The Two Secrets to B2B Lead Generation

Lead generation is an important activity for any B2B company. So much so that a lot of B2B marketers spend their time generating the leads, but not doing anything with them. And in their minds, that's okay, because that's all they were told to do.

"Generate more leads!" management said. So they did.

However that's not where the work ends. In fact, B2B lead generation is just the beginning. After all, the end goal of any marketer is to actually make a sale, not just generate the lead. Sales often finds out just how "good" Marketing is at generating leads when they start going through them all. They discover that while the pile of leads is HUGE, the quality is very LOW. This leads to a lot of frustration and finger-pointing.

Avoid all of this by figuring out what kind of leads you have, and then deciding on a course of action. In other words, lead scoring.

At a basic level, lead scoring is simply a way to determine how serious a lead is to buy your product. There are all sorts of methodologies you can use for lead scoring, but it ultimately comes down to two things: Fit and Engagement.

Fit

According to Eloqua, when you qualify a lead's "fit", you're looking at the individual and organization the lead belongs to. Based on information like their job title, industry, geography, company revenue, and more, a lead will be a better or worse fit.

Engagement

This is the lead's level of buying interest. Using characteristics like their online activity and response to marketing programs, resource downloads, social media shares, event attendance, and more, B2B marketers can determine the lead's level of buying interest.

Acting on your lead scores

After you've decided which elements to measure, it's time to measure them. Having formalized lead scoring thresholds will make it easier for B2B marketers to determine when to make the next move.

• Under a certain number, and it's a Marketing Qualified Lead (MQL), meaning they need to see some more content before they're ready to buy.
• Over a certain number, and it's a Sales Qualified Lead (SQL), meaning they're ready to buy and Sales should contact them immediately.

Knowing when to act

Regardless if it's an MQL or SQL, studies show that moving quickly to respond to those leads is the key. Of course for B2B marketers that means entering the lead's buying moment at just the right time. When that happens, studies show that you've got an excellent chance of closing the sale.

Having enough resources helps too

According to eConsultancy, many companies (52%) say they need more resources to improve their conversion rates. For B2B marketers, that means having enough content to feed leads throughout the buying cycle. Case studies, white papers, corporate blog posts, articles, checklists, webinars, events — all of these resources are needed for today's B2B marketer. After all, it takes at least four different pieces of content to even get your name on a vendor shortlist, so be prepared!

Set yourself up the right way

Marketing in the B2B world is a marathon, not a sprint. Preparing your Marketing and Sales teams with the same expectations and the same tools and resources, and you'll be on your way to converting all those leads you're already good at generating.

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Letting Your Leads Choose Their Own Adventure With Dynamic CTAs

By employing a "Choose Your Own Adventure" technique with your calls to action, consumers will be able to feel that they made the choice to continue down the sales funnel on their own, instead of being forced into it.

Choose Your Own Adventure in Email Marketing

Email marketing is often used to help further a relationship with a prospect, as well as generate more leads. To best accomplish these goals, consider the following example: When crafting an email for lead nurturing, the Choose Your Own Adventure technique will help you:

• identify the stage of the prospect if you are using stage-based content 
• offer prospects opportunities for advancement 
• provide specific data for more relevant future communications

In your email there should only be a couple of calls to action when using this technique. If you are using links in your signature, I'd suggest removing them. You can check your email tool to see if these links are receiving clicks, but your click-through rates on links in your email signature are likely the lowest of all. If they are high, then your signature is more enticing than your content, which means you should reevaluate the message of your email.

There is a reason for only offering two CTAs (and therefore two options), and a goal. The goal is to drive engagement, and to help your prospects move themselves though your sales funnel. If you give more than two options, your email is not targeted to its goal, and will likely miss its target. The second reason for the two CTAs is because people will only engage with relevant content. So if you are offering two options, the odds are in your favor they will only engage with the more relevant of the two options. So if your content is crafted for each stage, they will tell you exactly which stage they are in, and if they are ready to move to the next stage of content they can do so.

