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Successful lead generation is a goal for every business. But it's hard to get good leads and it's tough to do consistently!
Recently, I spoke with a salesperson for a technology service who has been experiencing difficulty due to decreased lead flow. He claimed that organic traffic to his website brought him four or five leads per week a few years ago. He believed his company had everything figured out. The situation then slowly deteriorated over the previous two years. A few of his company's SEO rankings dropped. The market was flooded with new rivals. The leads began to run out. He now enjoys receiving two each month.
Again, it's hard to generate leads consistently. However, it is not impossible. If the appropriate systems are in place, you can consistently generate leads for nearly any industry and almost any type of business month after month. Are you fed up with marketing that doesn't work for you? Start doing instead of trying. We'll go over the three lead-generation strategies that we've found to be the most effective.
These three B2B lead ages methodologies are: B2B lead generation via account-based marketing (ABM), inbound marketing, and outbound marketing are all viable options, but one or two of them will probably be more successful in your competition. The most important thing is to pick the best ones and use them well.
Let's begin with that in mind!
1. Account-Based Marketing (ABM)
The best way to consistently generate leads is to run an account-based marketing campaign if you are targeting a specific market segment with a high-priced product or service. A brief metric: How many businesses worldwide would be a good fit for your product or service? If it is less than 5,000, traditional inbound marketing will never produce consistent leads. Inbound promotion depends on individuals tracking you down; The problem with niche B2B industries is that not enough people are looking for them. Even if they are, it is difficult to attract everyone to visit you.
By reversing the process, ABM solves the issue: Your marketing is focused on finding your ideal customers and is customized for each account. It functions because it reaches a predetermined audience. You determine the characteristics of accounts that make excellent customers; You won't waste time on prospects who aren't aligned. This allows you to personalize your message. ABM campaigns can include personalization (first name, company name, location, etc.) because they are so targeted. You can engage your ideal accounts with consistent marketing to increase conversions after selecting them.
This is like fishing in a stocked pond that only has the kinds and sizes of fish you want to catch.
So, How Should An ABM Campaign Be Run To Consistently Generate Leads?
We have previously provided a more in-depth description of ABM campaigns; however, here is a summary:
Create the Campaign Plan The tools you'll use in ABM are probably ones you already know: email, paid ads, social media, website pages, and so on.
For instance, as part of your ABM campaign, you might use social media; however, you won't just post general LinkedIn posts on your page. Instead, you could upload a list of companies you want to advertise to in a very specific way. Create a strategy to figure out how to reach this audience. Which methods will you employ? How much can you customize? How frequently are the points of contact? Which areas of concern will you concentrate on for the various segments? It's critical to take note that ABM isn't something that exists rigorously in the advertising field. It is closely linked to sales. Personal emails and phone calls to contacts that appear to be hot leads should therefore be included. Acquire a List You may already have a list of ideal accounts with all of the information you need to effectively market to them. If so, excellent! Give yourself a high-five.
However, this is not always the case. The information you have about your contacts may be out of date. You may have no list at all.
You have two choices if you do not have the ideal list:
Add your list to it. You can use a list appending service to connect physical addresses with emails, phone numbers, and other information if you only have the name and address from a mailing that you send out every year but do not have the emails of your contacts. This is very affordable.
Order a list. This is a topic worthy of its article; however, if you do not already have a list, you can purchase one through Engage48 B2B data solutions.
It doesn't matter how you get your list; the most important thing is that it fits your target audience. The better your results will be, the more strongly you can filter these contacts. If you don't start with a solid list of verified contacts, you'll set yourself up for failure.
Last but not least, you will probably want to add multiple contacts to each account. Even though you might think you know the person who is making the purchase, one of the unique aspects of B2B selling is most decisions are evaluated and decided by a buying committee. You will have more chances to connect with the CTO, CIO, and office manager if you target them. Execute now that you know who you're aiming for, have a list of your contacts, and know how to get in touch with them.
You should also score everything your sales and marketing team does. Metrics are your friends, like conversion rates, open rates, time spent on the page, and bounce rates. Make use of the information to improve your campaign. Are you having great success on LinkedIn, but your display ads aren't working? Change the spending. Do you have a high bounce rate on your landing page? Change in response to your heat mapping and site analytics. Is there a low rate of click-throughs in your emails? Adjust the content or design, and carry out some A/B testing. You will be well on your way to consistently generating B2B leads if you pay attention to the data. You will be able to continuously optimize your campaign.
2. Inbound Marketing
You should almost certainly invest in inbound marketing if you serve a larger audience of more than 5,000 potential customers. Hubspot defines inbound marketing as a business methodology that attracts customers by creating valuable content and experiences tailored to them. In contrast to outbound marketing, which proactively reaches out to your audience with content they don't always want, inbound marketing helps them solve problems they already have and make the connections they're looking for. It works because it makes it easier for people like you who are looking for solutions to find yours. So, how should an inbound marketing campaign be carried out? Again, we have gone into greater detail about the intricacies of inbound before, but here is a summary.
Identify your target market.
