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We’ve all done it – we’ve been at the grocery store and seen that one item that sparked a craving. We’ve thrown it in the cart and made a purchase even though it wasn’t on the list. Maybe it was something you needed but didn’t remember or know that you needed it. Maybe you needed your significant other to point at it and say “hey, are we out of milk?” before you were prompted to buy.
In the B2B world, you probably have a quirky workaround for a pesky inconvenient process. You have a large problem that you have put on the back burner because you just don’t know how to fix it. If you are anything like me, you talk about it in close proximity to your phone - in hopes that Amazon, Google or Facebook are listening and go hunt for the perfect product or service to advertise to you with. Alternately it could be a product that you need to purchase in bulk or perhaps need to subscribe to receive on a scheduled basis. Wouldn’t it be nice if someone tapped you on the shoulder and said “I can help”
At its simplest terms, lead generation is just that. It’s a company or person trying to spark interest in a product or service. They are trying to remind you that their product or service is in fact, something that you unknowingly need. They want to turn you into a lead. Leads don’t mean a sale, but rather an opportunity to sell to you somewhere down the line.
Leads can come in many forms and from a variety of sources. They can come through social media, advertisements, online searches, referrals or through the telephone. Typically a lead is simply someone to follow up with. Someone you can reach out to and tell them or show them what products/services you have to offer in order to qualify them (or gauge interest).
Many companies rely solely on referrals from past customers. While referrals are a great source of leads, they do often dry up eventually. Your happy customer only has so many friends that are in a similar industry/position and in need of your product or service. In recent years there have been huge advancements and a focus on digital marketing. One big reason why digital marketing is so widely used is that much of the process is automated. You can reach a large number of people with less effort than some traditional methods. That being said, traditional methods should never be ignored. Often traditional methods such as telephone marketing can be very effective if done correctly and in some cases, are much more personalized than other lead generation efforts.
In any sense of the phrase, lead generation can have huge contributions to a company’s success. Often old school and new school techniques can compliment each other and they are not mutually exclusive. Each company should find a unique blend of lead generation techniques that yield the best mix of quality and quantity they are looking for.
- Kris -