Choose Your Own Adventure in Content Marketing

In content marketing, regardless of where your content is hosted, optimizing for engagement is always the goal. Let's focus, for a moment, on increasing the engagement after their first touch - so after the form has been completed, or after they arrive on a landing page from a keyword search. In the case of video marketing, consider giving your prospect different options as to what to do next after the video finishes playing. This will give them the option to stay engaged, and help you to identify where they are in the sales cycle. Using this technique with content marketing helps to:

• increase content engagement helping to further thought leadership 
• offer prospects opportunities for advancement 
• get more value out of the engagement you paid for/optimized for

For gated content, or content hidden behind a form, consider the following example. When your prospect fills out the form, they are saying, "Yes." This is a clear sign that they are willing to engage with you. Many people use forms that can automatically display messages, or what we call "thank you content," after they are completed. If you are using this technique, you can say "thank you," and offer two more choices of content. This will allow you to take advantage of the person's state of mind. They are in a place where they're hungry for content, so help feed them. Give them another option for more content in that stage, or the choice to a download a piece of content that will take them to the next stage.

Here is a great example of this being used by ATS. Notice the form changes after submission to offer more content. The offer is dynamic, so it can offer the most relevant content at the correct time.

Choose Your Own Adventure With Owned Media Channels

The Choose Your Own Adventure technique can also be used on your owned media channels. Let's take a look specifically at your website, and at a more advanced technique that can allow you to have dynamic content on your website. Many marketing automation tools and CRMs can provide this functionality to you. Using this technique with your owned media channels helps to:

• increase content engagement helping to further thought leadership 
• offer prospects opportunities for advancement
• increase on-site optimization 
• easily allow you to create a personalized experience

Marketing automation enables you to see where a prospect is in the sales cycle, and allows you to use dynamic content to serve up different content based on this information. So whether they're on your homepage, pricing page, or login page, you can serve up different content. I'd suggest using a few dynamic content blocks side by side, or one on top of the other. This will allow you to show a piece of content that's relevant to the stage a prospect is in, as well as give them a chance to move on to the next stage.

Here is a great example from Merchantry showing how they use targeted content options to help increase engagement rates by showing the correct content at the correct time. Notice how the orange block allows the prospect to request a demo, while the two blue blocks provide thought leadership content.

So if you're doing any type of content or email marketing, the Choose Your Own Adventure technique is a must for all modern marketers. I've taught this technique for years, and have seen companies double their content engagement simply by utilizing the Choose Your Own Adventure options. It also allows the consumer to choose, so they feel they made the choice, instead of being forced into it. Good luck with this technique, and please feel free to share examples of how you're using this technique in the comments below.

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Related articles

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• Email Marketing: Your Mega-Guide for Success
• 14 Top-Notch Resources to Help You Become a CRO Expert

Generate Leads Online for Your Brick and Mortar Store

Although many small businesses have created a website and Facebook page that covers the bare minimum, plenty of local businesses are still missing out on opportunities to use their websites to generate qualified leads.

If you have a brick and mortar store, you may have written off online lead generation as the domain of ecommerce sites, but that doesn’t need to be the case. Here are just a few ways that local businesses can use online marketing to reach out to their target audience and get more customers in their stores.

Align your internet strategy with a focus on leads, not traffic. Many businesses (and SEO consultants) make the mistake of aiming to drive as many visitors as possible to a website.  That may sound great, but 100 visitors that fit your target demographic are worth far more than 10,000 visitors who have absolutely no need for your products or services. Make sure your strategy is driven by your business goals, not just traffic generation.

Ensure your have a lead capture mechanism on each landing page. At the very least, you want a clear call-to-action on each and every page, but there are dozens of ways to encourage people to reach out to you. Just a few ideas include incentivizing them by offering a free e-newsletter, e-book, or coupon in exchange for their email address. What’s right for a business depends highly on your demographic and business goals, and the right internet marketing expert can help guide you in the process.

Develop a system to follow-up on those leads. If you’re capturing dozens or hundreds of leads, you’re headed in the right direction, but you have to do something with those leads. You must follow up in order to get them to convert.

Make contact information easy to find – on desktop and mobile devices. Don’t make web users do an in-depth search of your website just to find your phone number and address. Many consumers will be searching from mobile devices, and if they have to do a lot of scrolling or squinting, they’ll turn to another business with a better website layout.

