Which B2B lead generation strategies work?
According to HubSpot’s study, SEO is the best identifiable channel for generating B2B leads. While some other survey sites, claim email marketing to be the most effective channel for B2B lead generation in 2020. Refer to this B2B lead generation guide for 2020 and various other survey reports which define social media and content marketing to be most effective forms of lead generation.
Because of the different groups of people targeted by the survey sites, it has become obvious that different sites prefer different methods to be optimum for B2B lead generation. The variations in the participants’ skills, competency, and opinions changes the symmetry of the results.
- Email marketing
- Search marketing
- Social marketing
- Content marketing
- Conversion rate optimization
24 Strategies for Generating B2B Leads
Let us cover the best strategies to gain B2B leads. We will be unfolding above discussed 4 strategies, into topics that will help you understand the whole process of attracting leads.
Firstly, let’s discuss the most basic and most used method: email marketing.
Email marketing strategies to generate B2B leads
Emails still triumphs online marketing according to some channels, even after more than two decades of arrival. It genuinely deserves recognition when it comes to gathering B2B leads. Because of its results, it appears on top lists of B2B marketing companies.
#1: Automate your lead gen & email marketing campaigns
By opting for automated email, a lots of manual work of list management, targeting user’s behavior and other tasks, and will results of finding leads residing very close to the expectations.
The enhancement of results from automation has made it one of the trendiest choice of marketing companies.
#2: Build a free tool to reel leads in
Offer free tools in the website, as an attraction to get people to sign up for your services and generate more leads to opt for B2B marketing for your organization.
Through the free app, create a ‘call to action’, for all the users. It is a great way to bring forward the interested people in participating for the services offered by your website. Call to action through free apps are a very subtle way of redirection.
All you have to do is type in your email address and hit the button to get your heat map, which promises better website performance instantly.
#3: Give something away for ‘free’
This email lead generation strategy is something of a classic but not many brands really pull it off. Today’s internet users are so used to being promised something for free that it’s lost all meaning – not to mention, most of the “freebies” are worth nothing to begin with.
With this strategy, we don’t mean to target freebies located all over the internet. We mean to propose free proposal templates with emails and turn freebies into paying customers. The purpose of useful and free templates is to convince free users to opt for paid services. This strategy is classic, yet many brands fail to pull off this basic trick to generate leads.
By not targeting freebies, we don’t mean to devalue them. The free users are the majority while the business works on internet, and it is necessary to understand the value the free users bear to induce.
#4: Create referral campaigns to turn email leads into… more email leads
Set up fully automated referral campaigns, using automation workflow; convince existing leads to create referrals for you; in return for strong incentive. Convince all your leads to promote your business, ask them to spread the work, by offering them a hefty award in return.
Automated referral campaigns are easy, they don’t require you to do all the labour. Rather all the referral work is done by your current customers. Automating the whole process can do wonder for your lead generation scheme.
#5: Create re-engagement & customer retention campaigns
Follow customer retention campaigns, like the re-engagement campaign of Grammarly, you can follow them. The leads turns dead within a day, it does not take time for them to lose interest. To avoid the chance of losing a lead, is through re-engaging email. It’s a mail sent to an inactive user who has not used the service for a while, and by awarding them with some null achievement to attract them in re-using the service.
Participate in re-engagement and customer retention campaigns. It is immensely effective according to B2B lead generation guide for 2020.
Content marketing strategies to generate B2B leads
B2B decision makers have observed that majority of B2B buyers self-educate themselves in the younger stages of buying process. They ought not to depend on the advertisements that inform them about the product.
A friendly information source should be a reflective image of your B2B marketing campaign. It will attract people to make the call for themselves, whether they are interested in doing business.
#6: Create an automated webinar strategy
One of the most efficient ways for B2B marketing leads is conducting webinar. They are preferred by majority of B2B professionals. And by opting for automated webinar strategy, a lots of leads can be attracted to the B2B marketing.
#7: Turn your blog posts into in-depth guides
Build your website approachable and appealing with investing time and money on content. Create your own blog, third party sites, social media channels and more promotional content. The investment made on these in-depth material needs to be genuine and valuable.
Create blog posts/content related to the relevant topics to B2B marketing, make the blog posts as small-small parts of a guide which will motivate your readers to lean towards services offered by your website. The content created should be attractive, engaging and should be relevant to the market.
Since the website has a traffic, you know that your audience is interested in the topics discussed on it. Now, you have to focus mainly on the posts where the major interest of the audience lies. Based on the analytics you need to direct your content. These small engaging pieces of content lead to greater lead generation in longer run.
