The best way for small businesses to get ahead in the current era is by using effective digital marketing practices. Digital marketing typically includes various activities; however, one of the most important ones for growing your business is lead generation.
Lead generation can be defined as the process of finding potential customers for your business’s products and/or services, and reaching out to them successfully. Every time you generate a new lead you are adding more potential customers to your customer base.
These leads can then be “nurtured” during the buying process so that they are converted into paying customers. Most small businesses could greatly benefit by improving their lead generation practices. However, many small business owners are unfamiliar with the right methods for generating leads for their business.
So here are 4 ideas to generate leads for your business.
1. Facebook ad marketing
It should come as no surprise that Facebook is one of the most-visited websites on the internet. The platform boasts over 2.6 billion monthly active users, which makes it a great site for generating leads.
Sending traffic from your Facebook ad to a landing page that has been tailored for lead generation is an effective way to identify and pull in high-value leads. A good way to draw people’s attention is to hold contests on your landing page.
Marketers should create a Facebook ad that focuses on an attractive contest prize and targets people who are likely to click on the ad. This prize should be valuable enough to draw people’s attention, but not so expensive that it diminishes your ROI.
Once users are directed to your landing page via the Facebook ad, they should be presented with a contest sign up page that requires them to enter their email address. This gives you valuable lead information that can be used to nurture your lead in the future.
Marketers should hold this contest for a few weeks so that it draws in a large number of leads before the winner is announced. This strategy is a win-win, as one lucky participant gets to enjoy a prize, while your business gets numerous high-value leads.
2. Influencer marketing
Influencers are everywhere in 2020. They occupy a significant amount of space on most people’s social media feeds, and have a disproportionate amount of pull when it comes to boosting or tarnishing a business’s reputation. Whether you love influencers or hate them, your business will need their assistance if you wish to generate a sizable number of leads in a short amount of time.
One unique lead generation strategy involves reaching out to micro-influencers. This refers to influencers with a small number of very engaged followers. Contacting micro-influencers whose interests align with your brand could be more beneficial than using an influencer with a larger but less engaged following.
People who hold loyalties towards certain micro-influencers are more likely to be receptive to your business’s products/services, so marketers should reach out to the right micro-influencers to generate leads for their business.
There are many ways to select the right influencer for the job, but you should generally use one who can feature or mention your products/services in a context where it seems natural and less-overtly promotional.
For example, if your business manufactures flour, you should reach out to micro-influencers on Instagram that focus on baking recipes. These influencers could mention that your company’s flour was one of the essential ingredients that helped them create pancakes with an especially light and fluffy texture. The influencer’s followers will then be interested in trying out the recipe by purchasing your company’s flour.
3. Feature guest bloggers on your site
It’s common to see guest bloggers post on company websites in 2020. These people are similar to influencers in that they have a large following of dedicated users. However, these bloggers may not explicitly be involved with promoting or reviewing products/services.
When a guest blogger writes a blog or an article for your website, their following is likely to visit your website and develop an interest in your products/services. The blogger may not even need to mention your company by name, as you are already achieving your goal by getting new people to visit your website.
This can be a great way to generate leads as long as you choose a suitable blogger. You will have more success if you select a blogger who is considered an authority figure in their industry. These individuals usually have a following of users who actively seek out their opinion and guidance regardless of the site they are guest blogging for.
4. Optimize your site pages for lead generation
One of the most common methods used to generate leads in the digital era is to simply create content that attracts users to your website. It’s possible to pull in visitors from organic search results by uploading high-performing SEO optimized content that is valuable and interesting to your audience.
Marketers can use analytics tools such as Google Analytics to identify pages on their company site that are performing well with audiences and optimize the pages for lead generation. This optimization process typically includes strategic placement of exact-match keywords on your page. However, there are many other ways to improve your page’s SEO.
Another simple method involves speeding up your site so that visitors are less likely to turn away while it is loading. You can do this by compressing your site’s images and by using browser caching to reduce load times for people who have visited your site before.
These are just a few of the numerous ways to generate leads for your business in 2020. Most marketers use a combination of the aforementioned strategies, but they are always on the look-out for new ways to draw in new leads.
These marketing strategies are always changing, so it’s important to stay up to date with lead generation practices in the digital era to ensure your business isn’t left behind.