Invest in mobile click-to-call. The fewer clicks a web user has to make to contact your business, the more likely they are to actually do it. Recognizing this, Google recently added a click-to-call extension for their Adwords. If you use this extension, a phone icon and the word “Call” will appear below your ad listing in search results, and people who have performed the search from their phone can simply click the button to immediately call your number.

Get listed online. When was the last time you used a phonebook to look up the number for a business? If you can’t remember, you’re certainly not alone. With more and more people eschewing land lines for cell phones and businesses listing their contact information online, bulky phonebooks have largely become obsolete.

However, as the physical yellow pages have vanished, virtual Yellow Pages and other local business directories have sprung up. In addition to prominently displaying your business contact information on your website, get your company listed in these directories – and keep them updated – so that local consumers can easily find you. You can also use them to do communicate with customers about new products, changing hours, or other important announcements, and run specials and promotions.

Claim your location on map sites. Speaking of local directories, claim your profile on map sites, like Google, Bing, and Yahoo. By doing this, you can make sure these sites aren’t posting inaccurate information about you (you won’t see new customers if your physical address is listed incorrectly online) and respond to consumer feedback.

Include a contact form on your website. Adding a contact form to your site is incredibly easy to do (there are many templates available, and if you use a platform like Wordpress, they already have contact templates built in) and also incredibly advantageous. It provides site visitors with an easy way to provide feedback, ask questions, and request services and information, and it allows you to directly communicate with site visitors who may be interested in your products, improving your lead generation as a result.

Ask for reviews. If a current customer emails you or tells you in person how great they think your business is, politely ask if they’d be willing to write a short testimonial for your website or post a review on a site like Yelp. These positive reviews can help your business rank more highly in the search engine listings, and they’ll also encourage the many people who use review sites as research tools to come visit your brick and mortar location.

Try drip marketing. This communication strategy involves sending shorter, pre-written messages to prospects over time. These messages are called “drips”, and they are designed to help lead a prospect to converting into a sale. If you have captured online leads, this is just one strategy available to you for following up via email marketing.

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How to Use Twitter Lead Gen Cards to Increase Newsletter Sign-ups

Newsletters are an amazing marketing tool. The fans that regularly read your newsletter are often your most valuable brand advocates. They are the amplifiers that spread the good word about your brand.

Building a large newsletter audience can be tough, but there are some great tools out there to help you through the process. One of them is Twitter.

Marketers don't always think about Twitter as a tool to increase newsletter subscribers. Buried within Twitter analytics, there's a way to create a lead generation card.

Most marketers are initially discouraged from exploring the lead gen cards because it looks like you have to enter credit card information and pay for an ad campaign. But you that you can run these Twitter lead gen cards for free. Just don't promote it, and you never have to pay a dime.

The Best Tactics to Generate More Leads from Facebook and Twitter

Social media is a great way to connect, share and interact with others beyond the known periphery. You will come across many online blogs discussing the best ways to enhance your social media reach. We will not delve into that same matter further. Our focus will be on something else: Lead Generation.

Likes, pins, followers, comments, friends, and engagement - these are popular social media metrics. But what is more vital to consider is whether such metrics result in sales at the end of the day. Otherwise, all of them are completely useless.

Change your perspective

One of the biggest misconceptions about social media sites is that they are only for brand awareness and not for generating leads. If you consider the same, your business is missing out on a lucrative marketing channel.

Instead of getting distracted with the counts of Facebook Likes and Twitter followers, focus on the statistics that can contribute to your revenue. It will be impossible to track ROI if your organization’s social media strategy is not constructed to support lead generation. It is high time to change your outlook and concentrate on generating social media leads.

If you are planning to start a lead generation campaign, Facebook and Twitter profiles are great places to begin with. Here are a few tips that you should consider to generate leads from these two well-known social media profiles:

Facebook

There are 1.2 billion active monthly users on Facebook and therefore, this channel is the prime focus of the business owners. However, this platform is often not conducive for direct sales, but by distributing quality content and engaging with the customers in one-to-one communication it possible to build trust among the Facebook users. What else you can do to generate leads from this popular channel? Let’s see-

Attracting the customers

First, it is important to understand the kind of information your potential customers are looking for. Sweepstakes, contests and group offers on your Facebook page are good to attract the attention of the customers. Do you remember “Do Us a Flavor” campaign from Lay’s? The brand just asked for a new flavor that the customers may like in their chips. The idea was simple and it clicked. This campaign generated huge publicity and the brand has no doubt gained lots of new customers.