On social media, you can minimize the content posted on the website. With the help of social media, you can target the same group of audience, all you need to do is to redirect them to the website link. It is immensely effective according to B2B lead generation guide for 2020.
#8: Add dynamic CTAs to your blog posts
Locate CTAs on the blog posts, suggesting the readers to download the in-depth guide on the services offered by you. We have to utilize their interest that they already demonstrated, and lead them to a pathway for them to gain more information. Adding dynamic CTAs can be used to turn website users into email leads; and will increase the number of downloads exponentially.
With implementing CTA, we aim to turning as many users into leads rather than losing their engagement and losing them to the other platforms.
#9: Generate email leads from video views
Place sign up CTAs on your videos. Catch the viewers on sight, don’t let them just walk away from the video. Give them a redirection towards the website and Email campaign. Engage them effectively and make use of the CTA appliance to make the hard work worth some leads.
You can choose the CTA to appear whenever you want it to be there on the video and customized messages to excite viewers can be made.
#10: Segment your content strategy
The users of your website will not be wholly interested in the generic content. Each user has their unique identity and interest. Defining them by the demographics I very much underestimating. Research your website users, it will help you understand in depth about your audience which lie beyond the generalized demographics.
After the research, start segmenting your content. Similar to the email marketing strategy, create content that reaches out to the needs of your user. Segment your content suiting the interests of the individuals to entice them in the services offered by you.
Reach the relevant audience niches by implementing keyword targeting on social media platforms. Create attractive content and campaigns to make the most use of the categories and platforms.
Click here, For a detailed insight into segmentation .
Search marketing strategies to generate B2B leads
Speaking of search, now seems like a good time to look at some of the best search marketing strategies for generating B2B leads in 2020.
We aim for being ranked higher on search results, the algorithm of Google has changed, yet with implementation of basic SEO tricks, power over the search results can be gained.
#11: Pack your content with data & sharable ideas
Implementing SEO tricks and adding SERPs can give your content a massive breakthrough on search results. It will optimize the ranking, and relevance of the content with the search terms.
Pack your content with backlinks, connect your content indirectly with reference sites. It will increase the traffic on your site. By adding stats, photos, data, and analysis from various sites, the chances of ranking higher on search results rise two folds.
This makes it easy for Google’s algorithm to verify the accuracy and reliability of your content and it also makes it more link-worthy and sharable to users.
#12: Update your old content
Clear your old content, replace it with new updated content. It will prevent your website from having too many pages on same topic. As the posts get old, the links forged in can break, the old information can become irrelevant and the ranking can be affected. Updating your content will lower the chances of keyword cannibalization, which requires a lot of work to deal with. Surf through the old content and run them over with new posts for the users.
Make this maintenance, a part of your content clean-up routine. It is the basic tip of the B2B lead generation guide.
#13: Build negative keyword lists in Google Ads
Another effective strategy to target highly-segmented web users is the appliance of single keyword ad groups (SKAGs).
You can target any keyword like ‘B2B marketing’ and create campaigns centered to only that keyword. To target the users better, you can narrow down the segmentation by using a more precise keyword. It will guarantee your ad to be seen by the right audience.
Google has started creating restraints around selection of keywords. However to implement this method, you can use negative keywords. Build them around the exact keyword used for ad campaigns. This will effect google by not showing your ad to the unwanted audience and lastly deliver it to the right segment of crowd.
These are crucial to targeting the right audience in Google Ads and delivering highly-relevant leads to your landing pages, making them more likely to convert into leads.
#14: Personalize your landing pages to match search intent
Personalize your landing pages to align with the search terms used to search for your services. Google analyses the frequency of keywords used in the starting 100 words. The often it is used, the higher art its chances to rank higher on the search results. This personalization will enhance the effect produced by your Ad campaign.
#15: Create remarketing campaigns to keep users engaged until they convert into leads
Create remarketing campaigns can be induced in your strategy to engage the visitors with the website and convince them to opt for the services provided by you. It can increase the chances of turning the large traffic brought by PPM into regular users.
It is immensely effective according to B2B lead generation guide for 2020.
Social media strategies to generate B2B leads
We have already seen how the social media can be used for niche-targeting. However, we can’t deny the fact that social media is one of the mature B2B lead generation channel. It is being used by majority of B2B marketing channels. And you can implement these strategies to top your social media marketing, to generate B2B leads in 2020.
