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We all agree that lead generation is the most important aspect of B2B marketing. It can be considered as one of the building blocks of any successful marketing campaign, which leads to increased revenue and scalability for your business. However, it can prove to be challenging, especially if you’re a small company without a big budget. In fact, according to a survey done by Inside View you could be losing as much as 85% of your marketing budget on ineffective B2B lead generation campaigns.
You need to employ a full-funnel, multi-channel strategy with a consistent messaging that precisely targets people that are most likely to convert. In this blog, I am going to share an 8 step lead generation strategy that is sure to garner qualified leads.
Winning Steps for B2B Lead Generation Strategy
You will also get to know the ways to determine where your potential customer base is, ways to identify the cost for each channel, and ways to maximize performance.
1. Define your target audience thoroughly
Clearly identifying your target audience is the first step of any successful lead generation campaign. If you are wondering how to find out who to target, know that you don’t have to play a guessing game. It is quite possible that you already have all the data that you need to identify your audience.
Google Analytics provides you with all the information you need including the audience demographics, such as age, gender, location, etc. You can find and analyze all this data through Google Analytics and figure out who you should be targeting.
You can even find what your competitors are doing by looking at prime conversion data that Google Analytics offers. However, you should be vigilant when interpreting that data because not everything that works for your competitors is sure to work for you.
By thoroughly analyzing all this data in Google Analytics, you should clearly know who to target, which channels to use, and what your competitors are doing that’s helping them.
2. Test and compare your strategy
This step requires a lot of competitor research. The aim is to find out what your competitors are doing. Moreover, what’s working for them and what’s not working for them.
You might be wondering how you’ll be able to get all this data. This is where Google Analytics Benchmark Reports, SEMrush, SpyFu, and other software come in. These tools can help you figure out the channels your competitors are using, and also the budget that they are spending on those channels.
Figure out these key things:
- Are you spending as much as your competitors are?
- Figure out your channel-wise cost per acquisition.
- If you can scale each channel or not.
- Understand the market saturation for all the channels.
- Do you have a plan of action to increase conversions for less cost?
You won’t be able to answer these questions at the start. You will have to run tests on ads and you will also have to make changes on the landing page, targeting, and other factors.
Now that you’ve done your research, you should evaluate all the available channels for marketing that are available and which ones, according to your research are the highest converting ones. It would allow you to choose the platforms that have the potential to fulfill your lead generation goals.
3. Make an offer
Once all the research is done, you can then move on to actionable steps. The first thing that you should consider is your offer. In B2B marketing, it is really important to make an offer that is significant. The reason is that you’re dealing with businesses and they require a profitable bargain. They’ll only share their information when you incentivize doing so.
Some of the ways you can do it are:
• Quizzes
Focus on the pain point while creating your quiz. For example, you can ask people, ‘How much will you save on rent by staying with us?’. You’re basically highlighting your USPs by first highlighting a problem and then offering a solution.
The title needs to be catchy enough so that people are compelled to click. Not just the title but the whole ad copy should be strong and catchy.
• Webinars
Webinars are an amazing way to add people to your funnel. Host a webinar about your industry topics and invite experts to talk. Relevant people are going to come looking for information. You can advertise it along with a registration form to get your prospects’ details.
• Case studies
Case studies are important when it comes to B2B lead generation. It’s only logical that businesses want to make sure that you have the expertise in your industry and case studies are the best way to showcase your successful projects.
Now you can use case studies in multiple ways. You can use them on landing pages, post on social media, use them for link bait, just to name a few.
• Industry awards
You might not think of awards as an important aspect of lead generation but they definitely make a huge difference when it comes to differentiating your business for others in the industry.
Figure out the industry-specific awards and work towards winning them. Once you have them, display them as badges so that people know about your accomplishments. You can even launch your own awards in your industry. It is an amazing way of letting your potential clients know that you have what they’re looking for.
4. Advertise your B2B offers
It’s time to choose your offer or offers that are irresistible and advertise them. You will have to be more creative while advertising your offers. You can use client testimonials, pain points, and you can even answer the burning questions that are industry-specific.
You can make use of three compelling video formats to advertise your offers.
• Explainer videos
The videos describe a problem and propose the product or service as a solution.
• The product demo video
Set the product up as the hero and showcase all the key aspects of your business.
• Offer video
This type of video has a direct offer or a deal that is compelling enough for people to click.
5. Analyze user’s responses to your campaigns
Running advertising campaigns is one thing but analyzing the campaigns to the minute details is what actually leads to more effective and targeted campaigns. You will have to analyze each area from the highest converting frames to the best performing sequences. You need to know everything that’s working and not working.
