Lead Generation

4 Pillars to Generate More B2B Sales Leads

February 2, 2017 by Andrew Leave a Comment

Build it and they will come.

We’ve all heard this, and those of us who have been in business for any length of time know it simply isn’t true. Especially, if you don’t have a storefront and are selling a more specialized product or service.

But that doesn’t mean generating leads for your B2B needs to be especially hard or time consuming. Not if you take the time upfront to develop a solid, scalable lead generating system that will work for you on your behalf.

In the past, that may have meant attending networking events, sending out direct mail flyers, cold calling and spending large sums on advertising campaigns (often, with little promise of a return) until you eventually “tipped the scales” and began generating referrals by word of mouth. Business would be good – for a while; until you inevitably hit a dry spell and began the process all over again. The good news?

There is another way. Thanks to the proliferation of modern technology, and a few simple, inbound marketing tools, you can now create cohesive online systems for gathering leads from your company Website 24/7. This strategy has three primary components:

Creating educational content that takes prospective buyers through a complete sale cycle on your behalf.

Drawing traffic to your site to interact with your content.

Implementing a system for capturing the contact information of prospective buyers who are interacting with your content.

While there are many individual tasks associated with executing each of the above – that are beyond the scope of this article – there are 4 critical steps to getting started:

Commit to Long Term Game

Though generating leads via online marketing isn’t any more time consuming than traditional methods (it’s actually faster in some cases), it does require a long-term commitment.

Unlike a radio or television ad that can be created and “thrown out there” within a week, generating quality content for the Web takes time. Because you’re not just creating one piece of content, and you’re not overtly trying to convince prospects to do business with you, you’re becoming a helpful and trusted advisor.

Instead of screaming “Buy now!” you’re calmly saying “Here are all the answers to the questions you’ve been asking yourself.” It’s a different strategy and thus, requires a different mindset. The good news is once you’ve accumulated a large amount of blog articles, whitepapers, videos or whatever other type of content you’ve incorporated into your overall strategy, it’s there forever. Meaning, you’re never starting over from scratch, as in the traditional marketing example above, AND the results of your efforts will only compound over time.

Conduct a Visibility Audit

You can have “the best” content on the Web, but that doesn’t matter if no one can find you to read it. In the online world, visibility is created slowly and strategically over time. Google “pay-per-click” ads, social media ads and partnerships with more established industry players are just some of the ways this can be done. But, before getting started, it’s important to assess where you are. That way you can really celebrate your gains and see how far you’ve come in the future.

Begin by entering the ten most common phrases you think potential customers would search for – as related to your offering – in a search engine. If your Website isn’t appearing on the first page for any of your terms, you’ve got some work to do. Also, take a look at any social media accounts you have and notice the number of followers. While this isn’t a complete audit, this will provide a starting point to work with.

Conduct a Content Audit

An often overlooked part of online lead generation is maintaining your content over time. Periodically review the information on your site to make sure it is recent, relevant and technically correct. Depending on your industry, exciting, new developments may occur regularly. What you don’t want is to have a customer pouring over outdated articles that are no longer indicative of current “best practices” or solutions.

Remember your goal is to become a trusted partner in your customers’ research process. In addition to updating old content, you should be regularly publishing new stuff. Above all, make sure all content is serving your target audience in an engaging and relevant way, while still remaining true to your brand message.

Provide Multiple Points For Engagement

The majority of your prospects won’t be ready to do business the first time they arrive at your site, and that’s OK (especially, if you sell something with a high price tag). As in “the offline world,” different people will naturally be in different stages of the sales process when they first interact with you.

Thus, it’s extremely important to offer a variety of content options for prospective buyers in their respective stages: Easy to digest blog articles, videos and audio files for those early in the process; more comprehensive white papers for those further along; and clearly visible contact options for those ready to buy. That way, no matter where someone is in their information gathering process, you can offer something of value.

