We are all in the game of getting more customers, more sales, and more time for ourselves, and hopefully, by now you know social media can get results for you.

I believe there are five main areas in business:

  • Lead generation – attracting more of the right people to you
  • Lead nurture – looking after these people before they buy from you – yes they may watch for a long time before they are ready to buy
  • Sales and conversion – getting the best conversion rate you can
  • Deliverables – everyone does this part the best, all the things you do for your customers
  • Follow-up, Resales, Upsell and Referrals – how you look after your customers once the business is complete…for now

WHY THIS IS IMPORTANT

Each of the five areas is important, some of them you will do better than others. The thing is to focus for the next 30-60-90 days in the area where you have the most work to do.

Let me explain, you may have a great process to attract people into what is called the sales funnel – basically, this is how people get to know you, like you and trust you – it takes time, in fact, it could take years before the person is ready to buy.

You may be great at sales and conversion and deliverables is a no-brainer.

The area you leave to last is the sales nurture – this could be your email follow-up, newsletters, or posting valuable information on your website and social media…it’s the one area you like the least.

In this article, we’re going to focus on lead generation and ways to attract the right people to you through using the right message at the right time.

LEAD GENERATION

Before I share my list of Lead Generation ideas with you, I first want to give you a brief definition of what this actually means.

Lead generation in marketing speak is the generation of interest or inquiry in your products and/or services of your business.

Leads mean the contact information of a potential customer such as first name and email or connection via messenger.

It’s not just about likes and follows on social media, the goal here is to get your potential customer to share their basic information in exchange for a valuable free offering such as a cheat sheet, whitepaper, video training, newsletters…the list is endless.

Gone are the days when you could put something for sale out there and people would buy, the ‘if we build it, they will come’ mentality does not work when it comes to social media and lead generation, where the aim of the game is to attract your potential customers.

You need a plan for attracting leads! The plan will differ from one social media platform to another.

What they all have in common though is CONSISTENCY.

Don’t just do this once – set time aside to do this on a regular basis, planning is the foundation for all social media results.

So here are a few suggestions for the following platforms:

Landing Pages

You may have heard the term ‘landing pages’ – these are stand-alone pages usually connected to your website. There are loads of options to choose from these days.

I have a WordPress website and have been using Lead Pages for almost 10 years. Other choices are ClickFunnels and Kajabi, there are so many out there, it’s about finding the one that is right for you.

What you need to consider when building a ‘sales funnel’ or what I like to call the ‘relationship’ funnel.

    • Keep registration forms short. Only ask for the information you need to contact them, the more details you ask for the less chance of someone filling in the form.
    • Make sure your Call to Action buttons stand out – have only one request on any page. The more options you give, the greater chance of a decision NOT being made
    • Be clear about what you’re offering – I know the internet marketers want you to drive your potential customers to another landing page, with a low-cost offering, but that is for internet marketers. Those of us in small business, we are wanting to connect and create a relationship with this potential customer, not sell them something from the get-go.

Social Media

The most obvious choice I believe for generating leads is via social media – so your work is to get the real results you are looking for on each platform.

Here are a few tips to improve your engagement and increase the likelihood of genuine relationships rather than fake connections.

  • Facebook
    • Think about how you view your personal profile versus your business page. How do you want to leverage your personal profile for business?
    • Have a business page
    • Add Calls to Action to your posts – add value first always and perhaps every fourth post, have a gentle offer such as download your free tool, join your group or sign up to receive a magazine or newsletter
    • Actively encourage your customers to be ambassadors online – give them a reason to give you a shout you
    • The main thing to remember here is people are on social media for human connection, to watch a funny video or find out what everyone is up to, they are not there to hear how amazing you think your business is
    • Offer value, information and education, and position yourself as the person of influence you are
    • Run Facebook ads – the thing is, there is so much you can do for free, save this for events, and specific offers you are running
  • LinkedIn
    • Be strategic with your connections, go and view a potential profile, see if it is a fit and then send a meaningful message on why you think you should connect
    • Where likes on your Facebook page don’t mean much – connections on LinkedIn certainly do. The algorithm is super friendly to users compared to Facebook. The more connections you have, the more people will see your posts.
    • Follow your current clients and prospects.
    • Join groups and add value to others by posting impactful content.
    • LinkedIn has a fantastic search option, use it to your advantage

Write A Blog

The best place for your blog is on your website. If you don’t have a website, then it’s time you looked into ways to get one. There are a number of options available such as SquareSpace or Wix, however, I prefer and recommend WordPress every time, as you own the site.

Use your blog to:

    • Deliver product education.
    • Integrate a link in your blog content so potential customers can purchase from your shop or the latest offering
    • Use strong headlines and pull your readers in – your goal is to engage them with content related to your products. I have found a great Headline generator if you need help with this, just email and I can send you the link
    • Help your products get found through a combination of keyword-rich blog content, staying true to what I call the content pillars, and linking both to other parts of your blog and your website. For example, my content pillars are organic marketing, business growth, mindset and life.
    • Share your blog to get social media results
    • Make it easy for potential buyers to contact you for sales or customer care questions.

Lead generation is always about attracting the right people with the right message at the right time.

Find what works best for you and your market and make sure you are doing it consistently.

Overall, there are three core principles that will help you generate leads:

  1. Provide a great product/offer
  2. Identify your target audience
  3. Give the target audience a reason to act NOW.

The rule here is to position yourself as a leader, offer valuable content, and do it regularly!

If you’re curious to know how to create your four pillars of content, please feel free to reach out and connect with us today.

From here we then head into what I call lead nurture, more on that next time.

Have a great week,

 

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