Understanding Lead Generation

November 11, 2017 - By James

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Did you know that 61% of marketers reported that generating high quality leads was problematic for their organization! That’s a large number! However, if you can learn to target your leads, you can make lead generation less problematic!

Leads are aptly named because they LEAD you to new business. In order to grow, you need to generate leads so consumers can purchase from you. Let’s learn about the ins and outs of lead generation!

LEADS = REVENUE

Leads are tomorrow’s revenues. Do you want revenue tomorrow? Of course you do and of course you want leads. Each brand, organization and entity can benefit from capturing leads. Interruption marketing is dying quickly; in place is what we call permission marketing. Just as the name sounds, you are receiving permission to market to people.

HOW TO CAPTURE LEADS

Generating and capturing leads is an art form. You cannot just ask for permission and get it. Sorry, it doesn’t work like that. Good influence and perception of value are the key motivating factors in permission marketing. Here is the basic understanding of what is taking place:

First, provide or demonstrate value (Perceived is received).
Secondly, ask for permission to advance the relationship (Capture lead).

WHERE TO CAPTURE LEADS?

Let’s face it; the world is digital. Knowing that, we should proceed accordingly. Here are some places to capture leads:

Websites

There is not a better time or place to ask for permission to market than when a visitor is on your site. Now is a great time to ask.

Contact Forms- You should have forms that are easy to access throughout your site. It’s important you DO NOT use pop-up forms on the first page. Pop-ups on the first page are annoying and no one has learned enough about you in 10 seconds to give you permission for anything. You can place contact forms towards the top or bottom of the page for ease of use. You can also use sidebars, side menus, or columns for contact forms.
Offers- Creating offers that provide value in exchange for permission to market are quite successful currently. Perhaps it’s an ebook, download or a membership; all of these are ways to help generate leads on your website. “Want to download this amazing value? Give me your name and email address and I will send it to you!” Pretty simple, and it works.
Landing pages are being abused but, because they work great for niche markets, everyone assumes they will work for them. The truth is most landing pages will fail. People progressively learn about tactics being applied and make smarter choices. If people cannot learn about who is offering this product and review their site, they keep going in most cases. This is why most landing pages have a low conversion rate. Please consider utilizing your full website before turning to landing pages.

Social Media

Contact Forms- You can create forms for people to fill out that will integrate with your email marketing software or database. This way people on social media can sign up to be marketed to directly.

Advertising

One of the fastest ways to gain attention is to pay for an audience. It’s then up to your content or offer to convert people into leads.

LEAD GENERATION

Capturing leads is an action but generating leads is a process. Lead generation is based on building relationships through consistency and knowledge. Capturing leads is a form, whereas generating a lead is establishing the why someone should provide permission to you so that you may market to him. What are some ways to generate leads? Targeting leads will provide a better return than not targeting, simple as that. Take your time to develop an understanding of your target audiences.

Social Media

Social media is where consumers are at. Businesses do not spend billions advertising on Facebook because they enjoy it. We do it because that’s where our target audience is. We go where the people are. If you expect to gain awareness and interest, social is a great place to start. Learn how to leverage social as an advantage. Become proactive in the social game.

SEO

SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization which is a fancy way of saying we use keywords that people are using and get other websites to link to us as we do to them so we are a legitimate source.
SEO brings you one of the most targeted audiences you could ever dream of. You can check what your keywords are that are most searched and then find out if your site is trying to pull those people. Understand there are consumers out there who are searching for either you or something you offer and you are choosing to either pull that business to you or you are choosing to let it go without a fight.
If consumers can find you easily, it improves your chance of gaining them as customers. To learn more about good SEO practices, read this!

Referrals

All too often in the digital world referrals become forgotten. Word of mouth is still the largest contributing factor to an organization’s bottom line. Encourage referrals but do it in a way that is personable. Social media testimonials lead can lead to referrals. Ask for feedback from customers and most importantly ask for referrals. When you qualify how a customer came to be it will help you understand what works best and what you should work on more.

Advertising

I cannot tell you how many times I have become aware of great products or services through advertising. I may have not have purchased right away, but it surely started the lead generation process for myself. I believe advertising if done right will bring leads even if they do not purchase immediately.

QUESTIONS TO ASK YOURSELF

Leads can be captured in a variety of ways. You may offer a service for free in exchange for a lead. You may offer a product in exchange for a lead. You may offer nothing and still capture a lead. Here are the questions you must answer:

What are we doing that makes consumers want to stay informed about what we are doing?
- If you are knowledgeable, then share your knowledge so, when people have problems in your area of expertise they are are unable to solve, they will turn to you. This is a great way to build subscribers.

Do we capture leads knowing that 98% of people do not buy on the first visit to our site?
- Plan out your site for returning visitors. Put time and resources into developing a site that is user-focused.

Do we capture leads for future products and services?
- Offering a new product or service? Market ahead of business to raise awareness that something is coming and anyone who wants to stay in the know can provide an email address. One email on launch and sales will be there.

Do we capture leads to supply high-quality content to win the hearts and minds of our target audience?
- Supply content that is personable and relevant. Don’t become sales pitchy in your content with self promotion. Provide value and/or entertainment. What would your customers (friends) like to spend time viewing? Provide that and good influence will go a long way.

CONCLUSION

There is not one thing you can do to generate and capture leads. It’s a process that is built around consumers. Ask yourself this important question: What leads should we capture and how would they like to be treated? If you can target your audience, you can gain leads. If you can gain leads, you can increase business. Isn’t that the ultimate goal? Remember, leads are tomorrow’s revenue.

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