Try to know your customers

You should also think about the information that you might like to know from your customers. It will be easier for you to convert your visitors into lead once you are equipped with more information about them. For that, you may use Facebook tab to ask them few simple questions. However, a social media user does not like these tabs and rarely visit them. You have to think of ways to encourage a visitor to fill up the questionnaire. A giveaway or offer can be enticing and works well to gather customer insights. You can also reveal the content of your website, if the user is ready to fill the signup form. Always try to keep such forms concise with minimum questions. You may ask for email address, demographic data or geographic location information. But, before that, customize your tab and make it brand related. 

If you are a retailer, it is still important to gather customers’ insights so that you can build up relationship with them. You can always allure the customers to walk into store enticing them with discounts and special offers.

Call to Action in your posts

Social media users hardly like sales posts. Instead of sharing your latest offers on your company’s profile, post tips and good images that may get much more appreciation. You can include your email id, phone number or useful links with that post. You may ask your fans to like something, comment on your posts or even interact with your content. This is a great way to generate leads from your content.

Paid ads

The organic reach of Facebook pages have dramatically decreased causing a sensation across industries, as the business leaders are forced to think of paid ads in order to be seen in the platform. With the paid ads the marketers can target the users based on their interests.  In every ad campaign, the advertisers can attach a call-to-action button.

Twitter

The HubSpot twitter account has 405K followers and more than 50,000 leads. Well, it is not difficult to achieve this landmark.

Build your network

If you tweet, just for the sake of tweeting, you can never achieve your cherished goal of generating leads. There should be a purpose behind your tweets so that more people are attracted to follow you. Focused communities participate in Twitter chats. To gain visibility you have to participate in those relevant group chat. You can either join the thread relevant to your industry or commence a new conversation. Whatever way you may prefer, just make sure that potential customers are participating in the chat.

Lead generation cards

Until now, the focus of a social page has been on optimizing content, so that it is easily discoverable. But, recently the focus has shifted to other aspect with the introduction of Lead generation Cards in Twitter. Now, the social users’ experience are optimized to make things more convenient for the users.

With these cards, it is possible to connect with the Twitter users outside your groups who will be interested in the messages you share. Even the company owners can attach a call to action button within their tweet. Users can expand the tweet, see a description of your offer and call to action. Their name and email address will be pre-filled within the card and they have to click the button to send the information to you. There is no need to leave the page for that.

Tailoring your audiences

Twitter introduced tailored audiences feature. It allows brands to share information with users who have expressed interest in them or in their category. That means your Twitter will only be displayed to people who have interacted with your site somewhere outside the Twitter. It helps to display ads to only the relevant users. This feature has shown an impressive result.

Business owners have to explore social media for many untapped opportunities to connect with potential leads. These are just a few suggestions how you can gain leads from two of the most used social profiles. You must try other social media channels and share the experience with us.

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The Benefits of Using Social Media Like a B2B Boss

"Marketing is no longer about the stuff that you make but about the stories you tell." -Seth Godin

There are all sorts of untapped marketing benefits available through social media, and when you use it like you know what you're doing, you make yourself - and your company - stand apart from the crowd. Take a look at the B2B benefits from social media use.

Increased Exposure

This one is easy, so no cheating off your neighbor. The greatest advantage of using social media is recognition. Consider these stats:

• 72% of all Internet users are now active on social media.
• Facebook has 1.15B users; Google+ has 1B users; and Twitter has 550M users.
• 70% of marketers have used Facebook to successfully gain new business.

Social media is quickly becoming the best way to build a reputation that's centered on what you bring to the table: your values, benefits, and advantages.

Expanded Footprint

Consider the fact that more than 60% of social media engagement occurs through a mobile device. Repeat exposure is a great way for you to share blog posts, videos, and other content with people around the world.

Personalized Marketing

82% of B2B marketers use social media. Today, it's difficult to stay afloat without the social media buoy. It's the difference between conventional marketing and personalized marketing: You can either use a single arrow to hit a thousand different bullseyes...or you can narrow down your targets and use a single arrow to hit a handful of bullseyes.

