Lead generation refers to the tactics and strategies businesses use to build interest revolving around their products or services among prospects; thus, converting them into customers.
Though lead generation is a simple concept, it is crucial to acquire leads. Besides, it is immensely helpful for businesses in increasing their client base and building revenue.
Regardless of how good your product or service is, if no one knows about it, none will buy. However, in this ultra-connected and technologically adept world, numerous lead generation techniques help you win customers.
Here, we have penned the top 10 lead generation methods and strategies that will effectively benefit your business.
10 Lead Generation Techniques That Will Benefit Your Business
1. Email Marketing
Email marketing, being one of the best online lead generation processes, stand still in this ever-changing digital world. Whether it is attracting a stranger, promoting products or services, nurturing leads, or retaining the existing customers, email marketing always proves beneficial. Additionally, marketers believe that emails are a great asset for any organization to earn.
Following the below approach towards email marketing can help you yield fruitful results:
- Find the right person to send an email
- Offer them an attractive value that makes them your loyal customers
- Write a compelling email subject line
- Segment your audience, i.e., send email based on your prospects’ interest
- Build an email series right from welcome email to the offer you want to provide
- Add an email signature
Open rate, click-through rate (CTR), and unsubscribe are the three significant factors that impact email marketing. So remember, higher open rate = better email campaign, higher CTR = more lead counts, higher unsubscribe rate = need to change the offer and campaign.
2. Search Engine Optimization
Whenever people have questions, they switch to Google to get the answers. Thus, it serves as a great opportunity for businesses to bring in more customers by targeting the keywords. If Google ranks you at the top position, then you will get the most organic traffic. Nevertheless, the majority source of B2B lead generation comes from search engine traffic.
Here are some SEO lead generation methods and strategies that can help you:
- Know your audience
- Identify target keywords and monitor their rankings
- Audit errors and fix technical SEO
- Define leads
When it comes to search engine optimization, you must avoid keyword stuffing, spamming, automatically generated content, and link schemes.
In this internet-connected world, social media provides a robust platform to connect and engage with prospects. As per the reports from several sources,
- Facebook has 2.41 billion monthly active users
- Instagram possesses 1 billion monthly active users
- Twitter boasts 330 million monthly active users
- LinkedIn has 303 million active monthly users
Out of them, LinkedIn has proved to be the most effective platforms for B2B lead generation process. Leverage the below strategies to make the most of social media marketing:
- Utilize social media chatbots for creating warm leads
- Start a FB group to increase the following. Use the platform to collect more reviews and invite users to sign up.
- Follow the right hashtags, participate in chats, and promote engaging tweets to influence users on Twitter.
- Use LinkedIn to connect with your prospects, post videos, and content, and benefit with LinkedIn Ads.
- Conduct live Q&A sessions, make big announcements and release a new product or service teaser on Instagram to attract an audience.
- Utilize platforms like Pinterest and YouTube to include CTAs in your images and images.
However, merely posting on social media will do nothing. You need to be more innovative with your posts.
4. Paid Advertising
We know that SEO takes time to show results. As opposed to it, paid advertising does the job instantly. It enables you to display your ads on targeted keywords. Thus, you can get instant targeted traffic with paid advertising.
Some of the lead generation techniques that will prevail the best-paid advertising results include:
- Social media advertising – LinkedIn Ads, Facebook Ads, and Google Ads
- Show up your trade ads on a non-competitors website that offer similar services as your business
- Buy space on the sites of media to promote your ads
- Leverage the benefits of Affiliate Marketing
- Encourage social media influencers to recommend your products or services to their followers
- Use remarketing
You can completely track your paid advertising campaigns. Besides, it is less expensive than traditional print advertising.
5. Content Marketing
As compared to conventional marketing, content marketing helps in generating 3 times more leads. While the scope of content marketing is broad, it is wise to focus on the type of content that helps generate more leads. However, a good content marketing strategy demands a degree of diversity and experimentation to determine your biggest growth opportunities.