Finally, until you have obtained someone’s contact information, they don’t exist as a lead! If you only provide direct methods of contact via phone and email, you’re missing out on developing relationships with those prospects who are still early in the information gathering process. You can fix this by offering a piece of high-quality content in exchange for the prospect’s contact information. Such a system can be set-up quickly and easily on any Website with a simple plugin.

Implement these four steps and you will be well on your way to creating a dependable system that directs traffic to your company Website and generates leads on your behalf. Got questions

Creatunity is here for you. We develop comprehensive inbound marketing strategies for enterprise level B2B clients. Our goal is to help you determine what makes you unique, translate that into an online marketing strategy and increase your revenue – substantially.

Are You Still Using Traditional B2B Lead Generation Strategies?

February 1, 2017 by Andrew Leave a Comment

It’s not that they don’t work anymore – because they most definitely do.

Cold calling, traditional advertising and in-person networking are all effective lead generation strategies that aren’t going anywhere anytime soon. But what if I told you that by limiting yourself to such methods you could literally be leaving thousands of dollars on the table?

The fact is the world is changing. But that’s nothing new, right? Isn’t it always? What is new is that we are living in an unprecedented time of technological advancement that was barely conceivable to our forbearers. This kind of thing gets talked about all the time, but rarely do we stop and think about its implications. And yes, that includes the way we generate leads, sales and revenue for B2Bs.

The bottom line: Consumers no longer want to be sold to (if they ever did); they want to learn. And they are becoming increasingly adept at finding their own solutions. As reported by the Harvard Business Review, a Corporate Executive Board study of more than 1,400 B2B customers found those customers completed nearly 60 percent of their purchasing decisions before ever having a conversation with a supplier.

This sentiment was further echoed by researchers Matthew Dixon and Brent Adamson in their book “The Challenger Sale.” Through their research, the authors determined prospects are usually 55 to 75 percent of the way through the decision-making process before ever reaching out to a specific company. How are they doing it?

By searching online, of course. If you’re used to walking your prospects through a long sales cycle – because your industry requires it or because your offerings come at a sizeable price-point – this can be discouraging. After all, you want to be there as early in the education process as possible so that you’re the one they turn to when they’re ready to buy.

The good news? You can still do exactly that, just in a different way.

Information and Education Is The New Way

By translating all of the advice, tidbits and information you would normally extend through a series of sales conversations to online marketing platforms, you can now leverage your efforts to generate more leads than you ever could have using traditional methods alone.

The key is to create a comprehensive inbound marketing plan focused on sharing useful content with your prospects. Useful content can be anything that educates, informs or entertains as related to your services. By pro-actively answering the questions your prospects are answering you will flip the typical sales process and instead have people contacting YOU.

Just imagine knowing a potential client has already gone through 75 percent of the sales process on their own before ever contacting you: They’ve read your white papers, they understand the solution you provide and they’re ready to do business. Meaning, you hardly have to “sell” them at all. Sounds good, doesn’t it?

At Creatunity we develop comprehensive inbound marketing strategies for enterprise level B2B clients. Our goal is to help you determine what makes you unique, translate that into an online strategy and increase your revenue – substantially.

10 Tips for Generating More Leads with Your B2B Website

January 31, 2017 by Andrew Leave a Comment

Websites – every business has one.

Chances are securing a site was one of the first things you did when setting up shop. E-commerce business or not, you might as well not even exist in today’s tech-savvy marketplace without one. But designing an attractive site is only half of the equation.

The other half is asking yourself what you want your Website to do for you, and implementing the appropriate systems for getting results. If you’re a B2B, we’ll assume you want your Website to increase your incoming qualified leads, as a minimum. Here are 10 simple ways you can do exactly that (without making any major changes to your existing site):

Hold a Conversion Audit

Motion graphics. Slick sliders. Beautiful colors – all of these can make an attractive site, but what many designers fail to realize is how little they matter. While aesthetics ARE important, they should never be the no. 1 priority for a business site.