Better Leads

Traditionally, content was king. Now, however, social media has a 100% higher lead-to-close rate than outbound marketing; its many methods, including community interaction, positive customer service, and audience influence, all have numerous benefits, as well:

• Maintain a competitive advantage over other agencies NOT using social media;
• Establish authority & subject matter expertise in your given field;
• Build relationships with customers & raise awareness of your company.

Improved Audience Targets

The easiest way to sabotage yourself is to hold fast to a belief that isn't true. Consider the following:

• The fastest growing demographic on Twitter? 55 to 64 year olds.
• The fastest growing demographic on Facebook and Google+? 45 to 54 year olds.

I'll bet you thought social media was just for technology-connected teenagers. Oh, no - not so! In fact, over 93% of marketers use social media primarily for business and every second of the day, two new people join LinkedIn - people who are, conceivably, not teenagers.

So the next time you start putting together your marketing plan, think twice about leaving out the three most active social media channels (Twitter, Facebook, Google+) from your list of venues. If you can always consider these as an option, then you're one step closer to using social media like a B2B boss.

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Sales Pipeline Strategies: How to Map Your Content for Better Lead Generation

Successful inbound marketing relies on supplying leads with the right information at the right time. The Internet has made buyers much more self-reliant when making purchasing decisions, so it is essential that your business produces top quality content that is relevant to their business pains and helps establish you as a credible source of information, as well as a purveyor of solutions that meet their needs.

Let’s take a look at the three main stages of the inbound marketing sales pipeline, to help us better understand what customers are trying to achieve at each step. Armed with this knowledge, you can then create finely targeted content that speaks directly into the prospect’s situation, preparing them to pull them into the next stage of the pipeline.

Awareness content

Long before a lead becomes an official prospect, people are visiting your website looking for general information to answer high level questions they may have. Yet even at this stage, your business has a chance of capturing the attention of the most casual of browsers, simply by letting them you know the problems they face.

For the greatest degree of success, you must:

• Identify the business pains your prospects may face.
• Identify the probable people who will be looking for solutions to those problems (CEO/CFO/CIO or even non-board level readers).
• Create easily-digestible information that imparts that information quickly and easily.

Because prospects are only really searching for information at a high level, content will need to be succinct. Consider using:

• Blog posts
• Online presentations
• Infographics
• Short introductory emails

“43% of all marketers generated at least 1 customer from a blog during 2013.”

Ultimately your content needs to:

• Confirm that the prospect has a genuine business pain.
• Provide evidence in support of that pain, and propose generalised solutions.
• Provide additional third party facts and statistics that back up the proposed solutions, lending additional expert credence to your content.

You must avoid pressure-selling – the content is to serve no other purpose than to inform and to raise your company profile. Your prospect will add this information to their mental inventory and almost certainly use it to begin the internal buying process. You can also use marketing automation tools to “suggest” related consideration content to help move them into the next stage of the sales pipeline.

“Lead nurturing programs show an average 20% increase in sales opportunities from nurtured leads and provide dramatic improvements to key conversion stages in the sales process.” – Calculating the Real ROI from Lead Nurturing, DemandGen Report.

Consideration content

After the prospect has become more aware of their situation and the high level solutions, they will need to present a business case to make a purchase. This is the point at which research begins in earnest.

As before, the key to success is making sure content is relevant, timely and factual. Because the consideration stage of the buying process may involve different job roles, you will also need to carefully reconsider your target personas, creating new ones where appropriate and addressing their business pains. For further clues as to how your content needs to mapped to client needs and buying processes, your marketing and sales teams can review previous projects.

Consideration content is also intended to provide in-depth information that will provide your prospect with everything required to create a shortlist of suitable solutions and providers. Decision makers need extensive facts, figures and examples targeted to their specific interests if they are to be convinced of your expertise and knowledge.

Typically consideration content takes the form of:

• White papers
• Extended articles
• Reports

Consideration content needs to be impartial, providing expert, non-partisan advice. Just like awareness content, consideration documents are supposed to inform, rather than explicitly sell. When prospects access your consideration content, they are giving clear indications of intent. Your marketing automation solution needs to provide other persona-focused consideration content, or provide links to decision content to help keep the prospect moving along the sales pipeline and maintaining a chain of communication with them throughout.

