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Leads and lead generation are like the life force of any business. Without them, businesses would have no customers, no conversions, and no revenue. Like any other business including B2B businesses, digital marketing agencies, eCommerce stores, SaaS, etc., want to increase their client base and offer more services to maximize profits.
All businesses at any level must be constantly generating leads because it expands their client base and gives them the opportunity to scale where needed. This in turn allows for the highest ROI which leads to business growth. Leads affect your online presence and help to build brand awareness.
Finding and testing new strategies for more significant lead generation is beneficial to your business because you can test if your marketing efforts show improvement in lead retention. By testing different lead generation strategies and analyzing the results, you can avoid making costly mistakes when working on new marketing campaigns, saving your business resources, and money, which leads to higher ROI.
Did you know that almost 54% of businesses spend 50% of their marketing budget on lead generation? That is no small percentage, it is because lead generation is what keeps a business thriving.
Generating leads needs patience and finesse because it takes an investment of time and money. All lead generation marketing campaigns must have well-planned strategies that are correctly executed to produce optimal results, that being said here is your list of how to generate more leads through online marketing in 2023.
1. Videos, Shorts & Live Webinars
Once upon a time, your marketing efforts could get away with written content and some images, and maybe a meme or two. Now attracting and acquiring new leads takes much more effort than ever before. Video marketing has exploded and its popularity has immensely grown in the last few years.
It is very effective because it helps your business reach a wider audience when compared to blogging but don't worry blogging still matters we will get to that later. In live stream videos, a business and its brand can engage potential leads and build a personal connection with them, which leads to building brand awareness.
Live videos also provide an excellent opportunity to generate high-quality leads for your business. According to a report, 82% of people would rather watch a brand’s/business live video than browse its social media posts.
The video carousels on Google primarily feature YouTube videos, which can boost your business's search visibility. Now YouTube Shorts has stepped into the video shorts category alongside TikTok and people are not just looking at new dance trends, businesses are engaging more now than ever before with this short video format.
A YouTube or TikTok channel can seriously benefit your brand. YouTube still holds its place at the top for the most popular video platform in the world. So, if you're considering where to start, YouTube may be great to begin your live stream journey.
Creating webinars is a great video marketing strategy because people truly enjoy them, they are interactive and highly effective. Just take a look at some of these statistics below:
- 83% of marketers say webinars are effective
- An average webinar can generate between 500-1000 leads.
- 58% of B2B marketers use webinars as a form of content marketing.
- 38% of marketers say webinars provide higher quality lead generation when compared to other channels.
- 15% of people who attend a webinar will make a purchase of the product or service being showcased.
2. Targeted Personalized Content
Content means so much more for a website than the website design in essence. A customer may like your website’s design and features, but they will stay for the content. According to research, content marketing plays an important role in acquiring new clients because it captures them at the beginning of their buying cycles.
It is crucial that you understand that creating any personalized content must be unique and not plagiarised because Google for example will penalize a website for just that reason. Creating content that addresses your target audience and their unique pain points and the solutions they need is how you make your content personalized.
Blogging is a surefire way to generate more leads. Blogging helps to create powerful pages that allow your business’s website to rank high in search engine rankings like Google. Your business will also be able to generate more leads by producing helpful and informative blog posts and by cultivating an audience that views your blog posts as useful resources.
Your target audience will see your search engine ranking place and will recognize your business and brand as an authority on the specific subject at hand. This leads the potential customer to convert and make a purchase. Creating personalized, engaging, and unique content for your business’s website is a challenge and must be well executed by following proper content and SEO practices.
3. Gate Your Content
Now that you have started creating content that truly matters in the lead generation department you can take it up a notch. If you want to make more of an impact on your lead generation efforts you need gated content.
This simply means that regardless of what type of content such as a weekly blog, eBook, promo newsletter, vlog, or live stream event you can “put it behind a gate” and every time a person fills out the form to receive the content, you have a new lead.
Keep any forms simple to fill out and have basic questions and balance the basic questions with a personal touch like “if you have any other questions we are here to help you and appreciate your inquiries” This adds a personalized touch.
You can effectively use LinkedIn to promote gated content if you are selling a B2B product. The chances are very high that your potential buyers will be on the largest B2B platform in the world. LinkedIn offers powerful features with the ability to run lead-generation ads.