If your primary goal is to capture leads, your primary goal should be optimization. And, oddly enough, what looks good doesn’t always convert. Hire an expert to perform a conversion audit. This person will be able to identify hindrances to conversions, point out missed opportunities and suggest small tweaks proven to capture interest. Take the time to conduct a proper audit and you’ll have a strong foundation to build a smart advertising campaign from. Translation: This can save you big bucks.

Track Interaction Patterns

Using special software, you can determine how prospects are interacting with your site and for how long. For example, the heat map tool CrazyEgg can show where site visitors are clicking, in what order and where they are coming from. CrazyEgg will also show how far down visitors are scrolling. With this data, you can test various “call to action” locations to determine which ones yield the best results This is one of those small tweaks that can surprisingly translate into substantially higher lead and sales numbers.

Use Exit Pop-Up Offers

It’s understandable – people want to review their options before making sizeable purchases. Why not get them off the fence by creating a pop-offer they can’t refuse?

Of course, not everyone will sign-up, but the ones who were this close to submitting their info before will. Whether you are running a pay-per-click campaign or sourcing content as part of an overall inbound strategy, you’re spending a lot of time and money to get that traffic. Since exit pop-ups are proven to generate results, why not get the most out of that money spent by maximizing your chances of conversion? And despite, common misconceptions, today’s pop-ups are designed to be sleek, stylish and inviting.

Get to Know Google Analytics

Want to avoid losing money on marketing strategies that don’t work? It’s time to make Google Analytics your new best friend. By installing a simple code provided by Google, you can easily track who is visiting your site, where they are coming from and how long they stay (among other things).

Say you notice much of your traffic is coming from LinkedIn, but hardly any is coming from Facebook. Armed with such data, you can divert more of your marketing budget to LinkedIn and maximize what’s already working. You may even decide to drop Facebook all together. What if you’re not getting much traffic in general? It’s never too late to implement a smart inbound and pay-per-click strategy. You can then get ahead of the game by tracking efforts from the beginning.

Get Live Chat Support

Live chat support is a fairly new way to interact with prospective and existing customers alike. Contrary to popular conception, there are actually real people behind those chat boxes! How it works is simple: You pay a support agency to “man” your site and answer common questions.

Entry point pricing starts at just $5 a month, although an increasing number of providers are actually offering free plans with reduced functionality. Once you’ve signed up, installation involves simply copying and pasting a few lines of given code onto your site. We recommend placing the button on the bottom-right corner, as this seems to be the place most users intuitively expect to find them. Again, just another small tweak that can be the difference between a prospective client gained or lost.

Include Social Proof

Social proof is any testimonial or endorsement that gives people peace of mind about working with you. It could be a written statement of praise from a previous client, the logo of a well-known news outlet you’ve been featured in or the emblem of an award you’ve received. Tastefully including such markers on your Website will definitely make others feel more comfortable reaching out. Case in point, more than 70 percent of Americans say they look at product reviews before making a purchase.

Great places to integrate proof on your site include the sidebar, footer and your About Page.

Split Test Your Landing Pages

This is one that surprises me every time – how a seemingly infinitesimal tweak can lead to huge conversion gains. I’m talking about something as small as changing the color of a button. While many layout practices are “tried and true,” there are certain elements that will always be unique to what you do. By using a tool such as Unbounce, you can create multiple landing pages with tiny differences to determine which design and content options convert better. It may not be rocket science, but the effects can be profound.

Simplify Your Fonts + Design

Your Website should first and foremost be reader friendly. And that means choosing fonts that are pleasing to look at and easy to read. As maintaining engaging content becomes further paramount to attracting customers online, today’s Web designs continue to become more content-based. The best sites and landing pages use plain, flat design and fonts. That means sans-serif typefaces with uniform strokes and designs. Think clean lines, bright colors and letting the typography “do the talking.” Here is an example of a site that does a great job of utilizing flat design. A final benefit: Simple fonts display better on tablets, mobile and variable sized devices.