“66% of buyers indicate that ‘consistent and relevant communication provided by both sales and marketing organizations’ is a key influence in choosing a solution provider” – Genius.com survey.

Decision content

With shortlisting complete, your prospects need to make a final decision. Decision content is again targeted at decision-makers and is much more of a sales document than those that precede it. Your prospect will not have stumbled on this content by accident – your marketing automation platform and pipeline rules will have guided them to the document based on their previous downloads and the inferences you can draw from that. You now have an audit trail of content they have accessed, giving insight into their business pains and their specific persona, allowing you to pull them towards the final information they really need to make a purchase.

“Automating Lead Management sees a 10% or more increase in revenue in 6 months.”

Content still needs to be factual and informative, providing the last pieces of the purchasing jigsaw. Unlike awareness and consideration documents, decision content should openly discuss your products, building upon the previously discussed issues and demonstrating why yours is the solution the prospective buyer is looking for.

Getting the sales pipeline mapped

The keys to successful content delivery for lead generation are:

• Accurate persona creation – who are you targeting?
• Accurate business pain identification – what are the problems these people face?
• Appropriate solution recommendations – how you can help these people?
• Timely information presented in the right way to the right people according to each of these factors.
• The use of automation to help keep prospects moving along the sales pipeline from awareness to purchase.

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Solid Ways for Lead Generation through Social Media

Are you looking for new ways to generate leads through Social Media? Over the last few years, social media has emerged as an effective tool for generating leads. Existing and potential customers are using social platforms to discover new offerings and also educating themselves.

Businesses today have seen social media being a vital channel to engage with their customers, and amplify their messages across them to garner more qualified leads. In this article I am going to highlight how you can generate leads effectively through Social Media.

1. Create A Blog

Creating a blog is the easy part; you need to provide unique content about your company and industry to your readers. Your blogs content needs to empower the reader and deliver some value. It needs to educate them, solve their problems and queries, improve their situation and re-instate their belief that your brand is the one for them to trust.

You must have a ‘subscribe for this blog’, either on the right side of the blog or at the end of the article so when they are reading your content they can easily just type in their email address. Have valuable content on your blog that requires the user to provide information to access it – that’s where they can fill the form and continue viewing the information they were accessing.

2. Use Twitter Cards

Twitter cards are one of the best ways to interact easily with your audience. Twitter lead generation cards increase conversion rates by capturing in-app form-fills from your followers.

Given the fact that you will be able to achieve much greater sign up rates using these cards, compared to trying to get people to leave Twitter to visit your website. With this card it becomes like an embedded landing page on your tweet.

3. Facebook Offers and Custom Tabs

In order to generate leads, your Facebook page must be a steady source of helpful, shareable information. Facebook offers are a great way to promote products and services on this platform and collect quality leads. Very similar to Twitter Cards. Facebook Offers work well is because when someone claims your offer; it shows up in their News Feed. Friends of that person can then see that their friend just claimed your offer. You see the viral effect here?

Another way is to use Facebook Custom Tabs for your page. Use fan-tatting and other user details gating to allow your audience participate in contests, games, giveaways. 

4. Use Facebook Applications and Ads

Creating Facebook applications for your contest are great ways for lead generation. So when the user accepts to use a Facebook application you can fetch all their details like email address, interest and much more with just one click of theirs.

Running ads on Facebook today is like breathing on Facebook for businesses. Use Facebook’s promoted post feature to highlight the content from your Facebook page or website. Share a link to your blog posts, products and services and even about your campaigns. With the consistent visibility offered by Facebook Ads will help you garner more leads.

5. Linkedin

LinkedIn is the best way to attract leads when it comes to customers, investors, business partners, sponsors, affiliates, and more. You must begin with making sure that your profile on LinkedIn is completed and is impressive. Then you can start networking in various groups, browse the directory of groups and choose the one which matches your company’s interest.

Identify the key members of the group who are very active, ask questions and answer them as well which provide value. Add them to your network, keep networking with them on this platform religiously and turn the conversations you have with them into a potential lead-builder for your business.

6. Slideshare

There is a need for visual element on social media, as readers are constantly inundated with text. With 60 million visits per month, Slideshare provides the perfect visual element for your posts. This service can help with attracting audiences who normally ignore the text or just skim through it.