This is where people can fill out a form directly on LinkedIn to get the content and they don't have to visit your business’s website first. It is literally a gateway to your business. By doing this, you can generate more leads at a lower cost than directing LinkedIn users to your landing page.
The key to LinkedIn is to constantly test ads, not just run one, but two or three at a time even if the differences are subtle, like saying the same thing in a different way. You can refine your campaign by observing which ads generate the best CPL (cost per lead).
4. Build Lead Magnets With SEO
Developing lead magnets through SEO efforts is a worthwhile strategy to generate more leads. A lead magnet is basically anything that can be downloaded for free, such as a PDF, white paper, newsletter, or free consultation.
In a nutshell, a lead magnet is a free incentive, a way of attracting visitors to your site and its offerings in exchange for their contact information. A lead magnet is an excellent way to generate leads because it helps your business get its foot in the door with a potential customer. Once you have the person’s contact information, you can start to develop and build a relationship with them.
You can offer your readers something of value in exchange for their email addresses, which is a great way for them to sign up for your email list. Providing free checklists, worksheets, eBooks, videos, or other types of content that your target audience would find useful can be a great way to get them to sign up.
In order to convert your leads into customers, you must nurture them with email marketing after the connection has been made.
5. Plan and Execute a Solid Email Marketing Campaign
Email marketing offers a huge opportunity to generate leads and convert them into customers because numbers don't lie and email marketing statistics show email marketing offers a 4300% return on investment. And for each $1.00 you spend on email marketing you can expect to make an average of $43.00 back.
Email marketing is still one of the most successful lead generation strategies. Email marketing allows your business to build solid relationships that offer your potential customers value. You are able to nurture these leads until they are ready to buy.
Below are a few tips to effectively get the most out of your email marketing efforts for lead generation:
You can start by adding a CTA (call to action) to every email. Every single email you send must have a CTA. The CTA could be anything from buying a product or service, confirming a call time, responding to an email, or clicking on a link to a specific landing page. You want to keep a limit to one CTA per email. Or else you will run the risk of annoying any potential customers.
We've mentioned personalization before and in your email marketing campaigns personalization is key. In contrast to the basic, one-size-fits-all emails, personalized emails have a higher open rate because people are attracted to the personal touch and are more likely to engage with them making it easier to catch a lead.
Thankfully, it is fairly easy to personalize emails by using email marketing software. You can use the custom field to include the person's name, location, or other relevant information and create personalized emails based on that information.
Segmenting your email list is important for clarity. You may have many email lists and different lists have different leads in different sections of your funnel. For example, You may also have customers who have already made a purchase from your business and are now interested in your other offerings.
To better target your emails, you'd want to segment your email list so that you can send more relevant, targeted emails to different groups, keeps things running smoothing and you can better analyze where the email marketing campaign needs adjusting.
Automating your email marketing campaign will save you a lot of time and effort. There are many email automation tools available, and you are able to set up a series of different emails to be sent out automatically over a certain period of time.
You could, for example, set up a campaign that sends a welcome email after someone subscribes to your mailing list, followed by an email with more information about your business a few days later. This can be followed by special offer emails and more without you having to press a single button.
Last but not least you need to be utilizing an email drip campaign. In an email drip campaign, you can send emails to people who have taken specific actions, it is similar to an email automation campaign.
For example, a potential customer visits and views your pricing page but does not buy anything at the time. A drip email campaign could be set up to send them emails over the next few days with more information about your product or service and any promotion, free trials, etc. Your chances of converting them into paying customers increase by running a drip email campaign and lightly feeding them your information.
6. Free Trial Offers = Lead Generation
Another stellar way to generate leads is by offering free trials to your potential leads. Free trials or free offers give potential customers the ability to experience your product and or service offering(s) first-hand. They actually get to see firsthand how your offerings can benefit them or provide them with a solution before they make an actual purchase.
According to a HubSpot report, conversion rates for the top 10% of landing pages are three to five times higher than average, and free trials are also perfect for upselling customers once their trial period ends.
