a webinar may be the ideal solution.

2 Participate in events

Events can be an excellent source of leads.

Nope, you don’t need to spend a fortune on a large event sponsorship complete with stations and freebies. 

While it is an admirable approach for a business to embrace, as an individual representative, you should focus on lead-generating techniques that are not dependent on the rest of your business.

Individuals may create leads by attending events of various sizes and meeting others in their business and market.

Also, do not be hesitant to spend for any of these activities out of pocket. In many situations, it’s more cost-effective to pay a little ticket price and walk away with a few meaningful contacts and discussions than it is to haggle with your boss about how much money you can get refunded.

When you attend these events, make a point of meeting and connecting with individuals on a social level. At smaller venues and meetups, avoid being the individual who is just there to promote your product.

Determine a succinct answer to the inquiry, “So what do you do?” that covers your potential customers and the pain issue you are addressing. Keep it brief and easy so that you can say it to anyone you encounter, perhaps leaving the door open to a sales discussion if they are in your industry.

3 Network on LinkedIn

LinkedIn is the most effective social media platform for independent salesmen wanting to create high-quality prospects on their own.

LinkedIn lead creation techniques may be as straightforward as expanding your social media platform by sending an appropriate request to members of your target audience and then initiating discussions with them.

Conduct a search for “LinkedIn Sales Navigator”, browse a profile, and send a personalized request message or LinkedIn InMail to initiate a convo.

While this internet marketing strategy is comparable to cold emailing in some aspects, you will generally need to be a little softer in your technique. Connection requests might contain a brief message, so be careful to explain why you’re requesting a connection.

If you send messages using InMail, you can use more words in your email, but you should still follow the communication recommendations above.

Follow up with those that make contact with you. Examine their social profile and inquire about pertinent company matters to determine if they are appropriate clients. However, you should avoid spamming your product presentation to everyone with whom you are associated. Simply engage in human-to-human interactions that are professionally meaningful, and people will get interested in what you are selling.

This is what individuals refer to when they talk about social media marketing on LinkedIn.

You can also get leads for your business by good old cold pitching:

4 Conduct cold prospecting outreach 

When people are referring to a sales representative as a “hunter,” they are often referring to those who are not scared to search for a new company on their own. If you’re adept in cold marketing, you’ll generate revenue.

The advantage is that so many salesmen will go to great lengths to avoid engaging in any type of cold outreach activity. Nowadays, most sales companies are set up in a way that the only individuals who market on a consistent basis are junior sales reps (often referred to as Sales or Corporate Development Reps) whose main responsibility is obtaining leads via cold outbound prospecting.

This implies that if you are ready to go the extra mile to achieve and do your own recruiting, you have the potential to be a superstar in your sales team.

How can you begin cold outbound prospecting and start generating leads?

To begin, you must identify your market and then compile a prospect list. In certain sectors, a cold email will be the dominant route for generating new business leads; in others, cold phoning will be more effective. The majority will be a mixture.

There are many solutions available to assist you in obtaining phone and email data (even if it is limited to corporate phone numbers and assumed business email addresses). 

Following that, you’ll require messaging. Construct a call script. Compose a series of chilly emails. There are far too many strategies to cover here, but after creating hundreds of cold email campaigns for businesses, an effective B2B cold email is as follows:

• Maintain relevancy
• Be succinct 
• Make it simple
• Once you’ve established your communications and list, you’ll need a method for sending emails and making phone calls. With email, managing prospecting straight from your inbox may be challenging.

You can also approach leads directly:

5 Engage directly with leads

One of your primary goals should be direct consumer contact.

FAQs addressed through live chatbots are a popular choice among most firms since they are easy to administer. Engaging in this manner may not be the most effective form of communication and engagement, though.

Customer service personnel must be available around the clock to ensure that each and every issue is correctly addressed through direct interaction, as opposed to indirect engagement, which uses chat, forum, and support centers. This enables greater word-of-mouth and produces warmer leads that are more likely to buy. This is how you generate leads from existing customers.

6 Advertise & retarget 

Advertising isn’t limited to social media platforms alone! Pay-per-click marketing on Google or Bing is a good option to sell to those who use search engines. 

It is important to know which searches are relevant to your organization as that will assist you in serving advertisements to the right people.

That said, on their initial visit to your website, just a small percentage of online users convert. In the event that a consumer clicks on one of your PPC ads, it helps to utilize display retargeting to present visual aids for your items on other prominent websites around the internet.

Digital advertising might be difficult to master, but once mastered, it could be one of the greatest and most efficient methods of generating leads for your business.

7 Ask for referrals 

The practice of seeking customer recommendations is one of the most established tactics for generating leads. If a current client shows they have enjoyed your product and service, encourage them to recommend it to their colleagues who may also be struggling with the same problem.

Clients may be willing to do this for free if the value of your company’s services is high enough, or you could build up an incentive structure to encourage them to do so. Consider offering your clients a portion of their next regular retainer cost for each new client they recommend to you.

