“If people like you, they’ll listen to you, but if they trust you, they’ll do business with you.”—Zig Ziglar.
Well, that’s what lead generation is about. So often, you would’ve heard from your sales team that even after giving a kick-ass product demo, the prospect still didn’t come on board.
That happened because the prospect liked your brand enough to listen to the demo but didn’t trust enough to sign up as a paying customer. This trust factor makes lead generation, especially B2B lead generation, a hard nut to crack.
The biggest aspect that works against you in the trust-building process is when you copy successful B2B lead generation strategies, thinking it’ll bring the same success for you as well. But guess what, your prospects are way too smart not to realize what’s matching your brand identity and what’s not.
Hence, they go away, even after listening and knowing all about your product.
This is where we’ll help you with 20 B2B lead generation strategies that will act as a booster to your lead pipeline rocket! Excited? We bet you are. Before talking about the strategies, let’s understand the process, the B2B lead generation process.
What Is B2B Lead Generation?
To start on the right note, B2B lead generation stands for business-to-business lead generation. This means businesses that sell to (*drumroll please*)…other businesses. It is parallel to the business-to-consumer (B2C) lead generation, where businesses directly sell their products and services to consumers.
In a typical sales funnel or process, B2B lead generation is the starting step. This is where personal information – such as name, company name, contact number, and email – is collected, that’ll be used to personalize further communication in the selling process. The goal of B2B lead generation is to create a consistent pipeline of highly qualified prospects that have the intent of buying and are looking for that slight little push.
The 4-step Lead Generation Process
Serious B2B lead generation requires a serious lead generation process with a proper framework for all the steps. Here’s the 4-step framework that’s widely used:
Step 1: Find
The first step to generate B2B leads is to find the contact details of your potential buyers. This information is sourced in-house (through B2B lead generation strategies) or generated by a third-party company specializing in lead generation. So that’s how the first step of the process works.
Step 2: Reach Out
Hoping that your sales or marketing team has got a list of high-quality leads, representatives reach them out one by one either through cold outreach campaigns, connecting on social media, or by reverting to their inquiries.
Step 3: Qualify
During the reaching out and interaction process, reps gauge how likely a prospect is going to buy. They do this by understanding the stage where the prospects are in the buying process. These stages include:
- Awareness: The customer is aware of what they need from the product or the type of solution they’re looking for. They discover more about it during their interaction with the reps. This is also the stage where they’ll consume blogs, whitepapers, and case studies to enhance their knowledge further.
- Consideration: This is the stage where the prospect/leads know the exact service/product they need. They detail their specific needs to the reps before researching to try finding a solution themselves.
- Decision: The prospects here are filtering through options to find the best fit. In this stage, the lead will have multiple meetings with you and other decision-makers before deciding to purchase.
Depending on which stage the lead is, the reps nurture them and try to close the deal.
Step 4: Close
This is where success happens! After multiple meetings (and negotiations), the qualified lead finally comes on board and becomes a client.
20 Mind-blowing B2B Lead Generation Strategies For The New Normal!
B2B lead generation is no walk in the park; we’ve already said that. But does that mean it’s as tough as making spaghetti that doesn’t look like noodles with ketchup? Nah, it’s not “that” tough. Many B2B marketers and companies generate leads every day, and they do it well.
So, where’s the problem?
B2B lead generation strategies. This is where things get tricky. Few companies use some amazing lead generation strategies that suit their industry, product, and customers, while the others copy them.
We would never want you to copy, as you can’t copy their leads and results. This is why we’ve come with this “mind-blowing” list of 20 B2B lead generation strategies that are sure to work. You and your teams might only need to tweak it a little to suit your business goals and need. But that’s it. Nothing else is required. Just pick and use.
Whoa, you’ve waited long for the real deal—time to let the cat out of the bag.
