If you expect your business to stay competitive, and if you’re interested in direct sales, lead generation isn’t a question of “If”, but rather “How”. There are many ways to reach out to potential customers for B2B sales, but as time goes on and the industry continues to innovate and evolve, some methods become outdated while others continue to cement themselves as the way to go.
Nowadays, and this is especially the case for B2B companies, you need to be able to implement and use an unconventional approach and methodologies. Your strategies must match your audience. Lead generation is not a one-time event, but a long-term process. You must regularly monitor the effectiveness of your content, metrics, and conversions, and be prepared to improve or completely overhaul how you do things. So, how do you build a strong foundation for generating digital marketing leads?
Stick To Email Marketing
They don’t call it King for no reason. Email marketing has proven to be one of the most reliable and cost-effective methods of lead generation for several decades now. B2B email marketing has a higher click-to-open rate than B2C and is the preferred marketing channel for 59% of B2B marketers.
This direct sales lead generation channel can consistently attract prospects if done right. There are a few things you must keep in mind to make the most out of it.
Automate It
No matter the industry, everyone that utilizes automation is familiar with the benefits it brings: smoother workflow, faster turnaround time, and the ability to devote the freed-up time to other activities rather than handling repetitive tasks. Here, at SalesAR, we have practically perfected this aspect. Email marketing automation is a must-have if you plan on generating direct sales leads.
Track Email Deliverability
Email automation is one thing, but are customers getting your emails in the first place?
You can have some of the best email content in the industry, but it won’t do much if your emails end up in the spam folder. Companies can improve email deliverability, and therefore – direct sales lead generation by following these methods:
- Emails that address the company’s name instead of the person’s name are more likely to end up in the spam folder or not open at all. Use a person’s address to send emails and include the option to reply to that address;
- Don’t change the sending times of your email campaigns too often. There will be certain periods when you have to send more emails of course, but be as consistent as possible so that your subscriber base knows when to expect your emails. Don’t bombard them daily, but keep it frequent enough for them to remember about you;
- Validate and clear your lists regularly so that you don’t send emails to addresses that no longer exist. This has negative implications for the state of your domain, mailboxes, and further outreach success.
Interesting Fact #1 – The USA & China are the top 2 countries that send the most spam in the world, with around 8.61 & 8.53 billion spam emails sent daily.
Choose the Content Wisely
Once the email is delivered successfully, it’s entirely up to the content to generate direct sales. Keep these things in mind when choosing what to include in your email:
- Your content should be relevant to your brand. Send emails about products, services, events, industry news, and the latest blog posts;
- Create a consistent design for your marketing newsletters, including branding elements such as your logo, brand colors, and fonts;
- Don’t try to sell something in every email. Keep it diverse with the occasional holiday-related email, some announcements, or even a gratitude email saying thanks to your clients and their brand loyalty. If every email is aimed towards selling a service/product, it will get tiresome pretty quickly and people will block you or unsubscribe.
Personalize
Personalization is a huge part of content marketing, and it’s critical to direct sales lead generation. In the world of B2B marketing, you need to build personal relationships, not just transactional ones, and once you’re doing that, don’t just make it about earning new customers, but also focus on keeping them loyal, enabling the possibility of future referrals, and direct sales.
At SalesAR, for instance, we personalize every single campaign according to the unique requirements of our clients, and that is precisely why we are capable of delivering industry-leading service and results. Which areas should a B2B business focus on then? Here are three areas you want to pay special attention to when personalizing.
Sales Presentations
You can start building customer relationships early in the direct sales lead generation process by developing a presentation that incorporates your and your potential client’s branding. Discuss topics that are important to your prospect, and don’t get too hung up on everything that your business can do, unless you’re talking about solutions you can provide.
Don’t be afraid to detail your presentation by mentioning keywords related to your client and their industry. Do your research to show them how knowledgeable you are about the company, but also how you plan for the future.
To end this point with an obvious statement – make it look good. Invest in a good graphic designer. Sales presentations are judged on their looks, so make them eye-appealing.
Social Media
Social media, long considered the domain of B2C lead generation, has its advantages in B2B as well. While you shouldn’t treat all social media channels the same, they all serve the same purpose at the end of the day, and you can be sure that SalesAR practices what it preaches:
- It spreads your brand identity and increases awareness;
- It’s a great method of distributing and sharing content;
- It helps you to connect and reach out to potential and existing clients.
Define your goals and expectations for the social media strategy instead of improvising and posting just for the sake of it. Most businesses don’t focus on direct B2B sales through social media and instead choose to concentrate on using it in a way that guides prospects through the customer’s journey to the top of the marketing funnel. If done right, social media content builds brand awareness, educates audiences, and builds trust & credibility within the industry. Obviously, all of the aforementioned benefits contribute towards direct sales lead generation.
Landing Pages
The main benefits of personalizing your landing pages include:
- Improving your SEO rankings;
- Moving leads further along the sales funnel;
- Capturing and converting leads into customers/clients;
- Using A/B testing for insights and improvements.
Interesting Fact #2 – Across all industries, the average rate for landing page conversions is 9.7%.
A well-planned landing page captures a potential customer’s attention in mere seconds. Ideally, they should answer the specific questions your customers may have. When creating landing pages, experience shows that you shouldn’t put too much information on them – it can easily overwhelm the visitor. Don’t forget the small attention span people have these days, which of course makes direct sales lead generation a significantly harder task. The SalesAR approach here is to keep it simple and elegant. The golden middle between minimalism and information overload. Be concise and clear – focus on one or two arguments instead of all of them.
