Are you struggling to get leads?
Have your leads started to dry up?
Are you getting leads but need to scale them up?
Here are our top 18 B2B lead generation ideas that you’ve (probably) not used yet.
We can guarantee there’s at least one lead generation strategy in here that you haven’t tried before.
New Lead Generation Strategies You Haven’t Tried Before
1. Add a CTA to Your Blog Content
Let’s start with a super easy change you can make that will make your blog content work harder for you.
If you have a blog that’s earning you a bunch of traffic, why not capitalise on that traffic by including a CTA?
All your blog content should have at least one CTA included.
You might use different CTAs depending on who the content is aimed at – if it’s aimed at top of the funnel traffic, you could include a CTA for your email list or an eBook.
If its content aimed at consumers further down the sales funnel, you could include a CTA for a free consultation. Don’t forget to make it enticing to your audience.
Of course, these CTAs will only generate leads if you have enough traffic coming to your page. Here are some tips on how to create content that ranks top of Google.
2. Package Up Your Best Content as an eBook
Make your blog content go further by repurposing it as an eBook.
We’re sure you’ve already got some great blogs on your website, but if you haven’t, watch our video on how to find high traffic blog post ideas.
Each blog post serves as a chapter of the eBook. In our case, we could package up our keyword research blog post as one chapter then use our guest post outreach blog post as another one.
It’s a great way to get leads as they’ll need to provide their email address in order to receive the eBook.
3. Use Automated Chatbots
Here at eSearch Logix, we’re big advocates for automated chatbots.
In 2021, we earned more than 4,000 leads via our website.
250 of those came from the automated live chat on our website.
250 leads for 30 minutes work setting it up.
Not only that, but we set it up to help users find blog posts, training guides and podcasts too.
Even if they weren’t ready to convert right at that moment, we kept them on our website and began building a relationship with them via this chatbot.
4. Build a Community
Creating an online community space where your target audience can come together and connect is a great way to cultivate a relationship with your audience.
Keep in mind: this only works if you genuinely want to help your audience and engage with them regularly.
You can do this by setting up a Facebook Group, Slack community, Reddit Subreddit, Discord server, or forum on your website.
This not only gives your audience somewhere to seek help and chat with others, but it also provides you with an opportunity to do three things:
- Learn more about your audience’s pain points
- Connect with them on a more personal level, giving them more affinity with your brand
- Highlight your brand, services, or products
5. Start Live Streaming
Live streaming is an amazing way to interact with your audience live and in the moment.
YouTube is actually classed as the second biggest search engine in the world, and people searching YouTube are often doing so to learn how to do something…or to learn about a product that can help them skip the learning part altogether.
If you’re already writing blogs full of great information, why not use those ideas for live streams too?
You can use the live feedback you get from your audience to improve on the content you already have, or for inspiration for new content.
We use our live streams to show our audience a bit of what they can expect from our website reviews (although we do stress that they won’t be done live unless requested). We also use them to host presentations with different team members who share actionable insights from their marketing skillset.
6. Use Exit Popups
Exit popups are a great way to grab someone’s attention just before they leave your site.
They are set to appear when a visitor is about to click away from your website. For example, when their mouse has moved towards the close tab button.
If they’ve managed to miss your main call to action, including it on an exit pop up is ideal for giving yourself one last chance to get it in front of them.
You could also use this as an opportunity to offer them a free download, an extended free trial or a discount code – this totally depends on your product or service offering and what works for you.
Exit-intent popups should:
- Not ask the viewer to input too much information
- Have a clear message and benefit
- Create a sense of urgency with limited-time deals
If you want to bring your exit popups to the next level, you can make each one relevant to the page the user is leaving, or even include testimonials in the popup. Just make sure you don’t make them too cluttered.
7. First Step in a Consultative Sales Process
This is our fancy way of saying “offer a free consultation but make it better”
What we mean is that you need to be clear about the benefits of your free consultation to help you stand out from everyone else who is offering the same thing.
For us, it’s our free website and marketing review. Rather than us offering a free quote for our marketing services, we instead offer a free, 10–15-minute video review. We stress that there’s no obligation either. This takes away the fear of awkwardness that potential customers might have if they decide not to work with us right now.
It’s high reward and low risk.
8. Automate Your Email Marketing Campaigns
Email marketing gives you the chance to target more specific content at different demographics within your customer base.
Automated email campaigns have several benefits, including;
- Saves time
- Generates leads (whilst you sleep)
- Increases revenue
- Retains customers
- Helps to monitor campaigns
- Shortens sales cycles
Automation allows you to set up different triggers, such as joining the newsletter or abandoning a shopping basket.
Some popular eCommerce automation campaigns are;
Welcome Sequence
A sequence of 3-5 emails that are triggered when someone signs up for your newsletter.
Re-engagement Sequence
Reconnect with someone who has been subscribed to your emails for a while but hasn’t engaged with your emails or made a purchase.
Abandoned Basket
Email sent automatically to email subscribers who abandoned their cart to encourage them to complete their purchase.
Browse Abandonment
This is similar to the above, but it focuses on products they have viewed.
Preference Emails
Learn more about your customer’s preferences to find out the types of products they like, the services they’re interested in.
Collecting reviews, testimonials and user-generated content
The possibilities when it comes to email marketing are endless!
9. Use FOMO
Harnessing the fear of missing out can be a very effective lead generation strategy.
