Maddie Karlsson

January 5, 2023

Across industries, and regardless of company size, generating leads is imperative for growth. Alongside driving revenue, generating good quality leads should remain a focus. Without a solid pipeline of leads, revenue streams risk quickly drying up and you’ll find yourself scrambling for business.  

Lead generation can be complex, at least good lead generation. We hear a lot of businesses relying solely on referrals, but best practice is trying out different channels and sticking with a few that works for you, to ensure there is always a solid influx of leads even if one goes temporarily quiet.  

Targeting the right people

Lead generation only works if you target the right potential customers. If you don’t get in front of the target audience at the top of the funnel, with your content and branding, it’s going to be a tough job pitching and selling your products to them.  

- Start with ensuring you know the different audiences that make up your total market, do you understand their pain points and needs?  

- Do you know where they are, and how to reach them? Learn and adapt your communication to those channels.  

- Make a habit of using both paid and organic content that appeals to your specific audiences and their needs, creating an authentic connection.

Fix holes in your funnel

Each stage of the sales funnel will be dependent on the previous stage, to push potential customers to purchase.  

It’s important to allow your clients time to research your brand and offering in order to build an interest in your product, and ultimately the trust to convert to a sale. But that will only happen if your content or funnel is interesting to them, and each stage effortlessly pushes them forward to the next. Identify where drop-offs happen and work on a fix from there. If for example, your leads drop out during the decision stage, look into providing more information or resources that will help them make up their mind. If the majority of your fallout happens at the awareness stage, you may need to focus on creating more engaging marketing material and increasing your brand visibility.  

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Follow-up & nurture your leads

Failing to follow up and nurture your leads is a very common mistake, generating leads is just the first step. It's important to follow up with leads in a timely manner and nurture them until they are ready to make a purchase. A personal approach where you make it clear that you understand the client’s needs and concerns is the best way to follow up. This can be achieved through targeted messages or offering resources that can help them make a decision. Equally important is the time you let lapse between following up, and your responsiveness - your potential clients need to feel that they matter to you and that you are someone that can help offer them a solution to their issues.

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Test and analyze

Simple A/B testing can be incredibly valuable. You can test subject lines, CTA text, placements and keywords, so keep testing and analysing once you have identified touch-points that resonate for your target audience. There are always parts you can sharpen and make perfect to optimise the results.  

If you don’t optimise and try to improve your lead generation efforts, you’re missing out on a lot of potential customers, it all comes back to understanding your clients.  

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Use compelling CTA’s  

Once you’ve drawn in your ideal customer, you need an easy and enticing road forward. Spend some time crafting your call to action and ensure it is clear, compelling and actionable. Otherwise, you end up leading the customer all the way to the finish line, but leaving them there to figure out the final steps themselves.  

• Building a dedicated landing page with the sole purpose of funnelling the customer to conversion.  

• Include a compelling offer, like a giveaway, that help increase the value of a conversion.  

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Don’t let your lead generation efforts frustrate you, but rather use the work it takes to optimize your funnel as a means to learn more about your target audience and get closer to understanding their needs and pain points so that you can offer true value. Good quality leads can help you transform your business so don’t let the additional effort keep you accepting passable leads.