Lead generation isn’t new; in fact, it’s as old as buying and selling. What’s changed is the location of the marketplace in which we do business. We’re far from the trading post or Roman market today. In fact, we’re increasingly reliant on a marketplace that has no physical location at all – a digital agora that spans the globe. In a market of this size, being able to generate and capture leads is more important than ever. What are the next steps for B2B companies that want to optimize their lead gen activities?
Improving the Customer Experience
Your best sellers may not even work for you. They’re the ones who buy from you – your customers. When they’re happy, they tell the world about it, and their voices are amplified like never before thanks to social media. When you work toward improving your overall customer experience, you earn referrals from the people who matter most. No amount of advertising spend counts for as much as the approval you earn from your customers, particularly in the B2B marketplace. Work on becoming more service-oriented, proactive, and committed to your customers, and they’ll reward you with lead gen you can’t buy at any price.
Service on Demand
The exponential growth of on-demand services such as Uber, eBay, and Amazon in the B2C sector has implications for B2B marketers too. These services are the ultimate in responsiveness, allowing users to get what they want immediately and move seamlessly through the buying process. B2B companies can parallel that experience by becoming more responsive to leads and instituting drip nurture programs to develop them once they’re captured. When leads visit your site, are they greeted with an opportunity to solve their problems immediately, or do they have to work for it? Find ways to implement on-demand service, and you’ll be ahead of the curve.
Fact-Finding
To generate more qualified leads, you need to know who they are and where to find them. The digital age has brought with it an almost overwhelming amount of information, but without a way to make sense of the data, you may as well not have it. Marketing automation systems that gather and coordinate data into an actionable format are quickly becoming essential to lead gen activity online. The longer you use marketing automation technology, the more effective it becomes as a lead gen tool because it’s constantly finding new information and comparing it against historical data to reveal new insights.
Going Mobile
You may already know that over half your audience now reads your email on a smartphone, tablet, or other mobile device. Did you know, though, that they also do a good bit of their other fact-finding and decision-making on the fly? It isn’t enough to be mobile-friendly in your lead gen; you need to think of mobile first. Marketing email has to be viewable on mobile devices, but so should your website, blog, and newsletter content. Apps and calculators that help leads see your value directly are an outstanding way to capture their interest. Think of new ways to move into mobile and beat your competition to the marketplace.
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