3 Online Lead Generation Techniques for Your Business

Lead generation –the process of getting the contact information of potential customers that show interest in your business, is a critical aspect of marketing and sales. The more leads a marketer generates, the more sales he closes. As a business, it is important for you to have a steady flow of leads that will eventually convert to customers. Generating leads is no easy task. In fact, according to CSO Insights, 68% of companies report struggling to generate high quality leads. Believe me, as a marketer myself, I understand the struggle. That’s why I’m sharing some online techniques that I’ve used or seen to be effective in generating quality leads.   Website Did you know you could use your business website to generate sales leads? I’m not talking about just having a Contact Us page and hoping that your visitors will pick up the phone to call or take a drive to your location. I’m talking about actively asking your website visitors to drop their email addresses and phone numbers so you can follow up with them. Approximately 96% of your website visitors are not ready to buy. Your visitors are probably researching your business and your product offering. As they research your business, they are also researching other alternatives to your business. This is why it is important to use forms to capture their contact information, so you can nurture them until they are ready to make a purchase. A form is an essential tool that allows you to capture the contact information (name, email, phone number etc) of a lead. Typically, you are to offer your visitors something in exchange for them to offer you their contact details. It could be a free product trial, free consultation, free information/content or anything you know your target market requires to help them make a purchasing decision. Check out these examples:   You should have a link to your lead capture form on every page of your website. You could place a call to action on every page of your website that will link to your lead capture form.   Video Let me tell you a short story. Once upon a time, in February 2015, Nigeria’s leading online information portal organised its annual E-Business Fair. That edition of the E-Business Fair turned out to be Africa’s biggest SME event and hosted over 5000 business professionals and entrepreneurs. Recently, the company launched a video announcing the 2016 edition. As we speak, at least 2 people register every day from that video. Using video content is an excellent avenue to generate leads for your business. You could either post a “product explainer” video on your product page or on the world’s second largest video search engine – YouTube. Videos are effective because people retain over 50% more information via visual and verbal learning cues. Also, 50% of e-commerce buyers report feeling more confidence in their purchase decision after watching a product video. To generate leads with your video, place a call to action in your video. It could be to subscribe to your newsletter, register for a free demo or whatever you want your prospect to do.   Content Content marketing generates 3 times as many leads as traditional marketing. The use of content such as blogs and email newsletters have helped 92.7% of companies using content marketing to generate leads. So how do you use content to generate business leads? 1. Know your audience 2. Create content that either solves your audience problem or informs them 3. Place a call to action that leads to a lead capture form on every content The mistake I see many marketers make (including myself), is not setting a clear call to action on their content. Whether you’re using your website, a video or even social media, it is important that your focus should be to generate leads by capturing your prospect’s contact information. Need more tips on how you can drive sales to your business using online tools? Sign up for our newsletters.