The end goal of B2B lead generation is to create a consistent pipeline of high-quality leads who will eventually turn into paying customers. If you are searching for ways to drive high-quality traffic and a steady flow of leads for your B2B business, then you’ve landed in the right place.
Our previous blog ‘B2B Lead Generation Tactics For 2021 Part 1’ deep-dived into 5 awesome B2B Inbound Marketing strategies to increase brand visibility and grow your business in the current climate.
Part 2 of this blog series will uncover 4 more proven B2B lead generation methods for success.
Let’s dive in!
1) Marketing through social media
Over the last two decades, Social Media Marketing has evolved to become one of the primary lead generation channels for B2B marketers because of its advanced targeting opportunities. With nearly 50% of the world’s population on social media, understanding how to nurture and market your offering to prospects on various social platforms has become critical for every business today.
You need to spend time creating and sharing high-quality content, and engaging with your audience across social channels, as it will help create a voice for your brand. Today’s B2B customers want social proof. If people trust you and like what you’re saying on social media, they’ll arrive at your website ready to become a customer. Companies need to understand that the number of likes, shares, comments, and followers may not guarantee a transition into sales, but if you provide value over time and nurture your prospects, social media can significantly supercharge any company’s inbound marketing efforts.
Depending upon your business and industry, some social channels might work better than others. Conducting sufficient market research on your buyer personas will help you identify the channels where your customers are spending their time. Alternatively, you can also test the effectiveness of different social channels to find what works best for your business, and focus your efforts there. Here’s a quick look at what different social media platforms can do for your business.
- Facebook: Sixteen years since its inception, Facebook still reigns as the most popular social platform with 2.45 billion monthly users. Many Small Businesses prefer to market their products and services through Facebook as it’s the most affordable, and is extremely valuable when it comes to marketing to people by interest and behaviour. Inserting a Facebook Pixel on your website is an excellent way to re-target individuals who have already visited your site and has the potential to generate significant inbound leads as it delivers your content to users who are most likely to take the desired action.
- LinkedIn is the most effective social media platform for B2B Marketers and professionals and is also the go-to social media platform for B2B buyers. More than 30 million companies around the world use LinkedIn for business. With more than 690 million members, more and more brands are using LinkedIn marketing to network, connect, and sell. In fact, over 46% of all social media traffic to company websites comes from LinkedIn. (LinkedIn) LinkedIn ads are extremely powerful for B2B companies, due to their advanced methods of targeting that no other social media platform can match. If you want to get your brand in front of the businesses most likely to buy from you, this is your place.
- Twitter is all about conversations and news. It is the 4th most popular social media platform for B2B (after Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram) with 145 million daily users. Twitter is a gold mine for customer/industry insights and opportunities to build your brand, drive sales, and win followers. Twitter is especially useful for SaaS and Tech companies. Popular SaaS firms like Slack, Zoho, etc. use Twitter to answer customer queries, share tips and status updates on their software. Although running ads on Twitter can be more expensive than on Facebook, the engagement rate is very high.
- YouTube has always been a source of entertaining video content, it’s also become a great place for businesses to add more depth to their content strategy by creating videos and playlists, and engaging with a larger portion of your audience. 56% of marketers rated YouTube as important to their overall success. Not only does YouTube allow marketers to present unique content that’s easy for viewers to consume and share, but as the world’s second most popular search engine, YouTube can also help boost your SEO and overall brand presence. In fact, one-third of the total time online is spent watching YouTube videos.
Making effective use of social media as an inbound marketing tool can allow you to personalise and grow your online presence, generate more leads, attract new customers and make sure you stand-out as a thought-leader within your industry and ensure stronger sales results moving forward.
Click here to read our blog on “How to use Social Media for Lead Generation”
2) Leveraging the Power of Videos
85% of consumers want to see more video content from brands. – HubSpot.
So why not explain your content in such a way that it speaks to the majority? Over the years, Video Marketing has revolutionised the way people consume content as it allows you to deliver information in a much more interactive, visual, and entertaining way. Video is no longer just a piece of your overall marketing plan. Videos have now taken over every platform and social media channel. So much that it has become a holistic business approach, meaning video content should be produced and used by all teams wherever it makes sense, in a conversational, actionable, and measurable way.
Videos can also help build trust with your target audience as it gives your brand a voice and introduces them to the people behind the product or brand, by giving your audience a glimpse of the magic that happens behind the door. The impact is strongest when the video is used on the landing page. Having a video on your website is seen as a positive ranking factor and can improve your website’s SEO. In fact the chances of getting a page 1 search listing on Google increase 50 times with video content.