Including a widget on your page that shows the last time someone bought something or offering a discount with a time limit, are both good ways to draw people in, as they won’t want to miss out on what you’re offering.
You can use this at various stages of the sales funnel too. If someone is further towards the top of the funnel, you can tease exclusive information and discounts if they join your mailing list.
For those closer to the bottom of the funnel who are nearly ready to convert, limited time offers work well as well as initiating a countdown on a deal once it’s in their basket.
10. Try A/B Testing
A/B testing is an extremely effective way to develop a better understanding of your target audience.
You can A/B test different landing pages, different social media ads, different offers, different wording, different emails – the list goes on and on.
It’s important to keep testing and innovating, but if you try and overhaul everything at once in a permanent fashion thing could go downhill fast.
It’s much better to make small changes and see which performs best and then make adjustments over time.
By doing this, you can see if current lead generation trends work well for your business and target audience without accidentally alienating your existing customer base.
11. Host a Virtual Summit
Virtual summits not only help you get leads during your event but also help establish you as a thought leader in your industry, hopefully leading to even more leads and sales in the future.
Hosting a virtual summit has tonnes of benefits. It’s even better if you have an international business with a “virtual” product offering, such as software, marketing services or consulting.
Not only that, it’s far cheaper than hosting an in-person summit. All you really need to worry about is streaming software like Streamyard. Most streaming software is free and easy to use, depending on which one you go with.
Other expenses could include PPC promotion and paying people to speak if you don’t have anyone internally who is able to take part.
Virtual summits are a fantastic way to offer lots of free value to your target audience while promoting your product or service.
We run our own virtual event called ‘Dominate’. You can register or watch replays of past events here. This all-day live virtual event is focused on helping businesses like yours to get more traffic, more leads, and more sales from your digital marketing.
You might even get some ideas for how you can host your own virtual summit in the future.
12. Use Content Extensions
It’s common for people to close the page when they’re done reading a blog post on your website.
By adding something extra as an extension to that content, you can keep them around for longer or get them onto your mailing list.
People making informational searches that lead them to your blogs might not be quite ready to convert yet, but offering them something in return for their email address can be ideal for beginning to build that relationship with them.
Rather than a service or product call-to-action, you can offer an eBook, template, checklist, or another freebie that matches the subject of the blog post.
13. Start a Podcast
Starting a podcast sounds scary, but it can be very lucrative for your business!
Many of our highest value leads come via podcast. The same could be true for your business too.
Podcasts are great for those who prefer audio over text or video. Think about how many people listen to some form of audio on their commute. This is a fantastic way to get your audience’s full attention while sharing genuinely useful information with them.
Podcasts don’t always have to be hours long either. We have the same stance on podcasts as we do on blogs and videos. If you can get the same message across in fewer words then why pad it out with information that won’t be useful just to hit a timestamp or a word count?
Being good at podcasting takes practice, but the more you do the better you’ll get. Once you’re more confident in your podcast skills you could reach out to other podcasters in your industry or related to your industry and inquire about guesting on their podcast, reaching a whole new audience.
If you’re putting the effort into creating a podcast you should be putting effort into promoting it too.
14. Use a Cold CTA
Cold CTAs are ideal for visitors to your website who are at the top of the funnel but not quite ready to convert.
These colder leads need something that’s going to bring them into your ecosystem and gradually warm them up.
eBooks, email courses, white papers, case studies. These are all useful pitchable items you can offer to people to get them into your funnel and become more receptive to your marketing.
15. Offer a Free Tool
Free tools are a fantastic way to collect the details of leads while giving them something in return.
Think about how you can make it as easy as possible for someone to purchase your product or service. What kind of questions and concerns may stop them from working with you?
If you offer business loans, by creating a calculator that gives a loan estimate and doesn’t affect their credit score, you handle potential customer concerns over how much they can actually loan from you in a matter of minutes, without them making a phone call or doing the calculations on their own.
Not only do you remove these barriers to purchase, but you can also collect their details through the tool and send them automated follow-up emails about their results and your services.
16. Use Social Proof
Testimonials and reviews should always be visible on your website.
If someone is nearly ready to become a lead, it’s possible that all that’s standing between you and your competitor are some great reviews.
Testimonials and reviews help build trust with your target customers. If you’re getting testimonials from current clients, see if you can get a photo to go with it. It adds that extra human touch.
17. Use Remarketing
Pay-per-click advertising is great for showcasing your business to new people, but it’s also perfect for reconnecting with people who have visited your website.
If someone didn’t see your primary call-to-action the first time they visited your website, you can highlight it to them via remarketing ads on social media platforms or search engines.
If someone started filling out your call-to-action but dropped off the page before finishing, you can remarket to them with a secondary offer, one that’s softer and easier to complete, in other places they spend their time online.
Remarketing is used a lot by eCommerce and direct-to-consumer brands, but not nearly enough by B2B businesses. Your B2B customers are normal people who spend time on social media when they’re away from their desks, so reconnecting with them via retargeted ads can be just as effective at generating leads as it is for D2C brands.
18. Share Case Studies
Similar to social proof, case studies are a great tool for helping your website visitors convert into leads.
By creating detailed case studies, with images and videos where possible, you are proving to these potential customers that not only do you follow through on your promises, but you also make an impact on your clients.
It’s important that you include calls to action throughout that are relevant to the case study, especially if you have multiple products or services.
