In today's digital age, everybody is online. From your brother to your grandma, everyone you know probably owns either a smartphone or a laptop, or some device that they use regularly to access the Internet.
Given that, one easy way for your business's sales and marketing teams to become more effective is to use the Internet to generate new business leads. For a B2B company, chances are that your target customers use the Internet a great deal.
There's no reason why you can't start channeling their attention towards your product or service that's going to be a life-changing positive addition to their company.
If you're ready to start harnessing the power of online lead generation but aren't yet sure of how exactly to do that, you're in the right place. In this article, we'll teach you everything you need to know about leveraging the Internet to create a funnel of red-hot, qualified leads for your sales team.
Start a Website
First things first: you need to create a virtual headquarters to operate from. Just as you have your physical location to take orders and funnel visitors into, you need a virtual location on the Internet to funnel your leads into.
If you haven't already, start a website. If you're a low-budget operation, don't worry. Website design isn't hard when you have all of the tools available today. I've made many a website with no coding background or technical experience whatsoever.
What's more, you can also get online in almost no time at all. With today's streamlined sales experience, web hosts and domain registrars can get your order processed in just a few minutes. And then in a few more hours, your domain will be registered online and you'll be able to start building out your website.
Create a Landing Page
Once you have your website created, you need to create a landing page. Think of this as analogous to the point of sale at your physical location. This is where your prospects give you their contact and/or payment details.
Your landing page needs to be built with a high conversion rate in mind.
Your conversion rate is the number of conversions (actions people take that you want them to, such as submitting a "contact us" form to learn more about your services), dividing by the number of overall visitors. Thus, you want to maximize conversion rate: get the highest number of conversions from the fewest visitors possible.
Funnel Traffic to Your Landing Page
Once you have your landing page built in a high conversion manner, it's time to start funneling visitors to it so that they can convert and bring in some dollars! We'll go over a few basic ways to generate traffic to your landing page now.
Leverage Free Search Engine Traffic
If you're a new business, chances are that you don't have the sky-high marketing budgets that the older, more established companies do. Thus, you're looking to take advantage of all of the free ways to generate traffic that you can.
There's no better free source of traffic than search engine traffic. Whenever someone searches a keyword related to your business's industry, your website should come up. That way, you can channel them straight from a Google search into your landing page.
Optimizing your website to rank high in Google's search listings, however, is no easy task. There are a variety of factors that Google considers.
Up first is mobile-friendliness. Google wants your content to be responsive and fit the screen of the user who is viewing it, no matter whether they're at home on their desktop or on the go using their smartphone.
Second, your content has to be keyword-relevant. You accomplish this by ensuring that the search queries related to your industry with the highest volume are frequently in your content.
Third, your website has to provide a good user experience. Google can tell if your website visitors aren't generally engaged with your website, and will penalize you for it.
Establish Solid Social Media Profiles
Another great way to source free traffic is to establish yourself on social media. Most people who spend any amount of time online have a social media profile as well. Thus, you need to get on the social media platforms that your would-be customers spend a lot of time on.
One of the go-to's for any B2B company will be LinkedIn. The professional nature of LinkedIn makes it an ideal candidate for the social media marketing strategy of a B2B business.
Consider the Power of Pay Per Click Advertising
If you do have some money to throw around, then try leveraging the power of pay per click advertising.
When you Google something, you've no doubt seen the ads that take up the first two or three listings in the search results. You can set your website up so that it figures in those featured listings. Every time a visitor clicks your listing, you pay a small fee.
If your website converts well enough, then this opens up an unlimited source of new leads. So long as your customer acquisition costs can be kept below the customer lifetime value and the cost of providing your service, you can generate a profit with this strategy.
Use B2B Lead Gen
Last but certainly not least, you can try using a B2B lead gen service in order to source new business. There are companies on the Internet that specializes in connecting companies such as your own with red-hot, qualified prospects.
You'll pay an agreed-upon amount per lead. Just as with pay per click advertising, you can turn this into a channel of unlimited profit if you are able to convert your leads well enough.
The Internet: A Spectacular Source of New Business Leads
There you have it — everything you need to know about leveraging the Internet to generate new business leads. Leads are the lifeblood of your business so keep them coming in consistently!