There are so many different types of videos you can create for your business. Here are just a few:
- Product Demo/Explainer Videos: Typically used to generate awareness surrounding your brand or to showcase how your product or service works. These are educational videos that will help your audience better understand your brand, why they need your product or service, and allow them to make informed purchase decisions.
- Video Interviews/Testimonials: These can be interviews with internal experts or influencers within your industry, a case study, or a video testimonial from a satisfied client. Video Interviews and testimonials are a great way to establish trust and credibility with your target audience, and also establish yourself as a thought-leader and expert in your domain.
- Event Videos: Most businesses have recognized how important video content is when it comes to marketing events. If your business is hosting/attending a conference or an event, produce and release a video highlighting all the interesting aspects of the event.
Click here to read our blog “Why Video Needs to Be Part of Your Content Strategy”
3) Industry-specific landing pages
Getting people to your website isn’t enough. When someone clicks through to your landing page, you usually have less than 15 seconds to capture their attention and prompt them to take an action. In the end, if you don’t know how to reach out to your visitors with content tailored to their interests, all your previous efforts go to waste. Whether you’re selling products or high-value services you need to capture prospects’ details and communicate what you can do to help them before you encourage them to take action. This is especially true in the B2B world where decision-makers are trying to solve a specific business problem particular to an industry. Creating Industry-specific landing pages is an excellent strategy to not only drive targeted traffic but also convert them into qualified leads.
Industry-specific landing pages act similar to a homepage but targeted to a specific type of client or industry. If your business focuses on a specific industry or caters to customers spanning across various industries and verticals like healthcare, manufacturing, or professional services, It is crucial that you craft landing pages that show how your product/service can benefit clients specific to that industry. Similar to other landing pages, industry-specific landing pages should include solutions to a particular problem within an industry and must clearly show how your product/service can add value by addressing their pains and needs. Industry-specific landing pages can also boost your SEO efforts because you can create content and rank for search terms that are really focused on a narrow niche. With a dapper first impression, you’re likely to get more leads.
4) Pump up those CTAs!
Now that your website is attracting the right visitors, the next step is to create a compelling offer that will have them take some action on your site to qualify as a lead or conversion. Creating the right Calls-to-Action (CTAs) is an essential element of any successful Inbound Marketing Strategy.
Think about all those times you’ve signed up for things in your life. Did you ever sign up for Spotify, Netflix, YouTube or Evernote? Each of these sign-ups is the result of an effective CTA. CTAs are a small but highly impactful tool that can be effectively utilized across all marketing channels to drive conversion. Before creating your CTA, you must determine your conversion goal.
Be crystal clear about what you’re offering
The whole point of your CTA is to call a user to take an action. Use actionable verbs in your CTA copy to drive conversion. Clarity is key. Be specific about what your offer is. If you’re giving away a free ebook, say “ Download our FREE e-book on X,” where X conveys the benefit of receiving the offer. Additionally, utilizing the word “free” enhances the value proposition of your offer. This is much more effective than “Download now” or “Get your ebook”·
Consider Font, Color, Style and placement
User experience plays a critical role in your conversion rate. As with any other visual asset on your website, it’s important to ensure that your CTAs align with your branding and style. Placement is key if you want maximum click-throughs. You want to place your CTA in such a way that it is visible and within a relevant context to promote click-throughs. The best CTA is one that uses an engaging font, and actionable language in combination with the right design elements which make it stand-out on your website.
Appropriate to your purpose
Ask yourself: What can you provide that has so much value to your visitors that they will trade their information to gain access to it? Could it be a free trial of your product? A free webinar or a podcast covering a hot topic within your industry? Is your audience in need of useful templates, checklists, and free tools to simplify a process? Whatever it is, make sure you have it narrowed down before you begin crafting your CTA.
Conclusion:
In summary, Inbound Marketing has proven to be the methodology for the digital era. Our job, as B2B marketers, is to help our buyers make informed purchase decisions by offering them something valuable. Whether your business is large or small, you can leverage the power of Inbound Marketing to improve brand awareness, improve lead generation, and increase sales. It goes beyond Lead Generation to nurture the leads you’ve attracted and builds trust and credibility in your business in the long-term. By following these 9 tips you can create the perfect inbound strategy through which you can create and share remarkable quality content to your users, escalate your lead quality, decrease sales cycle times and increase lead flow.
Want to learn more about Inbound Marketing and how it can be integrated into your business growth strategy? Drop us an email at [email protected] or talk to a member of our team today.