About 88% of B2B marketers use a lead generation funnel. Why? Because it works.
A clear, well-defined marketing funnel helps your sales team increase website conversions and enables your marketing team to identify content and campaign opportunities.
In this article, we offer actionable steps on how to generate leads without fail at every stage of the lead generation sales funnel.
Keep reading to learn:
• What Is Lead Generation?
• Understanding the Lead Generation Funnel
• Importance of Lead Generation in Your Overarching Marketing Strategy
What Is Lead Generation?
Lead generation is attracting and nurturing prospects to convert them into customers. Methods, such as blog posts, coupons, live events and online content, can generate leads online.
However, before leads arrive at a purchase decision, they have to go through a lead generation funnel.
Understanding the Lead Generation Funnel
A lead generation funnel or lead generation sales funnel is a marketing structure that guides potential customers through different stages – from being an ordinary lead to a paying customer.
The lead generation funnel typically comprises three stages: awareness, interest and decision. Here’s a quick overview:
1. Top of the Funnel (Awareness Stage): This is your chance to meet and greet potential customers. Quality content is your best friend here – think blogs, webinars and social media activity. Make it engaging and peppered with keywords, and you’re off to a flying start.
2. Middle of the Funnel (Consideration Stage): This is when your leads are seriously considering their options. Your mission here is to stand out from the crowd. Case studies and customer testimonials showcase your successes and build trust in your product or service.
3. Bottom of the Funnel (Decision Stage): This is crunch time – your leads are ready to decide. At this point of the lead generation sales funnel, free trials and demonstrations can be the cherry on the cake. They let your leads try before they buy, reducing perceived risk and nailing the sale.
While each business may have a unique lead generation strategy, customers will follow a similar journey. Understanding and tracking the customer journey stages is vital for creating an effective digital marketing sales funnel.
However, this blog will focus on optimizing the lead-generation process at each funnel stage (more on this later).
Importance of Lead Generation in Your Overarching Marketing Strategy
If you don’t know by now – to generate leads online and increase website conversions is the ultimate goal of any digital marketer.
In this relentless digital age where competition is fierce, partnering with a lead gen agency or lead generation specialist can help you one-up competitors, increase market share and boost overall profitability.
Here are some reasons why lead generation services should be a central focus in your marketing efforts:
• Targeted Audience: Target specific groups of people and tailor content to people more likely to be interested in your offer.
• Cost Effective: Unlike traditional marketing tactics, digital lead generation is a cost-effective way of reaching potential customers. With the help of social media, email campaigns and other online strategies, you can reach a wider audience without spending an arm and a leg.
• Increased Sales: By identifying and nurturing leads, you guide them through the digital marketing sales funnel, therefore increasing website conversions and boosting sales.
• Measurable Results: Digital lead generation lets you track your results and determine which strategies work. From there, you can refine your lead generation strategy for maximum effectiveness.
What’s more, digital lead generation doesn’t stop once someone has purchased your product – you can also use it to retain customers and build loyalty.
Offering incentives, discounts and exclusive content are ways lead generation companies encourage repeat business and brand patronage.
8 Ways To Boost Your Lead Generation Efforts at Every Step of the Sales Funnel
Generating leads is no longer a walk in the park. When asked about the biggest challenges marketers face, 66% said ‘how to generate leads’ (Hubspot, 2023).
Fortunately, there are several strategies to help boost your lead generation strategy and sales funnel optimization process:
1. Identify Your Lead Magnet
Lead magnets are powerful tools for collecting contact information from prospects. Strong lead magnets should:
• Be relevant to your audience.
• Provide value to your target customers.
• Be trustworthy.
• Keep your audience engaged.
• Be shareable content.
Generic information boxes and limited call-to-actions won’t cut it anymore. Instead, offer your potential leads something irresistible – a free eBook, exclusive access to an event or a discounted trial.
The idea is to keep them intrigued and interested enough to reach the last stage of the digital marketing sales funnel – conversion!
2. Keep Optimizing Successful Lead Generation Strategies
Retesting and optimizing your lead generation campaign is crucial for maximizing conversions. In fact, 32% of marketers evaluate their lead generation funnels weekly (Ruler Analytics).
Johnny Santiago, lead generation specialist at Johnny Santiago Media, advises testing key conversion points in the sales funnel. This includes experimenting with content, lead magnets and even products or services offered.
Constantly testing landing pages and analyzing user behavior is another method lead generation companies swear by.