Client referrals are an excellent source of new business leads for your company, especially since your existing customers are doing  most of the work for you.

8 Provide offers and giveaways

In a short amount of time, a giveaway or event may produce a large number of email or social media leads. How it works is as follows: 

Businesses provide a prize and in return participants refer friends, share your content, and like your social media accounts.

You may be as creative as you want with the prize/reward categories you choose, as well as the actions required to get points.

9 Optimize your website

Your website is the starting point for all of your online lead-generating activities. Getting visits to your website – whether through search engines, social media, or word of mouth – is pointless if those visitors subsequently opt to leave before completing a task or purchasing something.

Your website must be optimized in order to encourage visitors to take action – whatever it may be. If lead generation is your goal, you are generally attempting to obtain a prospect’s contact details, like their name, email account, mobile number, and other qualification that can assist you in the sale process.

What is the best way to generate leads using your website? 

While it is very simple to create a website nowadays, this does not immediately imply that your site will be effective for lead generation. 

It is necessary for all sections of your website to follow specific best practices in order to optimize the number of leads that you receive from search engines and other traffic sources. Search Engine Optimization, although it is a long-term strategy, is the most effective way to generate leads using your website. It enables you to organically attract qualified traffic to your site pages without paying for it.

10 Use both inbound and outbound marketing tactics

Despite the popularity of digital media, it is apparent that outbound marketing is still more effective than inbound marketing, according to statistics. However, this does not rule out the use of inbound marketing techniques. 

Consider deploying both techniques in a balanced way, as this will be beneficial in lead generation and, ultimately, in growing your business revenue.

When it comes to inbound marketing, customize your email correspondence and become more involved in online forums by constantly offering helpful material and answering common consumer concerns. This will assist you in establishing meaningful relationships with your consumers as well as generating additional leads.

11 Invest in lead generation tools

Sales success requires that salespeople be given as much information about their prospects as possible. This information is not always accessible when using manual data collection methods, which is where lead generation software and tools like LeadFuze come in.

The great news is that digitalization makes it simpler to have access to services and technologies that help streamline and maximize the effectiveness of lead-generating efforts. Using digital lead generation tools enables the automation of tasks that allows you to significantly scale your efforts. Your sales staff will have more lead data to work with, which helps close more sales.

On the whole, using lead generation software saves your team time that they can devote to more strategic and productive activities, like performing lead research or refining your communication strategy to reach a larger number of people.

Lead generation software ensures increased efficiency for your team by automating repetitive tasks and streamlining the process as a whole. It is the ultimate solution for smaller or overburdened teams.

12 Use Twitter to your advantage

The online platform Twitter is a great tool for socialization and content discovery. It is also a goldmine for lead generation. 

The best way to generate leads on Twitter is by registering a Twitter business profile that comes with many tools that you can use to find leads on the platform. Using tools like Followerwonk, you can also easily evaluate information about your followers, including when they will tweet so you never miss their content.

You can learn more Twitter-focused lead-generation tips here.

13 Get active on Q&A forums 

Addressing forum inquiries is a powerful way to demonstrate your industry knowledge while also laying the groundwork for future information exchanges. If done correctly, this technique may help you gain leads in a matter of seconds.

Responding to forum queries on sites such as Reddit or Quora is a great way to put this idea of persuasion into practice. Find topics or threads that are related to your company and start answering inquiries from other users. 

Make sure to add a call-to-action at the end of your responses, subtly encouraging people to utilize your service or product as a way to solve their problems. Even more subtle is sharing a resource on your website that can help users learn more about their problem and its solution. This is a great example of how to generate leads while also improving your SEO. When you have a synergy between your lead generation activities, you can expect compounding results.

14 Network constantly with sales prospects 

Although networking seldom results in immediate financial gain, it is extremely beneficial for cultivating career prospects. Make an effort to find a networking event that is both nearby and relevant to your field. This will allow you to keep your travel expenses low while still ensuring that you are taking advantage of simple business opportunities.

What can you hope to gain by participating in a networking event? 

If you come in with the expectation of getting a return on your investment, you will nearly always be frustrated. Instead, seek opportunities to win in unconventional ways.

Perhaps you’ll come upon a related firm with which you can collaborate on lead sharing, therefore increasing your reach. Perhaps you come across an influencer who agrees to conduct an interview with you that helps you to create a fantastic piece of content. This builds your authority and widens your content’s reach, both of which are beneficial for lead generation.

You may also bag a few guest blogging opportunities as a result of your networking efforts, which has benefits for SEO and your digital marketing in general. 

15 Get blogging

Blogging is an excellent way to generate leads through content creation while also improving your SEO. If you don’t yet write a company or personal blog, you can blog as a guest on other people’s websites.

Among others, guest blogging has the following strategic benefits:

• Establishes emerging business relationships
• Enhances your search engine optimization by collecting relevant, industry-related backlinks
• Attracts inbound traffic from a targeted audience

By guest writing for sites that are related to your sector but do not actually compete with you, you may generate leads for your firm. For instance, if you own a marketing firm, you may guest write for local signage firms. 

