Have you ever had a sudden idea that you thought was brilliant, but the results were disappointing? Often, it's this approach that squanders an effort to generate leads. Doing research and testing beforehand can help. In the meantime, here are some common mistakes that are made as well as some examples of what good lead generation looks like.
In the old days, marketers relied heavily on mail and telemarketing to get leads. In fact, telemarketing was all the rage before the internet. Some companies relied on it almost exclusively. Believe it or not, many companies still rely on it exclusively today.
Establish more than a single marketing channel to generate leads. For example, marketers still rate email as their most effective tool for digital marketing. That doesn’t mean your business should only use email, however. Email is only as effective as the number and the value of your contacts. In order to get more contacts, use tactics like free content and social media.
Getting your emails opens and social media followers are great confidence boosters. Regardless, they don't necessarily indicate that your marketing is effective. These are often called “vanity metrics," and for one important reason: they don’t directly contribute to your ROI.
If your 10,000 emails were opened by 10,000 recipients, you probably wrote a killer subject line. If only 1 person converted into a lead, the content within the email may not have been compelling or relevant. Everyone wants thousands of Facebook followers, but if none of them are visiting your website, they may not be people who need your product or service. In a worst case scenario, they may not be people at all!
Once your leads are in the sales funnel, they need to turn into a sale. Only then can you count your marketing effective. You need to nurture your leads after that initial point of contact. Align your sales and marketing so that they strive for the same goals. Use email automation, exclusive content, and lead scoring to nurture your leads.
Good lead generation methods means retaining the leads you already have. Once a lead has passed a stage in their journey, they should be met with a new type of touchpoint that is relative to them. This will keep them from unsubscribing and dropping from your lead list.
When business is good and the sales funnel is full of conversions, lead generation methods often falls by the wayside. But once you stop measuring marketing data and acting upon it consistently, you’ll start to see a drop in your number of conversions. Eventually, you’ll find yourself with some impressive past victories but no actionable leads to work on. Sustain your good lead generation efforts through good times and bad.
Some businesses rely on their sales team for all of their marketing efforts because they can’t afford to hire an in-house marketing team. When this is the case, businesses will often make the mistake of investing in marketing only when they desperately need it and then stopping their efforts once they see results.
Additionally, not every sales team has the experience necessary to market to prospective customers who are just beginning their journey.
To solve this problem, many companies outsource their marketing efforts. If your company outsources marketing, it’s best to think of your marketing partner as an extension of your own team. There should be clear communication between both of you about what your goals are, just as you’d expect between you and your in-house sales team.