Businesses rely on different innovative strategies to promote and market their products and services. And one of the most common methods is lead generation, which helps drive traffic to a particular company’s website or social media profiles.
Unfortunately, getting a lot of traffic is not enough if most of them won’t turn into profitable clients. This means all your lead generation efforts were a total waste.
Your company’s goal should be about generating lots of traffic and converting those traffic into leads.
Now, the question is: “Are you happy with the leads and customers you attract to your brand?”
If you think you need more to increase business revenue, it’s about time to learn how to improve lead generation for your company.
What Is Lead Generation?
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Before we get to the bottom of things, let’s define lead generation first.
Lead generation is basically the process of attracting strangers and converting them into leads. It’s the way brands. You will be capturing their interest until they are ready to make the purchase.
This technique is useful for both B2B and B2C companies.
10 Ingenious Ways to Improve Lead Generation
With the following methods, you can boost your lead generation efforts and start obtaining high-quality targeted traffic that converts.
Make Social Buttons Visible
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SMM or Social Media Marketing is one of the most effective ways of generating traffic and leads. According to Business2Community, 47% of marketers get new marketers on Facebook.
As you already know, Facebook is not the only social media platform available. So, imagine if you’re going to market on all social media sites.
Additionally, you can take advantage of this method by putting social buttons in different strategic places on your website. That way, people would be encouraged to engage, share, and like your brand.
With these social buttons, you can turn regular visitors into social media ambassadors. This also means that your content would be a viral lead generating machine.
Add a Limit to Your Offers
People tend to take things for granted, especially if they are readily available or in massive amounts. You should be offering a freebie that is not available anywhere else because visitors are attracted to scarce things.
Getting something that others can’t have or don’t have would give them a sense of pride and satisfaction.
You can do this by promoting One Time Offers or Limited Time Exclusive Offers with your lead generation efforts. Once you do that, you can sit back and watch your target audience sign up and grab your offer.
These offers can be given once a month and in a limited time. Through this, your target market would only have a short amount of time to grab the opportunity.
Your “freemium” offer should expire after a specific period. And once it expires, it will automatically become available as a regular “for sale” product. Make sure that these conditions are clear to your audience.
Since your offers are available for a limited time, your site visitors are less likely to resist them. They will ensure that they can sign up and claim it before time runs out.
Offer Limited Edition White Papers and eBooks
White papers and eBooks are typical lead magnets for the past years. But, how are you going to use these to your advantage if others are using this strategy?
Well, as we mentioned earlier, your offer should have an element of scarcity. There’s a lot of free stuff available online and if your offer is similar to what others have, people won’t be interested in getting it.
Therefore, you should be creative with your offers. You can add some exciting twists to your white papers and eBooks.
You can use existing premium content in the form of white papers or eBooks, specifically those that have already obtained a considerable following or readership. Start offering those for free for a limited time.
Or you can make those premium items available for limited downloads. Just make sure that you can clearly show how many download opportunities are left for your target audience.
Conduct Contests to Promote Your Business
(Image Source: Wishpond Blog)
This strategy has been used for quite a long time already. Despite being a sort of old school method, it’s considered effective.
Let’s face it: people love joining contests. Whether it’s because of the prize they can possibly get or just for the sheer fun of competing.
You can integrate this with some of your lead generation efforts, like your sign-up or survey forms. That way, they will be enticed to sign up to join the contest.
Your prizes can be premium items from your brand. To make them even more excited, explain well what’s in it for them and tell them how special the prizes are.
Boost Your Blogging and Content Marketing Channels
Your content plays a significant part in generating traffic. That said, it’s logical to level up your content marketing campaigns.
Craft high-quality content and get them in front of your ideal audience. If you can successfully do that, you may notice a steady influx of leads coming your way.
Target Customers Using Videos
These days, a video can be a very powerful tool. Integrate it with your current campaign to improve lead generation. With one viral video, you can obtain valuable and highly targeted leads for your company.
Aside from your video should be informative, it should also be thought-provoking and entertaining. If you can combine entertainment and useful information, then you got winning content. As a result, your target audience won’t hesitate to sign up.
Also, you can publish video testimonials or interviews of your satisfied clients. According to Bravo, video testimonials can help your brand receive positive responses, resulting in a longer time spent on your website.
Do not oversell your products and services. It would be best if you keep your videos factual — minimal brand suggestions and zero flashy advertising.
Make sure you will focus on how your offers can solve the challenges your target market is facing. Emphasize how your services have changed your current customers’ lives for the better.
Offer Relevant Webinars
Offering webinars on topics related to your niche is a great way to develop your brand’s online reputation, credibility, and authority. Webinars are even one of the most effective tools in generating high-quality leads for B2B companies.