Below are some of the sure-shot content lead generation techniques:
- Blogging
- Getting a Guest Post published on authoritative sites
- Creating lead magnets to the avail email address in exchange of free PDF, eBook, Webinar, and Case Studies
- Answering questions on Quora
- Hosting a Webinar
- Launching a Podcast
- Making videos and publishing it on YouTube or other channels
- Creating an online PR
Use any of the above content strategies and see for yourself what works and what doesn’t. You can, thus, refine your lead generation process gradually.
6. Website Optimization
Your website is the first step towards creating your first impression. For lead generation business, your website must have a user-friendly description of your value propositions. It must provide valuable information about your products and services, offer opportunities to sign up, and offer easy access to your contact details.
For online lead generation process, you should adopt the below website optimization strategies:
- Keep a tab on website visitors
- Make your website mobile-friendly
- Identify the technical errors and fix them
- Optimize your website as per the keyword searches
- Integrate pop-ups on your website to generate more sales
- Build quality backlinks to your website and increase your authority
If your website has not yet been updated or optimized for three years, expecting a good online lead generation business will be in vain.
7. Marketing Automation
By leveraging marketing automation, you can have all your lead generation methods and strategies on auto-pilot mode. Whether you are putting efforts in email marketing, lead nurturing, or qualifying leads, marketing automation helps make personalization easy.
Here are a few marketing automation strategies that can benefit:
- Identify leads with the use of lead generation tools
- Use email marketing tools to send emails automatically on any given day and time
- Harness the power of tools to schedule and post on social media platforms
Marketing automation tools connect with your CRM to enable you to automatically send targeted emails to leads that are personalized for a specific niche.
8. Blogging
Though blogs don’t generate a lot of direct leads, it is one of the most effective drivers of leads to your website. As you can create keyword-enriched content that can be found in search engines, you can drive a number of visitors to your website. Blogging is the cornerstone of your SEO. Without it, your SEO efforts won’t bring expected results.
Given below are some lead generation techniques through blogging:
- Post your blogs on Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook
- Target publications or websites that have authority in your market and approach them for Guest Blogging
- Attempt for cross-blogging on each other’s sites
- Video blogging on YouTube can help find new audiences. Also, translating your content can widen your reach.
Thus, blogging is an excellent way to showcase your expertise, build your authority, and generate your leads over time.
9. White Papers & eBooks
Offering White Papers can be one of the most common yet effective online lead generation techniques. They can establish credibility and generate leads for your business. Moreover, they can serve a dual purpose – informative sales pitch and an advertising copy. When certain topics demand more in-depth knowledge than White Paper, eBooks come into play. A high-quality, downloadable eBook can showcase your company’s expertise in specific subjects.
Adapting these lead generation methods and strategies for White Papers & eBooks can be exceedingly helpful for your business:
- Offer White Papers on your website or distribute it through third-party services
- Provide downloadable eBooks and White Papers and acquire contact information in exchange for downloads
You can even share them among your peers to expand your brand name and reputation.
For the B2B lead generation process, a high-quality and educational e-newsletter serves as an excellent tool. It not only encourages people to sign up but also helps you nurture the existing leads on your list.
To make the most of e-newsletter lead generation techniques, keep the following in mind:
- Ensure you provide compelling reasons for people to sign up
- Include exclusive sales and experiences to draw the audience
- Use them to announce your new services
The only thing that makes e-newsletter lead generation businesses succeed is better content.
These are the top 10 lead generation techniques that your business should focus on to widen its reach. Besides, cloud telephony is also emerging as an effective tool in lead generation. Undoubtedly, you must keep testing and retesting different methods to see what works for you the best.
Shrushti K. Chaware Works as a Digital Marketing Executive, at SoftwareSuggest. She is a Sports lover and always curious to explore new stuff. When she is not working hard at work, she can be found writing, reading or just wandering.