One of the most popular features in SlideShare PRO is the lead generation program called LeadShare. Using LeadShare it makes it possible to collect targeted leads by embedding contact forms inside presentations, documents and videos.

7. Clear CTAs (Call-To-Action)

Your call-to-action (CTA) has to be very effective and clear, as it is one of the most important parts of capturing potential consumers for your product or service. A strong CTA on landing pages entices the reader to your website for some value additions for them.

For example you can provide content which is so engaging and which provides value to them, that it entices them to click on the link to read more. Thus your CTA has to be concise and to the point, but also entices the reader to actively participate in what you’re trying to sell them.

8. Giveaways And Freebies

The word ‘Free’ is very powerful, when your audience see that they are getting some perks they will happily comply. Giveaways and freebies are a great and sure shot way to increase leads. Like we at Digital Insights have this free ebook to drive sales through social media.

For example you can have a giveaway promotion that requires a sign-up page. Not only will they have a chance to win a great gift or some other perks, they will also be signing themselves thus giving you a chance to showcase your brands product and services.

9. Social Listening

Most companies monitor online conversations to keep a track of the sentiment towards the brand, but social listening also reveals opportunities to generate leads. Thus you can make use of various third party applications to keep an ear out and monitor how your customers and prospects are behaving on social media. This can be a great research tool as well for your brand to generate leads.

Use tools like Talkwalker, Hoostsuite, Sprinklr, to get started.

10. Google Analytics -To Track, Analyse And Rework

Use Google Analytics to track, analyse and streamline the entire process of lead generation. Once you have set up all the valuable information with Google Analytics, you can start tracking your conversions. Make sure to understand where people are clicking more on your lead generation forms.

You can monitor all the data and analyse if your marketing efforts are working towards your lead generation goal. If the results are not what you had anticipated, consider re-working on design/copy/strategy.

Lead generation is still the heart and soul of doing business, where the fact applies that eventually your audiences can be converted into your customers. With the above methods for generating leads online, should put your business at making headway and begin with generating substantial results according to your marketing plan.

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4 Ways to Use Social Media to Generate Leads

#1: Twitter Chats

Twitter chats are frequently scheduled discussions hosted by a Twitter account. Each chat uses a particular hashtag so that other Twitter users can follow the conversation even though topics change with each discussion.

Because of the focused audience communities that participate in Twitter chats, they are a great place to generate leads for your business.

The #SmallBizChat is an example of a Twitter chat that successfully engages its community every week.

How do you start? You can participate in Twitter chats in two ways: Join existing Twitter chats that are related to your industry or create and host your own Twitter chat. Whichever route you choose, join in on relevant chats that potential customers would be participating in to make sure you gain visibility with the right people.

You can find industry- and subject-specific chats that relate to your business in this extensive library of existing Twitter chats.

#Likeablechat is a weekly chat that offers social media tips and an opportunity to network with other marketers.

When participating in a Twitter chat, it’s important to be a good participant. This will help you to attract the leads you want for your business.

Use the hashtag set by the host. Ask and answer questions with contributions that are insightful and illustrate your understanding of the industry and your business offerings. Stay on topic and remember—this is not the forum for pitching your services.

Twitter chats are a place to establish thought leadership and credibility.

Join conversations in chat with valuable tips and insights to establish yourself as a credible source.

Here’s how to get the leads you’re looking for.

Once you’re taking part in a chat, research other participants who have tweeted you as part of the discussion or have participated in the chat overall.

Friendly conversation with other chat members can help strengthen your ties and build long-lasting relationships on Twitter.

Follow individuals who could be potential customers down the line and keep tabs on any of their conversations that relate to your services.

Tweet with these connections outside of the chat and, when the time is right,direct message them to share additional links to content or marketing materials you have that will further establish your expertise and what your business could offer them.

Be sensitive and strategic in your pitch. Don’t oversell, spam, over-tweet or be vague with these relationships.

Wait for the right time in conversation to message someone about your business offerings. When you focus on building the right relationships through your Twitter chats, you’re sure to gather leads.

#2: LinkedIn Groups

LinkedIn Groups are made up of a variety of subject areas, bringing together professionals of similar interests to discuss topics that relate to business. Again, you can find potential leads by either creating your own LinkedIn Group or by joining an existing group that focuses on your area of expertise.

