15 Effective Lead Generation Strategies

In fact, the Lead is a potential customer interested in the product/service you offer, who has come into contact with you, leaving you some data with which you can contact him again. We talk about both Online and Offline Lead Generation of course, because until the advent of the internet Lead Generation was done by collecting data from: telephone interviews, trade fair stand visitors, collection of business cards, purchase of advertising space on Radio and TV, etc.

Online communication, on the other hand, is today one of the most powerful means of lead generation and sales conversion because it has an infinite list of tools available to exploit. Let's see the 15 most interesting together.

Why is Lead Generation so important?

The acquisition of a Lead represents the first step of the sales funnel in which it is essential to accompany the potential customer through specific tools and messages along the path that is completed in the purchase.

The advantage that Lead Generation offers is obtaining a profiled list of interested contacts on which to carry out profitable sales activities.

Videos that explain the use of a product or service, but also video tutorials of operations not directly dedicated to your product but to similar activities or which can subsequently lead to the use of your product .

If you think that this type of video is only possible for products from the DIY world, you are wrong. You can invent thousands of even funny videos showing how to wear a hat, how to play with a new toy, how to taste herbal tea, etc. Fantasy must be the master.

Review platforms generally have a strong presence in organic search, making them a great opportunity to expand your brand presence and get noticed by the right people.

When you encourage users to leave reviews on a third-party platform with strong SEO/well known (just think of TripAdvisor, Booking, TheFork, etc. which are paid or sector portals or Google Maps itself which are free) you increase the chances of being found by qualified potential customers in the search.

These platforms help you optimize your online presence and push interested people to find your product/service. What you have to do is: find the best review portals and platforms in your sector that can really help you to drive contacts to your site or to buy your services.

Also, this way you could match the competition in searches for high-value keywords.

3) Landing Pages

The Landing Page or landing page is the basis of online Lead Generation strategies. It is among the most used tools. It is a web page created ad hoc with one or a few very interesting contents which encourage the surfer to interact . The page must be simple, short, quick to read, perhaps with a video. What absolutely cannot be missing is the Call-to-Action , i.e. a button/link or form that immediately leads the user to become a Lead.

The web page must not have a navigator with pages to navigate, because the user must have only one action at his disposal , namely the Call-to-Action.

To maximize the effectiveness of a Landing Page it is a good practice to use Google AdWords to increase the number of people landing on the page and, based on the feedback, improve the page from month to month. Another method is to use the A/B Test, i.e. create two slightly different Landing Pages and after a while check which of the two performs better .

4) Quizzes or interactive tools

It is possible to offer a quiz to your website visitors , the quiz shouldn't be intimidating, rather it should mostly be engaging, simple, fun and really useful. A creative method to get to know your visitors better , obtaining information. Like the Quiz, it is possible to develop a Tool that is useful for users. The examples are endless: weather, live cameras pointing to places of interest (beaches, ski slopes, cities, etc.), a tool that allows you to create a personalized trekking route, a search tool and a comparison of school services, a that allows the user to create his own customized step-by-step product, game-tool that offers the user to win coupons, etc.

Interactive tools that, in order to really work, must be useful to the user and not just to you!

5) e-Books, e-Magazines, e-Catalogues

Do ut Des. What's better than donating first and then getting something in return? This is one of the most used strategies on the web, especially by sites that offer services: giving the possibility to download an e-Book for free , but only after filling in a form with your data (in order to make it easy to get back in touch via email or telephone).

But the offer does not stop at a simple e-Book or White Paper , in other sectors we speak of e-Magazine or the download of a real magazine (fashion, design, cooking, etc.), a magazine that initially it is a Lead Generation tool but which over time and the increase in notoriety can become a paid advertising tool, or get paid

6) An interesting Blog

How many times have you heard of the strategic importance of blogging? It's true, the Blog can become one of the most important tools for Lead Generation , but it must be: well structured, constantly fed with interesting contents and the articles/posts must have a strategy. Not all, but the most important will have to have an internal Call-to-Action (call to action), in order to transform the simple navigator into a Lead.

Opening a blog is the simplest thing, you can do it for free. But precisely for this reason it is the most abused tool and with the highest failure rate. Be careful with your choices.

If you want to be successful, you'll need to create an internal or external work team that takes care of your company's communication.