Still not convinced? Take this into consideration, every single software company from A (Abode) to Z (Zoom) offers free trial periods of its respective offerings. This strategy genuinely works and by offering a free trial you can attain the following:
- Instantaneously increase your conversion rates
- Generate leads and sales
- Insights into whether your product or service is being well received
- Upsell customers to paid plans
- Build brand awareness and brand credibility
- Expand your email list
Your business should definitely take advantage of free trials as a lead generation strategy, below are some tips on how to set up and offer free trials.
- Be sure that your free trial requires no credit card upfront (remember it is free)
- Make it very easy to sign up and skip the lengthy fill-out forms
- You should limit the free trial period to a maximum of 14 days
- Give your potential customers access to all of the features, benefits, and solutions of the paid plans you offer
- Provide your potential customers with the same customer support you provide your current customers during their trial period.
If done right, free trials can skyrocket your lead generation efforts.
7. High-Quality Social Media Marketing Practices
Every social media platform has its own set of social media marketing practices that vary. However, depending on what your business is offering and who your target audience is, some platforms work better for lead generation than others. That being said you can't overlook each of their own importance.
Platforms like Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, LinkedIn, and TikTok have on a global scale billions of active users. The right social media marketing practices can help your business to reach these potential customers and generate a massive amount of leads.
It has been proven that social media is an excellent source of targeted, new leads online, and businesses can transform these leads into paying and loyal customers by implementing the right social media strategies. One of the most effective tools in your lead generation bag of tricks is social proof.
Being able to give potential leads the chance to read a testimonial or watch an engaging video of your real customer giving their own testimonial boosts the credibility of your business and brand. This gives potential leads the conviction to continue through the sales funnel to make a purchase.
Generating organic leads may seem like an arduous process but by ensuring your social media channel aligns with your business and branding you can genuinely tell the story behind your brand including your vision, what your brand is all about, what solutions you can provide, and how potential customers can communicate with your brand.
You should make sure the social media channel immediately shows what your brand stands for as well as a way for potential customers to visit your website, get in touch with your brand, and shop. You also need to integrate a CTA (call to action) for people to sign up for any relevant or valuable blogs, videos, newsletters, offers, or gated content, or have the ability to set up a one-on-one meeting through phone, live chat, etc.
Another important social media marketing technique to help generate leads is targeted analytics, it's a pretty big deal because it makes an impact. Social media lead generation is not just about showcasing your brand to potential customers, it's about collecting data and targeting the right leads.
It is very crucial to take a step back and see what's happening behind the scenes, along with focusing outwardly on your campaign. Analytical and insight-based campaigns are more likely to generate leads when they are continuously measured, monitored, and refined.
Identify your key performance indicators before launching your next social media lead generation campaign. Monitor these KPIs continuously after launch, making tailored changes as necessary. Below are a few techniques and tips to get you on the right track:
- Using Google Analytics will enable you to keep track of leads on your site
- Monitor and assess which social media channel produces the most positive results for your business in terms of generating leads
- Keep track of which type of messaging performs the best for your business
- Monitor what time of day and in which timezones your customers are engaging the most with your social media platform
Last but not definitely least, let's talk about ads. Simply put, advertising on social media is absolutely critical if you want to keep up with your competitors in the online leads battle.
All of the heavy hitters in the social media platform game, including Facebook, YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, and LinkedIn (we went over LinkedIn ads previously) have options to create targeted lead paid ads. Social media platforms will display these paid ads on their own and feed them through to the curated audiences.
Paid ads are a great investment for quick results, many businesses use paid ads for certain promotions around specific times of the year or when but need a quick boost in the lead generation department. Paid ads should be constantly monitored and adjusted as needed. If one paid ad is not producing results, change tactics and pay attention to which ads are generating leads, being agile is the key to paid ads' success.
In Conclusion
Lead generation is the gateway to sales and success in any business. Regardless of whether you are aiming to increase revenue or improve customer retention. Setting a clear objective of what you want to achieve will help you map out and navigate a solid lead generation strategy for 2023.
In 2023, it is essential to analyze and assess previous campaigns to become more agile within your current lead generation campaigns. Understanding upcoming trends and market dynamics will guide you in a better direction and allow you to keep up with your competitors.
It will be easier to plan accordingly if you know what your goals are, how you will allocate budget and resources, and whether you will need to hire someone, as well as where you need to improve current strategies. Through these insights, you will be able to create a lead generation strategy that is more effective and results-driven for the coming year.