#1 Use The Power Of Surveys
As discussed, lead generation is about discovering contact information of good leads which can be nurtured into paying clients. One of the best B2B lead generation strategies is using SurveySparrow to conduct surveys. In your discovery survey, ask questions relating to your product and invite them for a one-on-one call to discuss further. Those interested would quickly jump in and become quality leads for your account managers.
SPB Web Solutions used surveys to increase their list of qualified prospects by 30%. First, they sent out a well-crafted survey using SurveySparrow’s built-in email platform, asking if prospects were interested in a free consultation call. Those that gave a positive reply were automatically segmented in a relevant audience list. And just like that, the “tough job” of collecting good leads became easy.
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#2 Focus On The Basics
If your focus is on finding leads for a new product, shift it on the product till it’s basic enough to solve simple but persistent problems. When you’re in the development phase, don’t focus too much on putting ‘X’ number of features solving small, even insignificant, problems. Instead, keep the product basic with only a few functionalities solves a pretty obvious problem for your target businesses.
We’re not saying you should skip user experience and keep the product dull, but one of the best B2B lead generation strategies is to let your product do the talking through its functionalities and by solving problems that need solving. Loom did that when they started. Basecamp still does that with its new products, along with many other SaaS and product-based companies. So why don’t you try it?
#3 Stay The Same Everywhere
Sendible got a deeper understanding of their on-site user behaviour and corrected a severe readability issue on their website for a version of Mozilla Firefox that 5% of visitors were using.
It’s crazy how businesses ignore one of the simplest B2B lead generation strategies of giving the same experience on all browsers.
Even when Google dominates this segment, there are still others with lots of users. And you don’t want qualified leads from your website to go away because of browser irregularities and incompatibility.
#4 Track & Test
With the onset of work from home culture, the need for a suitable software for different needs has grown massively. Businesses are always on the lookout for tools that can make their work easier while bringing results. Therefore, using heatmaps and mouse tracking tools is the best way to segregate normal visitors from the more interested ones. Then, a chatbot could start a conversation and turn these visitors into qualified prospects.
Once you’ve tracked your visitors’ activity, it’s time to do some A/B testing on pages that are generating the most interest. Again, simple and subtle changes could bring massive leads, as was seen when WorkZone, a project management software, changed the testimonial bar from black to white.
Continuous tracking and testing are how you’ll find the best version of your website, and this is a time-tested lead generation strategy.
#5 Fix What’s Broken ASAP!
“Here you go, here’s your beautiful broken vase. Your spouse would love it,” a shop owner to a customer.
“Are you kidding me?” Customer’s reply.
We’re guessing you would’ve replied the same; after all, it’s a broken vase! Even when a small part of the vase is broken, it’s enough for you or anyone else to not buy it.
Now, consider the same with some of your web pages. Imagine how your website visitors would feel if they land on a broken page showing a “404 error”? They certainly won’t be impressed, and they might even go away never to come back.
B2B lead generation strategies, whatever you may choose, should start with building and sustaining your brand presence. Only then can you think of trying something new and take some risks. So, check and fix all the broken pages, and you’ll see an organic spike in your prospect list. Ain’t that amazing?
#6 Be A Mobile-friendly Brand
Mobile devices generated 50.81% of global website traffic in 2020, according to Statista. To go with this, Statista also gave out a report projecting there will be 4.3 billion smartphones users worldwide by 2023. So, it’s obvious that most B2B buyers are using mobile phones extensively to make buying decisions. Moreover, this usage got increased when the Covid-19 pandemic hit, as most people were working from home, and rather than using their MacBook to find online tools; they were doing it with their smartphone sitting on a couch.
Customers, especially business owners, love it when they get similar experiences from a brand in all the different channels, which ultimately plays a massive role in their buying decision. So, if you haven’t already, get your website mobile-friendly. It would be one of your best business decisions, for sure.
#7 Talk About Yourself, Not Just The Products
The year 2020 showed there’s much more to life than just sales and profits. People connected with businesses that came out as humane and conversed with no hidden agenda. They felt they were in a similar situation, and their problems were similar. So, when things started getting back to normal, these same people became their customers.
