With every passing day, capturing leads is becoming more and more challenging. The lead generation techniques that were effective ten years ago do not deliver in today’s highly competitive environment. However, with the increase in competition, the strategies have also evolved. In this post, I will discuss 15 effective lead generation strategies that work for all businesses.

1. Start a Blog

Most marketers believe blogging is one of the most effective lead generation strategies. However, getting on the first page of Google and generating organic traffic is the biggest challenge related to blogging. You can only generate leads if you succeed in ranking higher for the right keywords. Therefore, to turn your blog into a valuable resource, you must:

Create Content According to the Search Intent

Search intent refers to the goal the user intends to achieve through search. To provide an ideal user experience, Google returns web pages that match the intent of a search query.

In other words, Google checks the contents of a web page to determine how well it matches the search intent and ranks it accordingly.

To create content that is aligned with the search intent, consider the following:

• Check the top results of Google search for the keyword.
• Recreate articles/posts that have a high bounce rate. A higher bounce indicates your content is different from the users’ expectations.
• Use LSI (latent semantic indexing) keywords. Semantically related keywords help search engines better understand the context of your content. LSIGraph is a popular tool for finding LSI keywords.

Create Content for All Stages of a Buyer’s Journey

Ignoring the buyer’s journey is among the common content marketing mistakes that negatively impact lead generation efforts. Lead generation strategies may only give ideal results if you nurture leads along the various stages of a buyer’s journey, i.e., awareness, consideration, decision, and retention.

To turn leads into customers, you must provide them relevant content at every stage of their buying journey. Even after leads become customers, you should create post-purchase content to ensure customers return for more purchases.

Optimize Content for Search Engines

Your content will only generate leads if you rank well in search engine result pages. Therefore, optimizing content is equally important as creating content. To optimize content, consider the following:

• Include the main keyword in three places, i.e., the title tag, meta description, and H1.
• Use internal links whenever possible. Internal links make it easy to navigate your site and help search engines better understand its structure. However, including internal links in a blog with hundreds of posts can take time and effort. Therefore, I suggest using tools like RankMath, LinkWhisper, and Internal Link Juicer.

2. Build Email Lists

The most effective lead generation strategies focus not only on generating leads but also on nurturing them. One such strategy is email marketing. However, building email lists is a tricky task.

The ideal way to build email lists is using lead magnets. A lead magnet refers to a free resource you offer users in exchange for their information like name and email address. For example, you can give away free eBooks, guides, or tutorials. Another example of a lead magnet is a free webinar or course access.

One benefit of email marketing is that you can segment subscribers based on interests, geographical location, gender, or other criteria. Segmentation allows sending personalized emails, yielding better results. It also ensures that the subscribers receive only the relevant material. Most leading email marketing tools, such as  ActiveCampaign, Getresponse, Brevo (formerly Sendinblue), ConvertKit, AWeber, and Constant Contact enable users to segment email lists.

You can maximize lead generation through emails by improving the email open rate. To increase email open rate:

• Write engaging and captivating subject lines.
• Send emails at the right time.
• Ensure emails open appropriately on screens of all sizes.
• Cleanse your email list to remove subscribers that have been inactive for more than six months.
• Use A/B testing to discover the best performing CTAs, subject lines, and email delivery time.

3. Offer Live Chat

Live chat has long been associated with customer support. In reality, it is one of the lead generation techniques that significantly boost sales.

 Even if you provide all the product details, including features, warranty, refund or return policy, and pricing, prospective customers may still have queries before buying from you. Live chat lets users clear their concerns about products or services and discover alternatives according to their needs.

Live chat not only increases sales but also boosts repurchases and bulk purchases. Sales representatives can offer discounts or incentives, encouraging leads to spend more. Additionally, they can also recommend products based on the personalized requirements of the prospective customers.

Most importantly, live interaction helps businesses better understand their target audience’s problems, needs, and demands. As a result, companies can improve their lead generation strategies.

4. Offer Discounts and Incentives 

Another popular lead generation strategy is to offer discount coupons and incentives. Discounts and other incentives encourage users to become customers. Even if the users do not immediately become customers, they will become leads by providing their contact information to avail the offer.

Discounts enhance customers’ purchase experience by providing valuable offers. To further boost lead generation, you can create a sense of urgency while offering discounts and incentives. Adding a timer is one of the best ways to develop a sense of urgency.

Digital coupons also help businesses get rid of poor-selling items and boost referral programs. Both new leads and existing customers will likely promote the offers and discounts to their friends and family, bringing more leads for your business.

You can also use discount coupons to get customer feedback. For example, you can offer a discount to those who complete a survey. With each survey, you get a lead in the form of an email address and name of the prospective customer.

Shortstack is a widely used tool for distributing coupon and prize codes. It lets users decide whether to distribute coupon codes as a contest prize or hand them over to everyone submitting a lead generation form.

5. Run Contests or Giveaways

Contests and giveaways are among the lead generation strategies that generate maximum leads in a short time. They are conducted for a short time but get viral quickly. You can run contests and giveaways on your website, social media platform, or both.

However, for maximum benefits, ensure the following:

• The prize is useful for your target audience. It could be one of your products, a product or service related to your business, or a gift card.
• Deadlines and conditions are mentioned clearly.
• Promote the contest on different platforms.
• Announce the winner publicly for transparency.

The following are a few types of contests you can run to generate leads:

Event-based contests: You can run contests on special events, such as Halloween, Easter, and Valentine’s Day.

Polls: Polls allow you to collect valuable information from prospective customers through multiple-choice questions.

Giveaways: Anyone can participate in giveaways by just providing their email address. The winner is chosen randomly.

SweepWidget is a famous app most marketers use to create contests and giveaways with the help of a drag-and-drop builder. It allows users to track, manage, and disqualify entries. It also enables users to select winners manually or randomly.

