Leads, leads, leads. It's one of those buzzwords that is constantly thrown about. Marketing and sales teams alike need and want more of them.
But, in the quest for more leads, more teams are sacrificing what is key; high quality leads.
There’s absolutely no point generating 100 leads if they’re not really interested in what you have to offer. What you need are leads that have a need for your product or service and are actively seeking whatever that may be.
The solution?
The inbound way
You might be thinking how on earth inbound marketing can solve this, but when you think about it logically, it all makes much more sense.
Let’s put it like this; imagine a company is looking to get leaflets printed. The manager asks someone on the team to get a quote for x number of leaflets. Now, think about if it was you that got asked – what would you do? Most probably start looking online. If you search for ‘leaflets’, then you will be presented with an array of links. You’ll most probably look at the first five links to get a feel for what you need. The best designed website with the most readily-available information is most likely going to be the one you prefer, and you will therefore make an enquiry with them.
And it’s as simple as that, a prospect with a genuine need for a product or service has landed on a website and made an enquiry. That lead is going to be a lot easier to convert than a lead generated through cold-calling.
But, you might still be thinking, what has this got to do with inbound? A solid inbound strategy will ensure that people are more likely to find you when they are searching, and the better your website and the content on it, then the more likely someone will make an enquiry and a purchase.
There’s lots of different techniques you can use to attract more prospects to your website, and subsequently, maximise the number of higher quality leads generated.
SEO
Short for ‘Search Engine Optimisation’, this is basically optimising your website so that it appears higher up in a search engine such as Google. Your SEO strategy is so important in the online world that we live in, in order to be found. Make sure you have a strong focus on the keywords that can get you to the top of the page, and you can maximise this through content marketing.
PPC
‘Pay per click’ is similar to SEO in the sense that it’s all about getting the to the top of the results in a search engine, but it is a lot costlier. It’s a quicker win, but it’s as easy to get knocked off the top spot as it is to get there. You need to be clever with it and incorporate your SEO strategy with it for maximum results.
Social media
Social media is an absolute no brainer – it’s free! Utilise the different platforms available, whether it be Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn or YouTube, you’ll reach a different audience through each platform, and in turn this will strengthen your online presence and therefore strengthen your SEO strategy.
Content
Content is key. This includes blogging, white papers, eBooks, social media and videos. The more content you have readily available, the easier you are to find online and the more likely a prospect will take an interest with you rather than your competitor. Make yourself genuinely helpful and people will be more likely to ask for your help.
Buyer personas
Using different techniques is all well and good, but, if you don’t have your buyer personas in mind throughout every stage of your strategy, then you’re not going to be attracting those high-quality leads that you are seeking.
You need to ensure that your inbound strategy is built around your buyer personas and that way you will be consistently focused on high quality lead generation.
Lead nurturing
Another thing to remember is that once you’ve generated a lead, it’s not over. You still need to nurture that lead, but a lead that is genuinely interested will be easier to nurture. Use marketing automation through platforms such as HubSpot to ensure that you are on top of your sales funnel – and adhering to those all-important GDPR regulations.
Revamp your marketing strategy by incorporating inbound strategies and watch not only your lead generation maximise, but the quality of your leads maximise.
If you’d like any more help or information on how you could transform your business, then feel free to drop us an email to grow@bbdboom.com and we’ll be more than happy to offer you some expert advice!