If your main goal is to improve lead generation, you can offer webinars for free. Since joining won’t cost them a penny, many people would jump at the opportunity.
During the webinar, you can share your expertise on a particular topic or invite a speaker to discuss topics related to your niche.
Remember that the topic of the webinar should be relevant to your target audience.
Become a Legitimate Source of Industry Research Reports
Building a name and an excellent online reputation can be challenging, especially for startup companies.
But, what if we tell you that there is a quick way to establish your name and reputation? It’s quite simple — make your website the primary source of reputable and reliable research reports in your niche.
Typically, your target market would be attracted to brands that they believe have the authority in a particular industry.
Therefore, you can boost your credibility and branding by offering industry reports in exchange for your target audiences’ contact information. By signing up, they can receive updates regularly.
As a result, your brand would be the first one on their list when they’re planning to avail of a product or service.
Up Your Game With Your Giveaways
One of the things that can boost traffic on your website is the free stuff you offer when a target audience provides their contact details.
Unfortunately, your competitors might have also come up with the same idea. It’s even possible that what you offer is similar to what they have to offer, especially if you are using Private Label Right (PLR) materials — these are readily available from many online sources.
That said, it would be best if you avoid those and start thinking of a unique offer. You don’t want to add to the piles of virtual junk that your target market has already downloaded from the internet.
Raising the bar with your free giveaways is necessary. Offer something useful, original, relevant. Or better yet, offer something that would only be available on your website.
Some good examples are exclusive access to your resource library, apps and software.
Optimize Website to Improve Lead Traffic
To enjoy an increased lead generation success, you should never forget to optimize your website. Honestly, this should be the first thing you should do.
Although this step is quite obvious, many marketers and business owners still failed to focus on this strategy. Most of them are just focused on filling their sites with fancy content that doesn’t even produce results.
Remember that you shouldn’t be making the same mistake.
An optimized website for lead generation clearly shows its target audience what the site is all about and what it can do for their pain points. Visitors should not be spending lots of time to find out your brand’s purpose.
According to the Nielsen Norman Group, visitors would leave a particular site within 10 to 20 seconds if they don’t find anything of value.
New Ideas to Improve Lead Generation
Wait… we’re not done yet!
In this part, we will talk about lesser-known strategies that can be effective in boosting the number and quality of leads for your brand.
Never Use the Word “SPAM”
That’s right — telling potential customers that you will protect them from spam can actually reduce the number of leads.
You might think that you can be your visitors’ “knight and shining armor” because apparently, everyone hates spam.
But the thing is, mentioning it would just remind them of SPAM. In fact, you can scare 18% of your prospects, resulting to thinking twice about signing up.
you can scare 18% of your prospects, resulting to thinking twice about signing up Share on XLeverage Emotional Marketing
(Image Source: Upland Software)
A lot of marketers mistakenly believe that their prospects only use logic in making purchase decisions.
That’s somehow true. Your potential clients would show you that they are logical in their decision. However, their behavior indicates otherwise.
Yes, logical selling works, but tapping into your target audiences’ emotions is a strong strategy. To do this, you have to correctly assess how a particular prospect feels about your product and the solution it offers.
Buyers begin with an emotional connection. Logic will only serve as an extensive backup.
Use Power Words in Your Button Copy
Your button’s copy is one of the significant factors that affect action. Therefore, you will need the ultimate lead generation formula to come up with a good one.
With the right formula, you can create button copies faster and can even get higher success rates on your landing pages.
Moreover, you wouldn’t be spending a lot of your time on A/B testing.
Here’s a great formula by Joanna Wiebe you can follow:
- Start with I want or I want to
Start your copy with I want _____ or I want to _____ and just fill in the blank. Use those phrases as thinking guides.
- Start with “Get”
The logic behind this is simple. Apparently, everyone wants to get something.
- RAD (Require, Acquire, Desire)
First, you have to provide the information your possible clients require before deciding to click the button. Second, you should make sure that you have an easy to acquire (click) button. And lastly, your visitor should desire whatever you offer.
- Hook, Line and Sinker
Create a copy with this formula: command verb + offer+ urgency.
For example, you can say: “Save 50% now!”
Types of Lead Generation Strategies You Can Improve
We have already told you about different strategies to improve lead generation efforts in your company.
This time, we will be discussing the various types of lead generation and what they are all about.
Cold Calling
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This is one of the oldest lead generation methods. In this strategy, marketers use telephones to reach out to possible customers and directly pitch their products and services.