6. Set Up Quizzes 

Next on the list of lead generation strategies is setting up Quizzes. Setting up lead generation quizzes helps you generate leads and gather valuable information.

Businesses can build their email lists using quizzes, as the users only get to see the results after entering their email addresses. At the same time, you can also collect valuable information required to segment the leads for tailored marketing campaigns.

However, consider the following factors while creating quizzes:

• They must be relevant to your products or services.
• Users should find them engaging and informative.
• Create simple and easy to understand questions.
• Create questions that revolve around target audience problems and needs.

There are several types of quizzes you can set up to generate leads. For example, you can create a quiz to propose a personalized product recommendation, give an estimate, or create a plan.

Woorise and Shortstack are popular tools for creating quizzes for lead generation.

7. Run PPC Campaigns

Despite being cost effective, content driven lead generation techniques take time to generate leads. The most time-consuming activities involve content creation for various stages of a buyer’s journey, search engine optimization, and lead nurturing.

On the other hand, PPC advertisements are among the lead generation strategies that involve higher costs but give instant results. Since advertisements mostly appear at the top of the search engine results, you can target serious buyers. They target leads needing a product but are still deciding where to buy it.

8. Create a Referral Program

A referral program is among the lead generation strategies that generate quality leads. Existing customers who found your products and services useful will likely recommend your brand to those with similar needs. As a result, leads generated through referral programs are mostly quality leads.

However, existing customers may only refer your products to their friends and family if you give them some incentive. Ideally, you should run referral programs on your website, social media, or YouTube channel. You can request your customers to refer a particular number of friends and get a discount on their next purchase.

Several tools, software, and solutions are available online, like Invitereferrals and ReferralCandy, for creating effective referral programs. Such solutions not only save time and resources but also give better results.

9. Leverage Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing is similar to referral programs. Like referral marketing, affiliate marketing is among the lead generation techniques that generate quality leads. However, in affiliate marketing, affiliates promote your products instead of customers and earn a commission per lead they generate.

You can benefit from affiliate marketing in two ways:

• Create an affiliate program and announce it on your website.
• Join an affiliate network.

As per the goals of your lead generation strategy, you can choose the suitable commission structure and payout options.

10. Create and Upload Videos on YouTube

Creating and uploading videos on YouTube is next on the list of lead generation strategies. YouTube videos are beneficial for two reasons:

1. Effective marketing requires creating content in different formats, such as text, images, infographics, and videos. If you make content only in one form, i.e., text, you will miss out on a large audience that prefers videos over text.
2. YouTube is the second largest search engine, allowing you to attract and capture additional leads.

You can include CTA links in the description box or within the videos. Either way, videos are great at generating leads.

11. Earn Trust with Social Proof

It is human psychology that before buying a product, customers want to know whether it is worth buying. In other words, potential customers want to know other people’s experiences with the product and the brand.

Social proof is a lead generation strategy in which businesses use evidence that other people have purchased and found their products useful. Such proof is used to influence the buying actions of prospective customers. Social proof enhances a brand’s credibility and builds customers’ trust.

The following are a few examples of social proof you can display on your site to earn the trust of potential customers:

• Reviews.
• Ratings.
• Testimonials.
• Celebrity endorsements.
• Awards.
• Social media signals, i.e., shares and followers.
• Influential customers.

Displaying social proof helps boost the results of lead generation strategies. Therefore, reach out to your existing customers and encourage them to write reviews and customers.

12. Offer a Free Trial

Offering a free trial helps businesses generate the highest quality leads. Free trial is among the lead generation strategies with the highest conversion rate. They attract only those leads who genuinely intend to become customers. The leads can test the various features through a free trial and become familiar with the service.

Another advantage of a free trial is that the leads learn more about the product or the service. During the trial, they will likely discover added benefits of the service or the product they didn’t know.

13. Organize Virtual Events

Next on the list of lead generation techniques is organizing virtual events. The most popular events include webinars and training classes.

Since online events require preregistration, it allows businesses to collect valuable information about leads. Additionally, those who reserve seats are likely interested in your products and want to learn more about them.

Once you have gathered information during the registration process, you can target the leads through emails, convincing them to convert into customers.

Hosting virtual events is among the lead generation strategies that enable businesses to interact with potential customers more effectively. However, organizing events around topics related to your business and prospective customers’ interests is critical.

14. Engage with Prospects on Social Media

Social media platforms are ideal for maximizing your reach. Even if you have a blog or a YouTube channel, you must share your best content on social media to generate more leads.

Before joining the social media platforms, research and find the platforms popular among your target audience. I recommend joining only those platforms where you can find your target audience. For example, joining Twitter may not help you generate leads if you have a clothing brand.

Additionally, aim for both paid and organic traffic. Despite being a little expensive, paid lead generation strategies provide much faster results.

You should also join community groups on social media platforms to extend your reach further. Such groups consist of people who have similar interests, problems, and concerns. Therefore, joining groups related to your niche can help you generate quality leads.

15. Try Remarketing 

Last on the list of lead generation strategies is remarketing or retargeting. Remarketing is targeting potential customers who have already interacted with your brand but did not make a purchase. It aims to encourage leads to convert into customers.

For example, in response to your PPC advertisement, a user may come to your site and add a few items to the cart but leave without completing the purchase. Cart abandonment is a common scenario businesses face all the time. However, through remarketing, you can remind the leads to complete the purchase and become customers.

You can remarket to your potential customers by sending them reminder emails. In scenarios other than cart abandonment, you can send relevant material based on how leads interacted with your brand, i.e., pages they visited and products they checked.

Conclusion

To grow your online business, you should try a mix of different lead generation strategies. Each lead generation technique extends your audience reach and enhances the chances of converting leads into customers.