All this happened as they felt a connection that was above any product or service. Very few would coin this strategy, but we’re saying you to use it. Please talk about your team members, show their everyday routines through small videos, highlight your working culture, and focus on how you and your employees tackle a problem and build solutions for it. This would develop trust for your brand, and trust brings sales.
#8 Give An On-Demand Product For Free
Neil Patel and his Ubersuggest is what we’re talking about here. Now, Ubersuggest is a completely free tool with no ads running to make any revenue. Yet, Neil Patel considers it a very crucial tool for his overall business umbrella.
Why?
Because Ubersuggest gives him quality traffic and eventually more leads for his ad agency so, here’s a free tool that is essentially a lead-generating machine for him. Even if he stops marketing himself (which he never will), Ubersuggest would still bring quality prospects for him that’ll turn into revenue-generating customers.
Even though this is nothing new (and probably one of the best B2B lead generation strategies ever), very few businesses follow this, which is beyond our understanding.
#9 Educate Before You Sell
This is where the content marketing genie comes in! The better you educate prospects about your industry, product details, and your business values, the more they’ll be inclined to becoming your clients.
It’s a long-term process, we agree, but extremely rewarding, too. So make every piece of your content a lead-generating opportunity by giving readers more than they could ask for. Your lead pipeline would never go dry.
#10 Omni-channel Presence
Another one of those B2B lead generation strategies that take time to execute but give extraordinary results later. If your products are good, why leave a stone unturned? Market and talk about them everywhere you can.
In the lockdown last year, podcasts gained immense popularity across all industries. Your teams can find podcasts on your industry or area of expertise, and you can go as a guest there. If that doesn’t work out, you can choose to sponsor few such podcasts to spread the news around about your brand. Similarly, YouTube videos and webinars can be shot, which could then be embedded into your website. The proof that webinar works come from the fact that 73% of marketers consider it as a top lead generation tactic.
The best part, these intellectual properties (podcasts, videos, and webinars) are there on the internet forever. So, once you’ve uploaded and given enough time to it, they would build a solid lead pipeline.
#11 Give Offers They Can’t Refuse!
Think of lead magnets here. One of the best B2B lead generation strategies is to give powerful offers or valuable content as your lead magnets. It should be so powerful that viewers would happily give their details, like an email address or calling number for the offer.
Even a well-researched and in-depth ebook would work well here. The point is to give them an offer that’s so great; it becomes impossible not to take it.
#12 Good Ol’ Cold Emails
“Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.” – Leonardo da Vinci.
For developing B2B lead generation strategies that work, businesses often ignore simple strategies to go for the sophisticated ones. A prime example of that would be cold emails.
Despite its low open and reply rates, cold emails are still one of the most successful and simple B2B lead generation strategies to use. Just focus on the right content, use a catchy (even crazy!) subject line, and send it to an audience who would be interested in what you’re offering.
Those who use it use it well and to significant effect. They take 5-7 follow-ups before giving up on a lead. If you haven’t given it a right try, we suggest you do. It’s a tested strategy that works.
#13 Social Media = Endless Leads
Social media has become the go-to lead generation channel for B2B marketers over the past couple of years, and the pandemic made it more prominent. 66% of marketers found leads from social media after spending just 6 hours per week on social marketing. That’s the best time to lead ratio you’ll find.
The best way to use social media for lead generation is to have a balanced approach where you’re playing the short-term game by running advertisements but backing that up with quality content to build a brand presence over time.
Here’s a question that you might want to ask, though – Which social media platform is suitable for my business?
The answer lies in A/B testing and documenting all results until you find a pattern. And once you find that, there’s a massive chance your lead pipeline would never run dry!
#14 Target & Re-target Ads Till You Hit Gold
With Facebook being the most active and biggest social platform, it makes sense to run advertisements targeting the right audience. But the right B2B lead generation strategy would be to target and re-target your ads on new demographics and interests. Here’s why:
- It would give you more data to analyze and find relevant patterns about the target audience.
