B2B Lead Generation Strategy
Without leads, there are no prospects. Without prospects, there can be no conversions, no clients, no revenue. Clearly, B2B lead generation strategy is of critical importance to any organisation.
Producing a steady flow of leads you can score, nurture, and convert is a matter of consistent effort, experimentation and the ongoing cultivation of relationships. Inbound marketing is a tried and tested framework that allows you to do that, and to create a blend of strategies that produce excellent results tailored to your audience.
Content Marketing
Content marketing is the first pillar of your inbound lead generation strategy. Research shows that a consistent and high-quality content strategy generates x3 leads and increases conversion rates x6. Regularly publishing engaging, valuable and targeted content establishes your authority, fuels your social and SEO presence, and drives visitors who are already primed to resonate with your offer to your website and landing pages. Explore and experiment with different forms of content to learn which ones resonate with your audience. Thought leadership, white papers and case studies are great places to start. You can find more ideas in our overview of different types of content marketing, our article on content marketing for creative industries, and our article on content marketing for ‘boring’ businesses.
Social Marketing
Cultivating an active and engaged social media presence is a critical part of B2B digital marketing when used strategically. Although the ROI is hard to measure and conversion rates are lower than other B2B channels, social is essential for creating top of funnel awareness, extending your brand reach, listening to your audience and driving traffic to your website.
Take care over your choice of social media platform and focus on the ones that can help to generate potentail leads. The B2B platform of choice is LinkedIn, where a strong company page, individual profiles for each member of your team and excellent audience targeting capabilities give you multiple opportunities to create direct links with potential sales leads.
Paid Advertising
While content and social media are strategies that take time to build, paid advertising can produce immediate results. PPC campaigns that translate into improved search results can be expensive, but social media advertising is often more affordable and offers granular targeting options. LinkedIn ads, in particular, provide the opportunity to reach a highly engaged B2B focused audience in order to find potential leads.
Email Marketing
Content, social and paid advertising will drive traffic to your website, but until you capture individuals' contact information and email address it doesn’t convert to leads. An opt-in email form, incentivised with a valuable lead magnet offering your visitor something they need in return for their basic contact details, is the beginning. From lead capture, subsequent emails allow you to gather further information and progressively build their profile, inform them about your offering and help them become ready to purchase. The beauty of email is in the data. Your ROI is easy to measure, you're able to segment and personalise based on the intelligence you've gathered, and analysis allows you to improve your performance.
Marketing Automation
Marketing automation is the set of tools that can help you pull together the different branches of inbound marketing into a comprehensive and measurable lead generation strategy.
Automatic scheduling can create awareness and presence through content and social. The right tools can make creating multiple social posts a doddle.
Integrating your site with contact and account management allows you to capture and score leads through opt-in forms and personalised landing pages.
Automatic delivery of white papers and follow-up emails delivers an efficient and helpful service with minimal administrative overhead.
Intelligently maintaining a record of ongoing interactions with your content, website visitors, social channels and email allows you to understand more dimensions of your customer relationships. This enriches your relationships and allows for conversations that are timely, informed, personalised and relevant.
Taken together, these interactions tell you more generally about what works for your audience and can work as automatic lead generation. This unique insight into how people engage with your business serves as real-time market research into your next lead generation campaigns.