#16: Use LinkedIn Advertising to target big spenders
By advertising on LinkedIn, a direct line to business decision-makers comes open to you. It gives you a chance to reach out key-individuals who are very tough to reach. You reach to the big spenders, incorporating an opportunity for self to make bigger profits. Invest in LinkedIn advertisements for making progress in generating leads.
It is immensely effective according to B2B lead generation guide for 2020.
#17: Promote your lead gen content on Twitter
Twitter is a place for people to stay up-to-date and informed about the things they care about – and this is the role B2B brands need to take on the network.
Use twitter to promote the B2B marketing content. Using third-party promotional content to promote your ad campaign can be very effective. Create your own community, very similar to segmentation, keep growing the community and bring in more potential leads.
#18: Make the most of Facebook’s targeting options
Facebook dominates the social media, holding large stocks of digital Data users, they are near to the best in the social media industry. Targeting such great number of users can make it easy for you to target specific audience. It can be very significant to generate leads for B2B campaigns.
#19: Implement Quora for research
Quora can deliver you the needs and necessities of your target audience. Avoid using quora to disguise answers as sales pitches for any question related to the services offered by your website.
Quora sure does works on many levels. It can be also used to study the competitors, and for interacting directly with users. It also gives way for your brand to exercise authority in your field.
#20: Build your own online community
Creating an online group on LinkedIn and Facebook can be a difficult task due to oversaturation of topics. But establishing yourself as a part of existing group to build up awareness can be easy. It can also be used to divert the members of existing groups to your newly established community.
Community building can be very significant for lead generation. Always have something fresh offerings for users to make them a part of the community.
It is immensely effective according to B2B lead generation guide for 2020.
Conversion rate optimization strategies
Most important part of all the strategies of attracting users is to optimize the conversion rate. The number of people attending your ad campaigns need to be redirected to your website. Same case needs to follow with all the communities build up on LinkedIn and Facebook. Conversion rate optimization is the basic priority to convert visitors into leads. For detailed insight into CRO, check out our article on how to improve B2B lead conversion rate.
#21: Optimize your web forms
Every conversion goal involves some kind of a form, whether it’s a product purchase, email signup, content download or anything else. Even after you’ve convinced someone to take action, that web form of yours is still standing between them and completing your conversion goal.
So the first place to start with your conversion optimisation efforts is your web forms.
Build web forms to begin with conversion optimisation. It is all what stands between you and your services. So, start with building a multi-stage form; according to reports, it is noticed that these forms have significantly higher conversion rates than traditional designs.
It’s even better to implement the use of form analytics tool, it will provide an insight into their interactions with form fields. Later, helping in pointing out the problems in the web forms and opening the spots for improvement. It is immensely effective according to B2B lead generation guide for 2020.
#22: Exit-intent popups
Result-driven marketers prefer exit-intent popups for expecting positive occurrences from its use, only if they are implemented the right way. Exit-intent popups can be really efficient in capturing interested visitors, only by the use of right words. It can turn the visitors into served leads in just seconds of pop up. To target a specific group, free downloads and promotion relevant to the topic can attract visitors in opting for the services offered.
You really have to determine what message will capture users’ attention once they’ve already made the call to leave your site. What can you offer these prospects at the final moment that will change their mind and convince them to stay engaged with your brand?
#23: Use heat maps to pinpoint conversion barriers
Heat maps are a crucial CRO feature. It detect and display the most hot spots of a website. With the use of heat map, you can see where users click, scroll, move, it will show you the most crucial actions of users. With this information you can determine the negative factors of conversion rates.
You can also compare the click rate of different elements to see if users are taking the desired action on your page or being distracted by something else.
#24: Test the elements that matter most
Don’t waste time and effort in choosing what background colour or shape of CTA button will interest the visitor.
Rather start testing the variants of your page’s content. Also, test your CTAs and variations of the CTA copies. These are the most influential part of your website. So, put your time and effort in testing the elements which matter the most.
Button colors can wait.
The global market keeps altering its course in these times of economic slowdown and pandemic. It’s best for marketers like you to keep an eye on customer behavior and innovate with the changes. It’s better to follow data driven marketing strategy to sustain your business in a longer run.
Follow these lead generation strategies to generate massive leads to benefit your B2B marketing. The best way always depends on how you implement these strategies, what services or products you are selling and whom you are selling it to.
If you wish to engage more leads on social media platforms or your website, we can offer you generous help and guidance. We are excellent at managing people’s business. And in the times of pandemic, we can market your B2B marketing to growth. With our help, nothing can stop you from succeeding in B2B marketing.