According to Himanshu Shrivastava, marketing manager at DesignBro, optimizing landing pages is crucial as your competitors are likely doing the same. By analyzing user behavior and making adjustments to headlines and CTA placements, you can greatly improve form fills and attract your target audience.
3. Flaunt Your Content Assets
Content is king for a reason. Creating quality, engaging content is the gateway to capturing leads’ information.
You can learn about prospects based on what type of content they look at – are they into eBooks? Webinars? Case studies?
It’s also an easy way to self-segment your leads based on where they are in the sales funnel. Oftentimes, the type of content they consume can indicate where they are in their buyer’s journey.
For instance, someone in the Awareness stage may be more interested in general educational content like “What is X?” or “The Basics of Y.” On the other hand, someone closer to making a purchase may be more interested in specific product features or customer testimonials.
4. Focus Funnels Around Target Leads
At the end of the day, people have little interest in your background or products. Well, at least not until they know you understand their needs or can solve their problems.
That said, focus your sales funnel optimization efforts around your customer’s needs rather than your brands’.
Brad Johnson, a lead generation specialist at Song Production Pros, shares an effective approach to running an email sales funnel.
Each email should provide valuable information, showcasing your company’s understanding and ability to solve customers’ problems. By building trust and offering value, your leads are more likely to convert into customers when presented with an offer.
5. Regularly Purge and Qualify Your Leads
Not all leads will convert into paying customers. Lead qualification allows you to prioritize your resources towards leads with a higher chance of converting.
Start by analyzing their interaction with your content. Leads who download relevant materials, like case studies, are likely to be of higher quality than those who only browse your careers page.
Additionally, consider their engagement with your company post-contact. Do they consistently open emails, participate in surveys or respond to calls?
Christen Costa, CEO of Gadget Review, advises removing unengaged leads from mailing lists to improve lead generation.
6. Simplify the Conversion Process for Your Leads
People nowadays want instant gratification, easy access to information and quick solutions to problems. A long, complex conversion process can result in lead drop-offs and missed opportunities.
Evaluate how your existing funnel facilitates lead conversion. Ensure that calls-to-action (CTAs) are well-written and strategically placed throughout your website.
Olivia Tan, co-founder at CocoFax, suggests including a CTA on every key page, not just the main landing page. Doing so can maximize the number of leads generated throughout your website.
The ultimate goal is to make it convenient for leads to provide information.
7. Invest in Remarketing Campaigns
Persistence pays off. If someone visited your website but didn’t convert, remind them of what they’re missing with a remarketing campaign. It’s like giving them a gentle nudge, “Hey, remember us?”
These numbers show just how essential remarketing is to your lead generation campaign:
• Implementing a remarketing campaign can boost the conversion rate by up to 161%.
• Around 65% of online viewers value and recognize retargeted ads that showcase products they previously viewed on other websites.
• 49% of shoppers surveyed believe personalized promotions or deals based on past purchases would enhance their shopping experience.
8. Measure, Analyze and Improve Lead Quality
All lead generation companies agree: testing and measuring your lead quality is necessary. After all, the success of your marketing campaigns relies heavily on the quality, not just the quantity of leads you generate.
But what exactly does it mean to measure lead quality? Consider these metrics:
• Target account: Does this individual match our desired customer profile? This criterion should be established before our sales team initiates contact.
• Content engagement: Are they actively interacting with the content that we know resonates with our target accounts?
• Pain points alignment: To what extent do their challenges align with the solutions our service/product offers?
• Competitor analysis: Are our competitors successfully targeting companies similar to these?
• Advocacy: Can someone champion our cause during the buying process?
Remember, your lead generation strategy is not set in stone. Your audience is changing, and your lead generation campaign needs to change with them.
Working with a lead generation company is a great way to keep your strategy fresh and effective. But even without professional lead generation services, this guide can serve as a starting point for developing your successful lead generation strategy.
Elevate Your Lead Generation Game With Thrive
A well-oiled sales funnel isn’t merely a mechanism; it’s the lifeblood of your business. And like a good brew, it gets better with time and attention.
Each step, from the top to the bottom of the sales funnel, is a new opportunity to refine your technique, adapt to shifting preferences and outsmart the competition.
Thrive, a top-performing lead generation company ensures your sales funnel is continuously stocked with high-quality leads. Our lead generation services include everything from data cleaning and enrichment to lead scoring and nurturing.
We also offer digital marketing solutions like email marketing, pay-per-click advertising and social media management to attract new leads and keep your funnel flowing.
Contact our lead gen agency today to see how we can help you generate leads online and improve your bottom line.
