What are leads?
Any business to be successful needs win customers, and that's what the leads are: potential customers.
Leads These are people who at some point interacted with your brand virtually, filling out a form with their contact details. In other words, these are access numbers that have become real business opportunities and are now within your company's reach; you just need to know how to take advantage of them.
Think about it: have you ever heard anyone talk about digital marketing strategy without mentioning the word LEAD? I bet not!
Since Digital Marketing gained traction, no term has stood out more than the famous "leads." If you're thinking about investing in this powerful form of customer acquisition but want to learn more first, this guide is for you.
How to Generate Leads?
To begin our journey, first of all, you need to understand two fundamental concepts: leads and lead generation.
A lead is a person who has somehow shown interest in your product/service by interacting with your brand through a digital channel, filling out a form with contact information, i.e., a potential customer.
Lead generation is the process used by companies to capture this information and thus form a list of potential customers that the sales team can work with.
Forms are typically linked to an ad or offer and ask for basic information such as name, phone number, and email address.
Why does your company need to generate leads?
This is the simplest answer of all: because to survive your company needs to sell, and to be successful it needs more and more customers.
Of course, this already happened before digital marketing, but times have changed and people's consumption habits have changed drastically, which means that the old aggressive and massive advertising formulas no longer work as they once did, quite the opposite.
People are increasingly unique, and to be impacted, personalized communication is needed, which requires refined segmentation, which is unlikely to be possible offline. Social media and the internet as a whole have provided the necessary tools for the public to learn about virtually everything, and with it has come an increasingly selective sense of choice. In short, to stand out in the market and attract customers, it's not enough to reach them; you need to win them over and be chosen. You need receptiveness.
And that's what digital marketing does through lead generation: it creates ways to attract those who are truly interested in your offering, greatly facilitating the building of a relationship between your company and your potential customer and increasing your chances of sales.
To learn more about how to capture leads and the path to converting them into customers, keep reading.
Main channels for capturing leads
The key to lead capture is segmentation. Before choosing which channels to work with, you need to define who makes up your target audience, how they behave, and what they consume. Only then will you be able to target the target audience and identify the right channel for that.
Another relevant point is your product/service. The added value and lifespan of what you're offering will be directly proportional to the effort required to sell it, and therefore, must be taken into account.
Once this is done, you can choose some specific channels and tools to generate leads. Here are some of them:
Landing Pages
Also known as conversion pages, landing pages are created with the sole purpose of generating leads and can be used in two ways: linked to Google sponsored links, serving as the destination for users who click on the ad, directing them to a form with a very objective product/service proposal. Or through content marketing, when users are encouraged to provide their information in exchange for valuable content. In this case, the user will be redirected to the landing page by clicking a call-to-action button on the company's website, blog, or even social media.
Paid Media
One of the most popular ways to generate leads in a short period of time, paid media is a great option for those looking for a quick return on investment.
With paid media, you can advertise through Google Adwords or even on Facebook, which also offers the option of creating ads aimed at capturing leads.
In addition to budget control and the ease of measuring metrics and results, one of the biggest advantages of this type of ad is targeting, since both Google and Facebook have thousands of active users and their data is used as filters for displaying ads, ensuring your campaign reaches the right people at the right time.
Social media
Undeniably, social media is already part of most people's routines, and today, it's practically impossible to find someone who doesn't use at least one of them every day.
With constant updates and tools increasingly geared toward business profiles, social media has become more than just a showcase for brands, but also a perfect platform for capturing leads and generating business.
If you're one of those who still believe that this form of communication will eventually die out, don't be fooled: the social media we know today may lose strength, but new, even more powerful ones will emerge.
Lead qualification
If you know someone who has invested in lead generation, you've probably heard that the campaign didn't deliver the expected results because the leads were unqualified.
Do you know why this happens? The main reason is that most people have the false illusion that leads are ready-to-buy customers, which isn't always the case.
As you've read before, leads are potential customers, and it's up to your marketing and sales team to separate those who can be immediately converted into sales from those who aren't yet ready to buy, in other words, to make the lead qualification.
Typically, each company determines its own lead qualification model, based on its own criteria, using automated methods and contact impressions. The key is to filter the results so that the sales team's efforts are focused only on the most qualified leads, avoiding wasted time on fruitless contacts.
Lead nutrition
At this point, you might be wondering: what about unqualified leads? Are they wasted? Of course not! That's where lead nurturing comes into play.
Lead nurturing is a fundamental step for your campaign to truly increase your company's revenue, and believe me, ignoring this step of the process is throwing money and many business opportunities away.
According to a survey by MarketingSherpa, working on lead nurturing can increase a company's sales volume from its database by up to 50%, at a cost 33% lower than that required to acquire new leads.
Lead nurturing is nothing more than providing your potential customer with content about the product/service they've shown interest in, trying to encourage them to make a purchase.
Lead nurturing isn't about making an immediate sale, but rather investing in the relationship with your lead, reinforcing your brand and demonstrating why your company has the solution they need. This way, when the moment comes for a purchase, your company will be the one they choose.
How to nurture leads
A lead nutrition It may seem like a lot of work at first, but as you've probably noticed, it's worth it.
The good news is that gone are the days when email marketing was the only way to nurture leads. It's undoubtedly still one of the most effective tools and shouldn't be underestimated. However, today it's crucial to diversify and work on nurturing across multiple channels, such as blog posts, newsletter subscriptions, SEO (to ensure your website's content is easily discoverable), and, of course, social media.
Keeping your social media channels updated with relevant content is essential for engaging with your potential customers, providing more information about your product/service, building credibility, and establishing a closer relationship with your leads. Furthermore, just like with email marketing, social media always offers the option to insert links to your website's purchase or sales contact page.
So, do you still have questions about leads, or are you convinced that it's what your company needs? Whatever your answer, contact us and we'll help you.
Also check out:
Want to know 4 ways to capture leads? Check out this other article where we talk about some channel strategies like LinkedIn and Facebook
Do you know how to generate leads for your specific market?
Check out these articles we created for each of the verticals:
Leads for construction companies
Leads for real estate agencies
Learn how to do it Lead capture on Linkedin
Understand the difference between Qualification and Score or lead scoring in this video tip from Tiago: Lead qualification is not lead scoring
Did you know that Facebook can also generate qualified business contacts?
The number of visitors to your Facebook Fan Page is very important for the growth and visibility of your company, but now there is a possibility to convert these users into leads and we teach you how to do it!
Learn how to Generate Leads with Facebook
Facebook is the largest social network in the world. Did you know it offers advanced features for generating leads? Learn more about it. Facebook Lead Ads and check out our video below:
What is Lead Acquisition Cost?
Lead Acquisition Cost is one of the most controversial topics in Digital Marketing. It's essentially the amount spent to acquire the contact information of someone interested in your product. There's much debate about whether it's related to lead quality.
Is it a determining factor in Lead Quality?