Keep in mind that inbound marketing won't work for you if your market is too small. So, the first thing you need to do is make sure that enough people are looking for your product and, more importantly, will buy from you. Before you can generate leads, you will need to identify three primary aspects of this cross-section.
What is this person looking for?
As you begin to hone in on your target audience, this is the most fundamental inquiry you can make and also the most significant one. You can position your offering to satisfy your buyer's needs if you can determine what your ideal buyer wants from your offering.
What kind of person is this?
Demographics and psychographics are the topics we cover here: Ethnicity, age, level of education, job title, interests, dislikes, and family life buyer persona is created using this information, which will also be used to shape message construction (what) and placement (where).
Where and how does this individual purchase?
As you identify your customer, this is the final clarification. You can focus your marketing efforts there if you know where they shop. For instance, if your customer is a 55-year-old man, you won't run a Pinterest campaign. But after that, it gets a little more complicated. On some channels, your customer is more likely to purchase than on others. They may be on Facebook, but they only use it for fun, and the majority of their business purchases are made via email. Though not easy to acquire the above information, conducting market research and speaking with real potential buyers will throw useful pointers. Your chances of failing will rise if you make assumptions.
Create compelling messages.
You can figure out how to describe your offering once you know who you are going to speak to.
A powerful message:
speaks to your customer's paint needs and wants.
explains the stakes.
is simple to comprehend.
is dependable.
At a strategic level, you ought to foster these informing records:
A paragraph outlining the stakes the buyer faces in making the purchase Empathy and authority statements positioning your company as the best solution A one-sentence tagline Spend time on these things but don't rely on your opinion to determine which message is best. 3-4 of your offering's unique value propositions 3-6 of your buyer's biggest pain points change your message based on how well or poorly it is received by the audience.
Reach your customers with your message.
When most people think of inbound lead generation, this is the first step they think of, and many businesses want to skip this step when they start inbound marketing.
As a B2B digital lead gen agency, we frequently receive inquiries from businesses seeking lead generation, which they typically interpret as message promotion. However, lead generation and message promotion are ineffective without a precise buyer persona and an effective message.
Your message must reach enough people to generate leads.
This is what digital marketers refer to as traffic generation. We've found that to consistently generate leads, you usually need to send your message to at least 1,000 people every month.
The simplest method for determining whether you are doing this: examine visitors to your website. Last month, did 1,000 people visit your website? If not, you probably need to drive more traffic.
Naturally, this varies based on your conversion rate, which we will discuss in a moment. However, it is a useful general standard to keep in mind. With 1,000 users and a conversion rate of 2%, which is about average, you will convert 20 contacts each month. The majority of businesses with a lead problem simply do not reach enough people with their messages.
You can increase traffic by:
SEO Paid ads on social media (mostly social or search ads), but you have to get people to your site. Inbound marketing will not be successful without traffic.
3. Outbound Marketing
Alright, we've reached the third and final method for generating B2B leads: outbound marketing.
If you have an established buyer universe that you can serve, outbound marketing will have the greatest impact. However, you must raise brand awareness in the market. In contrast to account-based marketing, it does not target particular accounts. The market is large enough that conducting client-specific research probably isn't worth your time (and may come across as odd). However, like ABM, outbound requires you to establish the initial connection. Think of cold calling campaigns to large lists, placements on billboards, and trade show booths. Even though doing these things takes a lot of time, they can have a big impact on getting leads. So, how should an outbound marketing campaign be carried out? There is a lot that could be said about this, but I want to concentrate on three main aspects of an efficient outbound lead generation campaign.
To begin, you must target the appropriate locations.
Attend trade shows like CES or Cisco Live if you sell SaaS to IT companies, for instance. You could advertise in WIRED; An advertisement would not appear in Home and Garden. The foundation of successful outbound marketing must be successful client research. When messages are seen by the right people at the right times, they work.
Second, marketing and sales must work together.
The sales team is directly involved in many outbound campaigns. A campaign of cold calling can't be run without sales, and it won't work if your sales team speaks a different language than your website's marketing materials. Take the time to carefully coordinate between sales and marketing when running an outbound campaign to ensure consistency and follow-through. You should keep track of everything.
Although they can still be tracked, outbound activities can be slightly more difficult to measure than inbound activities. What number of leads came through from the expo? How many cold calls must be made before a proposal can be made? You shouldn't be doing marketing if you can't measure it.
Are You Prepared To Begin Generating B2B Leads?
Look, lead generation always goes through ups and downs. Things shift. However, you can increase your consistency and position your business for growth by utilizing the appropriate combination of the strategies above, intelligently implementing tactics, and optimizing your results over time.
About Engage48
Engage48 is a full-service B2B Content Marketing and Appointment Setting Agency servicing B2B marketers worldwide on their digital lead generation programs. We also provide accurate and verified b2b contact data for your marketing and sales outreach programs.
We support business owners, b2b marketing, and sales heads in their quest for qualified leads. Whether you are looking to promote your b2b offerings to IT directors, HR heads, CFOs, CMOs, or the executive suite you can rely on our targeted lead generation and appointment-setting programs to produce the desired outcomes. And on a budget!
