I need more leads, we got to get new leads, we need better leads! Start a new lead generation campaign!
Those are the magic words that you hear every single day when you’re working on a demanding business environment.
Leads are the starting point of every sales process from small to big companies all around the world.
But what is a lead? which ones are considered “good ones” and how can you start generating leads?
What’s a Lead?
A lead is basic contact information about a person that may be interested in a product or service that may lead to a sale.
This usually consists on having the name, email address and phone number of a person.
A lead definition tends to vary between industry depending on their nature.
Leads for an online magazine subscription business are not the same as an insurance company leads.
The first one will probably need a name and an email address to start sending special offers and promotions to that potential customer.
In the insurance company case, you may need the name and phone number to contact the person over the phone or through text messages (SMS).
The more information you can get from a lead the better.
This way you’re able to pinpoint right away which ones have the best opportunity to convert into a potential customer (sale).
The more details a customer gives you the more interest it has to purchase your product or service.
We live right now in an era that has too much digital information. From hilarious cats videos, mouth-watering food recipes to outrageous celebrities gossips so people get distracted too easily.
When a person fills out a form with almost all the information that you’re requesting, let me tell you my friend, he/she is into you.
Timing is important
Another important aspect of a good lead it’s the time in which it was created.
Is not the same getting a lead that was created a few minutes ago versus another that it’s a month old.
You have better opportunities to close a sale from one generated recently since potential buyers are looking to solve their problems right away.
The more time it takes to contact them the slimmer are your chances to convert them to customers.
But once again it really depends on the industry that you’re working in.
What is lead generation?
Let’s talk about generating leads, what is lead generation?
Lead generation is the process in which you’re able to get people to provide basic contact information in order for them to get to know more about your product or service.
This is usually accomplished by having them fill out a form, subscribe to a newsletter, giving their name and/or email address in order to download or have access to exclusive content, completing a questionnaire or doing a survey.
This needs to be made in an ethical way and not trying to trick the potential customer into giving their information.
In the end, this type of practice can really hurt your business and you’re probably not going to get good leads.
Always remember that you have to give something in order to get something.
If you provide useful insight, value and a solution to your potential customer they’ll be more than happy to provide you with relevant information about themselves.
Now let’s discuss the steps that you have to take in order to get the lead generation process running.
Lead Generation Process
First of all, you have to define which are the business goals that you’re trying to accomplish.
Do you want to increase the total amount of customers in your business within the next 3 months, do you want to generate more sales for a specific product or service in the next holidays?
Next try to identify your audience and your perfect customer, which are their needs, their problems, the solutions that you have to offer.
A lead generation process goes hand in hand with a marketing plan because the clearer your objectives and audience, the better the results.
After you have this defined it’s time to move to the strategy, how are you going to get the potential customer to provide their information?
Lead Generation Strategy
The strategy is quite simple.
You only need to identify how are you going to drive your potential customers to your landing pages or contact forms. It can be made using the following tools:
- Paid advertising on search engines (Google or Bing Ads)
- Paid advertisement on Social Networks (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn or Pinterest)
- Creating a compelling post on social networks that captures clients attention
- Through SEO content on your website
- Using Facebook Leads Ads. These are quite popular since it’s really easy for a potential customer to provide contact information using a simple form within the ad.
In addition, Facebook lead generation process is very straight forward.
You can read our article on how to improve your leads generation strategy by clicking here.
Tips for better results in lead generation
These simple tips can help you achieve better results in your campaign:
- Be very clear about what you’re offering and how you are the solution to their problems.
- Create visuals that appeal to your perfect customer or audience and always provide quality information, useful insights, expert knowledge, and a unique value proposition.
Sometimes this can be challenging and very frustrating because but in the end, you will see results.
If the potential customer is interested in what you have to offer they will find a way to contact you.
It could be made either by a phone call or by submitting their information in a contact form. You should always have a clear and visible way for them to get a hold on you.
If they aren’t completely interested at the moment it’s always great to have an alternative for them to give you their email.
In other words, find a way to open a communication channel with them. You can achieve this by offering visitors to subscribe for free to your newsletter that has unique content or exclusive offers.
After the leads are in your database, it’s time to contact them.
You got the lead now is the time to contact them
There are a lot of different ways to get in contact with a potential customer.
Ranging from SMS to emails today you have a lot of options, however, the best way to convert a lead into a customer is with a phone call. Yeap, you read that right, a phone call.
It’s true that a lot of people prefer communicating through SMS but when it’s time to acquire a service or product, people like to talk to people, simple as that.
But the problem is not calling the customer, the problem is getting in contact with that person.
Some people don’t have much time in their day to day routine to be on an hour-long phone call or they’re called in the wrong moment.
This can really hurt business since this process can easily “burn” a lead.
When you burn a lead is when you had the opportunity of getting a person on the line but due to bad calling skills, the person hung up on you.
This is the type of scenarios that Pipes.ai really knows how to handle it.
Thanks to the proprietary A.I. software that runs Pipes, it’s able to handle all your leads automatically and call each one of them at the precise moment with different voice scripts.
With this approach, you avoid burning a lead and providing an excellent experience to your soon to be customer.
The final step after getting in contact with your lead is to check the results at the end of the day.
With the data collected start improving your lead generation campaign.
This is a must if you want to remain competitive and excel in giving more value to your business.
In conclusion, we hope that with this information you’re able to improve your lead generation efforts.