Create a Welcome Video

As recently reported by The Guardian, video will soon account for 69 percent of all consumer Internet traffic. Depending on the nature of your business, a prominently placed video may be a great way to increase conversions on your site. Videos should be professionally produced and kept to around 2 minutes in length. The average attention span will not focus for longer than this.

As with all online content, you want to captivate, entertain and educate. Highlight a few key talking points that include your brand’s core message, what you do and the type of client/customer you are best equipped to serve.

Offer a Freemium

Consider producing a high-value piece of content that can only be accessed in exchange for a prospect’s contact information. That could be their email address, phone number or anything else that might be of value depending on your industry.

The key is to offer something genuinely useful to your prospects. For example, if you’re an interior design consultancy, you could offer a free whitepaper discussing the 7 most important things your prospect must take into consideration before hiring a designer. Or you might offer a 5-point checklist for creating a look that compliments their brand. Whatever you do, don’t guess – do as much research as you can to determine exactly what your potential clients want to know more about.

How to Improve Your B2B Lead Generation In 2016

February 27, 2016 by Andrew Leave a Comment

Using content marketing as a source of B2B lead generation?

You’re not alone – an impressive 88 percent of your peers engage in content marketing, according to The Content Marketing Institute’s latest report.

In case you’ve stumbled upon this article by chance, let’s quickly define content marketing: Content marketing is a strategic way to enhance B2B lead generation; focused on consistently distributing relevant content that attracts (and retains) a clearly defined audience of people who are interested in your products and services.

The study, B2B Content Marketing: 2016 Benchmarks, Budgets, and Trends—North America, surveyed 3,714 recipients from a large range of industries, functional areas and company sizes around the globe. The most surprising revelation actually had NOTHING to do with the prevalence of content marketing and everything to do with the lack of confidence behind it.

When asked – In your organization, is it clear what an effective content marketing program looks like? – only 44 percent of respondents said yes. The data went on to suggest a strong correlation between successful content marketing initiatives and clearly developed plans.

Unsurprisingly, the more experienced the content marketer, the more clearly developed the plan! Which begs the question: How do you know if you’re working with a content marketer who can truly enhance B2B lead generation? Based on the findings, there are several characteristics to look for that often point to more successful outcomes:

Qualities of Successful B2B Content Marketers

They understand what successful content marketing looks like.

Successful content marketing begins with establishing clear goals. Not only do you need engaging, relevant content and a plan for distribution, but you also need a plan for gauging effectiveness. How else will you know what’s working, what isn’t and if you need to change course at any given moment?

Adaptability is the name of the game: Research, hypothesize, test, evaluate and repeat. One of the biggest traits that separates novices from experts is consistently tracking the right metrics and translating their relevancy across the organization as a whole.

Over the past 6 years, B2B marketers have cited Website traffic as their most often used metric. This year, marketers ranked lead quality, sales and higher conversion rates (in that order) as most important.

They document their content marketing strategies.

You know that old adage “a goal isn’t real until you write it down?” Well, the same might apply for content marketing. Research consistently shows that those who document their strategies are more effective in nearly ALL areas of content marketing (i.e. content curation, social media and paid methods of distribution).

A mere 32 percent of respondents surveyed said they have a documented strategy. While there is no one template for documenting a B2B lead generation strategy, there are several topics that should be addressed (the more specific, the better). Use these questions as a starting point:

What exactly do we hope to accomplish with our content marketing?
Do we have one target market or several?
What are their psychographics and demographics?
What does our sales funnel look like?
What is our brand story (ie. why should people care)?
What types of content will we introduce and when?

They document their editorial mission statements.

Only 28 percent of respondents surveyed said they had a documented editorial mission statement; another 30 percent said they had one, but it had not documented it. Let’s get honest: How likely is your mission statement to be consistently executed if you never write it down?