While it’s possible to join up to 50 groups, I suggest you focus your efforts on a few of the right groups for your business.

Join LinkedIn Groups where potential customers or clients may be active, then engage in relevant conversations.

Browse the directory of groups to find the right match, join the discussions and connect with existing members. Begin by consistently posting your own content or others’ content that’s on topic. Participate in existing conversations by answering questions and providing resources.

People ask questions in almost every LinkedIn Group, answer them to bring value and help establish relationships.

Here’s how to get the leads you’re looking for.

Identify group members who continually ask questions about your line of business or members who are generally looking for help. Publicly answer their questions from within the group, providing value and using brevity, then follow up with a more in-depth message by using the Reply Privately feature. This way you have both a public and a private point of contact with them.

The Reply Privately feature is an often-overlooked tactic for generating quality leads from a one-on-one conversation where you’re able to provide value and build trust. This feature is found below a group member’s question under the More tab or by hovering over one of their comments in the discussion.

In your private message, answer their question in full and let them know you’re available to chat more extensively on the topic by phone, if need be. Phone calls within the right context, like a LinkedIn intro, are more likely than a cold call to turn this conversation into a potential lead-builder for your business.

When you focus on establishing credibility with the information you share and then take the relationships you make in LinkedIn Groups to the next step and one-on-one conversations, you’ll gather leads.

#3: Facebook Advertising

Running ads on Facebook can fulfill many different goals, one of which is generating leads from the right audience. Promoted Posts—an engaging form of Facebook advertising—highlight your content in the newsfeed of that audience.

Promoted Posts generate more views of your content than it would organically receive on its own on Facebook, giving it that extra boost.

While Facebook isn’t often conducive to direct sales, you can build trust with Facebook users when you consistently distribute quality content and engage in one-to-one communication through long-term interactions.

Use Promoted Posts to highlight quality content from your Facebook Page or your website. Share a link to your latest contest, ebook, instructional video, blog post, lookbook or other content that doesn’t send Facebook users directly to a product or services landing page.

Signup forms like this one from Offerpop require Facebook users to enter information about themselves in order to enter a contest or see original content.

Here’s how to get the leads you’re looking for.

To help you capitalize on the click-through of a Facebook user, use a signup form that reveals the content on your website or Facebook tab only after the user fills out any required information that you define. This could be an email address, demographic data or geographic location information.

The more information your business has about a Facebook user, the better you can personalize your future messaging to match their interests, making it more likely that they will convert from lead to customer in the future.

With a content strategy adapted to your audience on Facebook and the consistent visibility offered by Promoted Posts, you’ll likely gather leads from your community on Facebook.

#4: Google+ Hangouts

Google+ Hangouts on Air give you the ability to communicate directly with your audience online, in real time.

Consider hosting a hangout focused on your offerings as a business to show the audience your unique value and, most importantly, to show a human face behind your business.

The types of hangouts that are beneficial for lead generation are:

• Customer service sessions
• Interviews with experts and leaders
• Giveaways and contests
• Free product demos
  

  Sephora hosted a Google+ Hangout on Air to discuss what’s happening behind the scenes and to talk with beauty bloggers and experts about the latest trends in beauty.

There are many ways to host a Hangout on Air with your audience. You can allow anyone to join in the conversation or limit the discussion to a few individuals. Choose the approach best suited to your the goals.

From the beginning, define what you’re looking to achieve from your hangout and how you plan to connect with your audience before, during and after the event.

Here’s how to get the leads you’re looking for.

Offer value above all, and use strong calls to action throughout your Hangout on Air. Encourage participants and viewers to interact with your business, learn more about your offerings and give people the tools and information they need to make an informed decision about their purchases.

Record your Google+ hangout and save it to YouTube so you can use the video in a blog post, share it across social media and add it to relevant YouTube playlists.

To further drive leads for your business, add links to the products and services discussed on the hangout in the description of the YouTube video for easy reference.

In the YouTube video from their hangout, Sephora included links to the products they discussed to make it as easy as possible for people to become customers.

Google+ Hangouts on Air offer businesses a great opportunity to create content and connect with potential clients.

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