This would help you in your retargeting campaigns and the new campaigns as well because you will have an idea about the kind of ads that are working. This is indeed an effective method of B2B advertising, in fact, this is what’s going to help you achieve your advertising goals.
Test your ad creatives and targeting performance
As aforementioned, consistent testing is the key. You have to periodically test the creatives that you are using, and also your ad targeting. This would tell you which audience segment is responding well so that you can focus more on that.
For a multi-channel lead generation campaign, you need to test the performance of different platforms that you are using. Figure out which are getting the most conversions and which ad groups are giving you the best return on ad spend (ROAS).
- Divide your resources strategically.
- Use at least five marketing channels e.g., SEO, Google Search, Facebook, etc.
- Define your advertising goals as clearly as possible.
6. Run data-driven advertising campaigns
Everyone is trying to get more and more leads and running advertisements left right and center. You need to be different in order to get your share in a highly competitive market.
Now how can you be different? You don’t have to do anything out of ordinary. All you have to do is to leverage data. Gather and make use of data, that’s all you need.
It has been found that data-driven advertising campaigns yield 60% more conversions. Why? Because data helps you pinpoint where you are spending money, which target segment is responding well, where the quality leads are coming from.
All this data can give you immense control of your advertising campaign and can help you achieve your targets effectively.
Now that you know how important data analysis is, you might want to ask how to gather all this data. This is where the tools come in. There are several tools out there that can help you track performance, gather data, and visualize it.
You will have to look at conversion tracking tools, user behavior analytics, multi-domain tracking tools, and cross-channel attribution. These will give you all the data you need in order to optimize your campaigns.
Gather and centralize data sources
Once your multi-channel lead generation campaign is up and running, you’ll notice that all the channels are showing activity and you might get lost in a pool of data coming from different sources. The solution to that is to gather all the platforms under one umbrella. This would allow you to track and analyze every single channel simultaneously.
You can make use of software like Google Data Studio or even Microsoft’s Power Bi. Once this is done, you’ll have all the data right in front of you to analyze and cross-compare.
7. Foster your leads
How do you convert people who have shown interest in your campaigns into qualified leads? You work on them, foster them to the point that they convert. You will do this by launching and retaining a retargeting campaign with a smooth sales funnel aimed at potential leads.
Understand that the objective of B2B lead generation is to keep the pipeline full of a consistent stream of qualified leads. This can only happen when your lead nurturing or lead fostering strategies are right on the money.
Some of the most effective lead nurturing strategies are:
• Use of Social Media
You can effectively use social media by giving away valuable information with a call to action to make users check out the gated content that requires giving contact information.
• Ads
Ad types such as remarketing ads and features are aimed at helping you generate consistent B2B leads by nurturing them over time.
• Referrals
Build a network of people interested or related to your business with your brand name attached to it. This leads to more people knowing about your brand via referrals, eventually giving you qualified leads.
8. Make use of email marketing
Lead generation agencies in Dubai and around the world agree that email marketing is one of the most effective ways of generating qualified B2B leads. The process starts with getting the contact details. This can be done either on the website or other channels such as social media. For example, to generate leads from LinkedIn there are free LinkedIn lead generation software available to use for your B2B lead generation and prospecting.
You can use tools such as Email capture pop-ups, Nano bars, etc. You should make sure that all the pages on the website are mapped to micro-conversion.
You will have to be creative to be able to make people stay on the website, complete an action, or give their contact details. You make use of Exit Pop-Ups, On-Site Email Acquisition, Welcome Automations, Abandonment Automations, etc. to entice people with compelling offers and reminders.
This increases the number of people engaging with the website drastically. As I said, you will have to be creative enough for it to work, otherwise, there is a risk that people might get annoyed with the pop-ups or reminders.
Conclusion
This is it for today’s blog. I hope you enjoyed reading it and that you’ve learned a thing or two about B2B lead generation. Use this strategy to get consistent qualified leads for your business. Reach out to me if you have any questions or comments.
If you are a business owner looking for qualified leads, contact Prism Digital , the best lead generation agency in Dubai and our expert advertisers will help you achieve your goals by devising and launching effective lead generation strategies. I will see you on the other side. Thank you and Goodbye.
About The Author: Lovetto Nazareth
Lovetto Nazareth is a digital marketing consultant and agency owner of Prism Digital. He has been in the advertising and digital marketing business for the last 2 decades and has managed thousands of campaigns and generated millions of dollars of new leads. He is an avid adventure sports enthusiast and a singer-songwriter. Follow him on social media on @Lovetto Nazareth