7) Influence the market with Influencers

Want to try and push your products quickly to a new market? Use one or more Influencers! They get paid to advertise your products (there are those who do it in a more hidden way, making them think they have chosen your product because it is more beautiful or more useful, and those who make it clear that it is pure advertising, a hustler). The fact is that the numbers speak very clearly, Influencers are a very effective channel , both for making a brand famous (brand building) and for making sales. The Influencer manages to put your company in direct contact with a precise target audience in a short time.

The Influencer is effective because: he speaks "the same language" as his peers , he is one of them, his followers trust him/her or take him/her as a point of reference.

8) Attract with Testimonials and Industry Experts

Sector experts are very similar to Influencers . They are also Influencers, but it is the way they are used that is different. In your project they will be real testimonials of your brand , or people who have embraced your project in a broad sense. In the eyes of your customers they love your brand and all your products, they put their face testifying the quality of your products.

Famous people hired to advertise are testimonials, but for a less expensive project they could be professionals (journalists, bloggers, architects, designers, etc.) who talk about your company, write articles about you, answer in an online column where make suggestions to users, wear a cap or t-shirt with your brand on it , etc. Here, too, the examples are endless.

9) Online courses

People are always looking for knowledge , especially if it is given free or at low cost. Creating online courses or webinars with experts who offer their precious time to impart lessons, give answers or important notions on a specific topic is an enormously fruitful tool for creating leads.

The hard thing? Organize the entire structure . Lessons, webinars, creating content and planning, finding the right experts who are also good at speaking in video conferencing. It is not simple, but certainly... very prestigious.

10) Social Media

It is important to learn how to exploit Social Media in their entirety . Use Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Twitter and LinkedIn not only to do brand building/make yourself known or to promote your products with advertising, make the most of them with listening and analysis actions .

Learn to listen to your users, collect their feelings, collect their ideas, collect their data and transform them into Leads. Respond to their requests, get them interested in your services, they must at least leave you their email, fill out a form or subscribe to your newsletter.

Make your users interested in your e-Book to download , promote them a webinar. You have to keep their interest active until they trust you. Only then will they turn into Leads and then into customers.

Another method of research and listening is to follow the Groups on Facebook and LinkedIn , within which you will have thousands of users and probable future Leads available. The important thing is to know how to interact with them.

11) Live Chat

If you have a website that gets a lot of daily and monthly visits, I suggest you add a Live Chat tool . You will give users the opportunity to chat in real time with an assistant from your company. This type of sales support will offer you two types of action, it will facilitate: online sales and knowledge of your users (which you can transform into Leads with subsequent recontacts).

We know very well who places orders on our site (they are customers for whom we have all the data), while we know nothing or almost nothing about the users who browse our site, especially if they do so in "incognito" mode, so... enroll immediately a Live Chat and find out who visits your site .

12) Facilitate word of mouth

The word of mouth tool is certainly the oldest advertising strategy. Those who are happy with our products will speak well with their acquaintances and so on. This also happens on the web, so it is important to find the right strategy to make the most of it.

One above all, the most used web method is: to offer an additional reward to the customer who introduces the product to a friend. Often the action is win-win, i.e. the prize is offered to both if the second friend decides to buy from the suggestion of the first.

13) Use Remarketing

Are you aware of Remarketing? If you've never heard of it, I suggest you look into it now. In summary, they are those advertising banners that appear wherever you surf online offering you products that you searched for a few minutes before.

Remarketing allows you to connect with people who have previously interacted with your website or mobile app. Your ads/banners are served to specific audience segments as they browse on Google or its partner websites. This type of advertising is based on cookies.

This is the "remember me" technique. The more times you view my products, the more my brand is strengthened, becoming more familiar and important in your eyes. This way you are more likely to choose my product than the competitor's.

To develop Remarketing campaigns, it is sufficient to have some experience and use Google Ads Display .

14) Organize Virtual Sales

If your company already uses Sales Assistants, planning a "Virtual Sales" tool will be much easier, you just need to organize your strategy and have a tool developed to be included on your website.

What it is: having one or more web pages on your site where users can freely request or book a video call with a Sales Assistant , you will have the possibility of obtaining dozens of leads every day. These people will be very interested in seeing the product to buy with their own eyes and having an Assistant at their personal disposal to answer their questions.

"Virtual Sales" are the evolution of sales within a Showroom. Think about it, the same thing happens when you go to a dealership to pick out a new car. An Assistant dedicates his time to show you cars, options and answer all your doubts. If he's good, he'll be able to sell you the car in just 20-30 minutes. Same thing for Virtual Sales: you need Assistants, a Showroom (or available products), a video-call booking tool and a lot of organization.

15) Marketing Automation