- Re-targeting advertisements would eventually compel viewers to click on it and explore more about the product, thus going into your lead pipeline.
#15 Go For Automation
80% of businesses using marketing automation saw their number of leads increase, and 77% of them witnessed a clear increase in their lead conversions. Survey software, heat maps, and email marketing tools form a part of the marketing automation umbrella, and whatever your business requirements and goals are, making proper use of such tools should be a massive part of your lead generation strategy.
#16 Focus On Long-tail Keywords
Let’s face it, till the time we’re using Google or any browser, SEO would never go out of fashion. But what if we tell you there’s a way around that?
Target long-tail keywords.
Yes, you’ve got to optimize the content of your blogs and website on a few targeted long-tail keywords relevant to your niche, and you’ll start ranking high on it quickly. Now, the search volume for a specific long-tail keyword is less, but those who’re searching are often serious prospects. And after seeing your blog or website, they’ll directly come to you.
#17 Find Winning Keywords From Competitors
Since we’re on the topic of keywords, here’s a B2B lead generation strategy that works brilliantly. See, if one or some of your competitors stick to specific sites for backlinks or favor optimizing a small group of keywords, you and your team need to dig deep on it.
Because they’ve found keywords that are generating leads for them, and you want to use them, too. Using SEO tools like Ahrefs or SEMrush, you can do that by targeting the same websites and keywords to drive hot leads that require little nurturing.
Run a paid ads campaign first to test if these keywords are actually generating relevant leads or not. This way, success would be all but guaranteed.
#18 Stay Patient With Your Email List
The way you organize your mailing list determines the type of leads you’ll get. If you choose to purchase leads, the quality of your mailing list will go down as a majority of these leads won’t be interested in any purchase, and they’ll require a lot of nurturing to move them down the sales funnel. So, staying patient and organically improving on your email list is one of te best passive B2B lead generation strategies you could use.
Adding actionable CTAs to your content, split testing different lead magnets, and creating valuable gated content like reports and case studies is how you’ll grow the list organically.
#19 Are You Using Bing?
Google is the most popular browser, and running ads there make total sense. But it’s not the only browser, nor is it the only search platform to run ads. You must’ve heard about Bing, haven’t you? Well, here are a few reasons you should start using and advertising on Bing as part of your lead generation strategy:
- Bing lets you have more control over which search partners are sending traffic to your website.
- With Bing ads, you can target users based on their devices. For example, you can easily target a search from just an android device using Bing. But with Google Ads, that’s not possible.
- Bing comes with better social extensions, which lures your ad viewers into clicking. For example, with Bing Ads, the Twitter followers of the brand who is advertising show up, but Google Ads shows a brand’s Google+ followers, which no one uses!
- Last, Bing has far less competition and a very cheap cost per click compared to Google Ads.
#20 Remove (Or Reduce) Barriers
We won’t go into much detail, because frankly, this Orbit Media article on this topic covers everything you should remove from your website.
Just one addition, try removing the login part, too. Your prospects would explore and spend a lot more time on your website that way. The primary goal of “Login” is to collect personal information like name, email, and contact number. Collect that using a powerful lead magnet, but remove the login part. It’s a barrier you don’t want in your lead generation process.
Time To Close Some Deals!
We started with a quote, so why not wrap up in the same way?
“Pretend that every single person you meet has a sign around his or her neck that says, “make me feel important.” Not only will you succeed in sales, but you will also succeed in life.”–Mary Kay Ash
This is entirely true for lead generation as well. Whatever B2B lead generation strategies you employ, their success depends on whether the prospects feel important or not.
So, remember to weave the strategies around your prospects. Don’t be transactional when you can be conversational and win their trust. Because sales, B2B or B2C, happen only when people trust people. Remember that.
We’re here 24/7 if you need us for your survey needs. Just shoot us a message, and we’ll be there for you. Time for you to use these strategies and close some deals now!