The problem with cold calling is you can be interrupting your leads while in the middle of something (e.g., a meeting, a family dinner or even during their nap time). That’s the reason why many brands refrain from doing it.
Despite that, there are still many companies that practice cold calling worldwide.
Email Marketing
In this lead generation method, you will be sending a sequence of emails containing relevant information that can encourage recipients to make a purchase from your brand.
It would be best to continue to improve lead generation campaigns as this is considered the most popular and most effective lead generation campaign of the 21st century.
Like what they always say, “email is not dead.”
Inside Sales
In this method, you will need a group of experts to manage your LinkedIn profile and other online platforms. Their goal is to get your products and services in front of the right audience.
Since this method focuses on quality leads than quantity, it can be ideal for B2B companies.
Search Engine Marketing
This method consists of placing paid ads on various search engine result pages. It would be best if you place ads on certain places your target market usually hangs.
Through this, you can successfully target people who are searching for particular keywords relevant to your brand.
Search engine marketing is a form of inbound marketing. In this method, you will be bringing people to your landing page or website so you can start converting them into qualified leads.
Social Media Marketing
Social media is powerful. That’s precisely the reason why you should take advantage of it to improve lead generation.
You can reach out to possible clients on various platforms like LinkedIn, Snapchat, Instagram and Facebook. What’s impressive about these platforms is they can offer you millions or even billions of potential customers.
In fact, many companies have already realized the power of social media that they have launched ad campaigns on most if not all of these platforms. By doing this, they got more customers and significantly increased brand awareness.
Best Lead Generation Sites to Follow
To improve lead generation efforts of your brand, it’s essential to stay updated with the latest trends in the marketing industry.
The market undergoes constant changes and your job as a marketer or a business owner is to keep up and be flexible to change.
Fortunately, there are many top lead generation websites for personal and career transitions you can follow. They can provide you with current lead generation stories, strategies, tips and news.
Here are some websites you can follow to increase lead generation opportunities:
LeadFuze
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On this website, you can find in-depth articles that can help you improve lead generation. You can even discover cutting-edge strategies that can help in your marketing, recruiting and sales efforts.
Since 2014, Justin McGill (the founder and CEO of LeadFuze) and his team have been providing their site visitors top-notch articles.
Aside from offering information, LeadFuze can also provide your brand with the best data for leads. This means you will be getting the freshest leads without going through painstaking processes.
With its help, you can automatically build a list of leads. You will no longer waste your time and resources on effectively coming up with the idea to obtain your target market’s contact information.
You can collect all sorts of data such as name, email address, position, company name, social media profile and website. Other details include interests, degrees, skills and education.
By following any of these websites, you can get some tips on how to improve lead generation or even discover new strategies.
HubSpot
This is one of the most informative lead generation websites that provide blogs and video training. Most of its content resonates with the market trends today.
HubSpot’s writers perform in-depth research to ensure that they deliver quality blogs supported with concrete samples.
The site publishes over ten well-researched content every week to keep their following updated with the latest lead generation trends.
B2B Lead Blog
Many B2B marketers visit this website because it contains a lot of useful information relevant to the B2B domain. Its blogs cover a wide range of topics like lead generation, sales and marketing.
It’s focused on lead generation and has discussed many lead generation aspects such as lead closing, lead scoring, lead management, lead nurturing and lead qualification.
This website has 15 contributors and each of them is an expert in the fields of promotions, sales, advertising and of course, lead generation marketing.
The blogs in B2B Lead Blog are relevant to the time and contain an abundance of marketing information that the readers can benefit from.
Traffic Generation Café
Unlike other lead generation websites above that have multiple contributors, the articles on Traffic Generation Café are written by one person — Ana Hoffman, a marketing expert.
The blogs on this website are suited for all kinds of online business. It focuses on how a brand can generate more traffic and leads.
On top of that, Ana has included current marketing news from all over the globe.
By basing on her own experience, she’s planning to help all companies, whether big or small, in generating relevant traffic.
Marketo
Here’s another website closely followed by many B2B professionals. The blogs on Marketo cover different marketing and lead generation topics written by experts.
It focuses on content marketing, lead generation, marketing automation, social media and relevant news in the industry.
The Marketo team makes sure to publish 5 to 6 articles every week.
Conclusion
Lead generation is crucial to any type of business. Keep in mind that your brand won’t survive without a steady influx of leads.
Therefore, it’s necessary to improve lead generation to generate highly targeted leads continually.
With the help of lead generation tools, prospecting can be fun and easy. You don’t have to go through complicated steps to obtain your target market’s contact information.
Additionally, it can even offer you well-written articles that contain various useful tips in lead generation.
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