Guest posting for local personalities and companies has great benefits for local SEO in particular. For instance, guest blogging and obtaining backlinks from a prominent podcaster in your region will help your website rank higher on Google in that area.

To achieve the best results, ensure that the site for which you’re guest posting is both related to your business and geographical area.

16 Provide a satisfying customer experience for current customers

Customers who have already purchased from you may be a treasure trove for generating new sales leads. Besides ensuring that they return to buy again, by serving them well and exceeding their expectations you make it easy to spread the word for you. Give them the best experience and you will even be able to ask them to recommend your products to their friends and work colleagues.

17 Get listed in directories 

Online business directories connect organizations with service suppliers. They also function as worldwide markets. They allow service providers to share information about their business, like the services they provide, and their service regions. 

On the other hand, these directories are also used by people looking for suppliers of specific products or services. So it helps to optimize your listing and make it easy for prospects to find you and learn what you do and how they can access your products or services.

It is generally more beneficial to use industry-specific business directories to narrow your pool of possible leads to people who have a genuine interest in your products. There are directories for contractors, general suppliers and traders, and professional searches. Most of these are just a Google search away.

18 Publish press releases

With increased competition among businesses, prospects have developed an aversion to marketing communications that are relentlessly focused on brand promotion. They are only willing to believe data coming from a reputable source, one that is seen as authentic, transparent, unbiased, and truthful. Press releases fall into that category.

Newspapers, blogs, and internet news websites also fit neatly into this category. People absorb news without questioning the article author’s motives. 

While it is well known that press releases are an effective instrument for B2B lead creation, they are not a straightforward solution. Newspapers are always on the hunt for stories, but they are unwilling to pursue those that may not be of interest to their viewers. You must create engaging stories around your brand that will captivate journalists and, ultimately, newsreaders.

19 Use your expertise to answer questions on Quora

Quora is a question-and-answer-based social networking platform where millions of individuals from all walks of life post daily questions and receive answers from other users. It is a great place to get business leads.

If you respond to enough inquiries from people, they will notice your profile and, more than likely, visit your website to learn more about what you do. You can also share links to content on your website that expands on the answer that you have just given, which helps people discover your company and the solutions you offer.

20 Participate in forums 

In order to know your consumers better, forums are a great place to spend your time. You will find it easier to contact your prospects with a prospective offer if you are familiar with their needs and wants. Discuss your thoughts and share your experiences with other users, respond to their queries, and be genuinely helpful and people will respond in kind.

21 Automate repetitive tasks

Perhaps not a way to directly generate leads, but automating lead generation can enable you to generate more leads in the available time. It enables considerable time savings by automating time-consuming, repetitive, and duplicated processes. It frees up your marketing staff to focus on more critical activities which require your personalized feel and ingenuity, such as communicating with consumers and building strong connections, planning campaigns, and developing new solutions.

According to research performed by the Aberdeen Group, 90 percent of established businesses that implement automation are expected to increase advertising revenue by over 15%. This is not just due to the effectiveness of automation, but also to the money saved on labor and other resources.

One of the best ways to automate lead generation is by building a lead generation machine, which is a structure of processes and activities that are designed to work on auto-pilot, 24/7.

22 Publish helpful, informative content 

It is generally known that positioning yourself as a source of good quality, helpful content can help generate more leads. 

However, content must be educational and appealing to the audience to whom it is directed. Use SEO to research topics that your prospects are interested in and optimize your whole website. High-quality content that is targeted at the right people will continue to draw attention to your website long after it has been published. 

In order to boost the number of shares and engagement of your content, also try to incorporate photos, videos, and infographics.

23 Keep learning and timeously adapt to market changes

The digital age has fundamentally altered the way we do business. In the past, advertising your business in a newspaper or running a leaflet campaign and knocking on doors would suffice. Today, there are many more options.

With the use of various analytics technologies, you can now zero in on your intended audience and study their behaviors in greater depth. It’s a little like putting your data through an x-ray machine. You now have complete control over who you target, when you target them, and how you target them, which allows you can execute your lead-generation campaigns with incredible accuracy. 

By starting with the ultimate objective – the user, you may reverse engineer your efforts and have a better understanding of their effectiveness. But to do all this, you must stay up to date with technology and be willing to learn new things, and continually adapt to the changing business environment.

 Today Facebook may be the social media platform of choice for generating leads for sales; tomorrow it may be TikTok. So the ability to continually adapt to changing market dynamics has become a survival skill for business.

Generate More Business Leads And Smash Your Sales Targets

We’ve covered a lot of ground in this post, but there are still many more different ways to generate leads for your business. So while you now know how to generate leads and have strategies to last you a while, never stop learning. 

Learn more about your business environment, emerging technologies and digital tools, and how you can leverage them for your lead generation. More importantly, continually study your existing customers and their pain points to better understand how to identify and nurture new leads.