Lead generation is a term used in the digital marketing industry to describe a technique that businesses use to get potential customers into their sales funnel. The goal of lead generation is to turn website visitors into leads, or people who are interested enough in your product or service that they want more information on it.
Lead generations methods include SEO, social media marketing, and email marketing. If you’re looking for more information on lead generations techniques, keep reading!
What is Lead Generation in Digital Marketing?
Lead generation is one of the most important activities in digital marketing. Lead generation focuses on attracting traffic to your website or landing page by placing calls to action in front of your visitors.
These CTA’s are aimed at encouraging potential customers to provide their contact details which will allow you to follow up with them via email, telephone, or direct mail.
Lead generation is typically done through forms presented on your website or landing pages with wording such as “sign up” and “subscribe”.
Lead generation is an ongoing process that often starts before a customer even arrives on your site when they are still researching products services online or through email campaigns that encourage prospects to sign up for content updates about specific products they may be interested in.
How to Generate Marketing Leads?
Since loyal customers are the lifeblood of any successful business, lead generation is a top priority for marketers and the companies that want to grow. The strategies of lead generations typically involve using content in various forms to increase brand awareness and interest in products or services.
Use the sales funnel to nurture the leads interested in your business and nudge them towards taking purchase actions. Seasoned B2B marketers focus on the quality of the lead they attract. They do this by working to understand their buyer persona and ensure that their content resonates deeply with their ideal customer.
Speaking of strategies, keep in mind that content is the medium you’ll use to reach your ideal customers. You need to invest significant resources in creating valuable content that helps your target audience achieve some of their goals related to the product or service you sell.
While you’re at it, I’ll share with you three effective lead generation strategies used by highly successful marketers to attract and convert qualified prospects.
If you want your ideal customer to pay special attention to your content when they come across it on any marketing channel, here are the lead generation strategies and tools to keep in mind while planning your digital marketing campaigns.
1. Use advertising platforms
If you have a budget and want to get started as fast as possible, the most simple way to test out your Minimum Viable Product (MVP) is to run advertising campaigns on Google or social media platforms like Facebook.
2. Create gated content pieces and promote them
One way to ensure that you attract quality leads is to create gated content. Gated content is valuable pieces of content that are related to the business goals of your prospect. This content can be anything- white papers, ebooks, case studies; give it a clear and captivating title that tells a prospect precisely what they will gain when they download your content.
Since the content is gated, prospects who want access will have to fill out the lead capture form. The use of gated content is effective because it makes a good impression on prospects who download and brings your brand legitimacy in front of them. It also provides you with high-quality leads with a genuine interest in your product or service.
3. Host events
An event is a great way to engage with your target audience in real-time and build meaningful relationships with them. Hosting a webinar, workshop, or conference to interact with your ideal customers gives you the chance to capture their contact information when they register for the event.
Pay close attention to questions, objections during your discussion in the event. You’ll learn more about your audience and artfully guide them through your sales funnel.
4. Promote your gated content and events on social media
Social media is the modern playground of the 21st century, with millions of people actively playing daily. Your ideal prospects are on social media, and your job is to find and display your lead magnets (gated content and event registrations) to them and watch the right prospects convert.
With social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram, you can access powerful ad targeting tools that let you segment and reach particular audiences. Successful B2B markets use paid Facebook and Instagram ads to drive traffic to their gated content.
5. Tools for Lead Generation
Lead generation is a process of building rapport and relationships with potential customers. Lead generation should not be confused with lead capture or lead conversion. Lead generation aims to create interest in the product and then eventually nurtures that interest into success and closing.
The sale while lead capture refers to taking an email address during checkout for marketing offers while Lead conversion refers to turning leads into actual paying customers. Lead generation, therefore, is one of the most important aspects of digital marketing today.
Tools for Lead Generation: To help you generate more productive leads, here are some tools I recommend you add to your toolbox:
1) Leadfeeder
2) Clearbit
3) Twitter Lead Generation Cards
4) Perfect Audience
5) SumoMe
6) Lead capture on any website
7) Lead Generation on Social Media.
6. Salespanel for Lead Generation
In Lead Generation Lead Generation often relies on contact lists from Lead Management Software. SalesPanel is a Lead Management System that allows marketers to create Lead Lists for Lead Generation purposes.
The Lead List can be created in several ways: Lead Pools, Match Keywords with Purchased Marketing Lists and import your own data. Once the Lead List is created it can then be segmented into custom-made categories that are more specific to the buyer persona.
These categories allow you to target users in a more efficient way than just having one massive list of leads where you have no idea what type of person they might be or whether or not they even qualify as potential customers.
Conclusion
One of the most important goals for digital marketers is lead generation. Conversion rates are key, but it’s hard to convert leads if you don’t have any in your funnel, to begin with.
Lead generation can be done through various channels including email marketing, SEO optimization, social media engagement, and more. The following article discusses some strategies that might work well for generating leads online or offline.