Every digital marketing endeavor aims for lead generation. You simply cannot grow a business online without it. But it takes a certain amount of finesse to get it right and maximize your returns.
A marketer’s ultimate goal is to generate high-quality leads that convert. That means you must attract people to your website and convince them to give up personal information—all with the hope that they truly need your solution and will become customers.
This is not easy.
Fortunately, there are proven ways to boost your chances of generating quality leads that will stick around. If you’re struggling to create an effective lead generation strategy, look no further. Here are four tips for generating more (and better) leads to improve your conversion rates:
#1: Produce Great Content
Content is arguably the most important piece of any lead generation plan. After all, people are typically first attracted to your site through a valuable piece of content. What’s more, content marketing costs 62% less than traditional marketing and generates three times as many leads.
But you need a defined target audience for your content marketing to be effective. Once you know who to target, you can create informative and engaging blog posts, ebooks, videos, webinars, and landing pages that speak to specific pain points, outline solutions, and prompt visitors to take action.
#2: Distribute Content Mindfully
All your delightful content will go to waste if you don’t have a good distribution strategy. You want your target audience to discover your content, so you have to be intentional about how you get it in front of them.
For starters, it’s a good idea to do some behind-the-scenes work on search engine marketing (SEM) and search engine optimization (SEO). According to Formstack’s state of lead capture report, organic website traffic is the top source of high-quality leads for marketers, so paying attention to SEM and SEO will help prospective customers find your content via a simple Google search. You should also consider which social networks are most relevant to your audience and strategically share your content there.
#3: Use Mobile-Friendly Forms
Once your content brings visitors to your site, the goal is to get them to convert (i.e., to provide contact information via an online form). With the prevalence of mobile use, designing mobile-friendly forms is one of the best ways to boost your conversions.
Optimizing your forms for mobile means considering how they appear on smaller screens. Users shouldn’t have to put in extra effort to complete a form on a mobile device. Input boxes should stretch across the screen, required scrolling should be kept to a minimum, and desired action should be clear.
#4: Track Performance Data
For an expert digital marketer, the job is never done. What does that mean? Refine. Refine. Refine.
Tracking the performance of your content and web pages with Google Analytics or other tools helps you determine which of your efforts are working so you can optimize and scale those efforts. You can also use form insights to identify field bottlenecks and other form elements that may be hindering conversions.
An effective lead generation strategy is all about attracting visitors with valuable content, converting them with optimized forms, and continually using data to refine your efforts. Put these tips in action, and your leads are sure to pour in.
About the Author: Ashley Walsh, VP of Marketing, Formstack. Ashley has worked in multiple areas of the B2B marketing sector and is currently the VP of marketing for Formstack, an online form building solution based in Indianapolis.