Again, the key to running a successful campaign is consistency. You want your content to have a familiarity that your prospects look forward to. Contrary to popular opinion, writing a mission statement doesn’t have to take an entire weekend! But it should include: A brief description of your intended audience, a core message (focused on the key point you want customers to walk away with) and the primary goal you hope to accomplish.

They communicate frequently with their teams.

According to the report, 61 percent of the most effective B2B marketers meet daily or weekly. The reason being? Online marketing is about adapting your plans according to what’s working.

As new data emerges, lead generating strategies should be adapted to meet what works. Further, sometimes the most valuable pieces of information – that end up inspiring the most interesting content – come from those weekly check-ins. The bottom-line: Consistently communicate with staff members who are regularly interacting with the customers.

Again, content marketing is showing no signs of slowing down. A reported 76 percent of B2Bs surveyed said they will increase the amount of content they produce in 2016.

Will you be joining them?

Getting Zero Sales Leads from Your B2B Company Blog?

January 31, 2016 by Andrew Leave a Comment

You’ve been told you need a company blog, so you have one.

You may even publish an article every once in awhile (if you remember). But overall, your blog is a “dead-end zone.” Heck, you don’t even want to read it! Your content is that boring – if this sounds at all familiar, you’re not alone.

Too many companies have enthusiastically created a blog because they were told it was vital to their marketing efforts, all the while not really understanding how it fits into an overall strategy. Here we’ll review the why behind creating a company blog, how to integrate it into your marketing plan and how to create engaging content people actually want to read:

If a tree falls in the forest, and nobody’s around to hear it, does it make a sound?

Your company blog is a lot like that tree. If you don’t have a strategy in place to generate traffic to your site, you don’t really have a blog – you have an ornament. The purpose of your blog is to educate, entertain and inform prospective and existing customers around your services. Hence, if you aren’t driving traffic to your company Website there is little incentive to keep an active blog running! You can think of your site as the hub of your online marketing strategy and the sources generating traffic as the spokes. Social media posts, Google advertisements and organic search traffic are all worthy strategies for encouraging prospects to click through to your site, and we usually recommend a multi-tiered approach to garner the most effective results. However, the blog’s primary purpose is to convert those prospects into paying customers once they get there.

Now, obviously, most visitors won’t choose to do business with you based on a single article. And that’s OK – blogging, at its best, is a long-term strategy designed to build relationships over time. And you do that by regularly producing high-quality content people are interested in reading. Which brings us to our next point:

What should you write about?

Of course, everyone wants to know the answer to that question (even seasoned content producers struggle with it). But let’s first discuss what you shouldn’t write about:

You shouldn’t write about the features, details and technical aspects of your product or service (for the most part)
You shouldn’t write about things that have absolutely nothing to do with your business or industry.
You shouldn’t write about topics that you yourself wouldn’t find interesting.

So, what does that leave?

You should be answering common questions, providing information that helps prospects reach their related goals and highlighting the benefits of your offerings.

There are many ways to generate topic ideas including analyzing keyword phrases being searched for, repurposing existing content, expanding upon questions frequently asked of your sales force and explaining new practices and trends that would be of interest to your prospects. But that leads to another question:

How do you stand out from competitors?

With nearly every business now in the online sphere, this is a common concern. The reality is you may have some content overlap with your competitors, but that’s OK. Even though most businesses do have Websites, most are NOT producing quality content. By simply regularly publishing relevant articles, you will be standing out! Other ways to leave a lasting impression include:

Writing simply and clearing (ie. avoid industry jargon).
Using colorful language (ie. paint a picture using illustrative examples with plenty of adjectives).
Incorporating infographics (ie. these illustrative graphics are 30 times more likely to be read than a purely textual article).
Being consistently good at what you do (ie. if you want to be known for producing “how to videos,” make them the best tutorials they can possibly be).
Weaving your brand’s core message into posts as often as possible (ie. look for relevant opportunities to expand upon your brand values).

But none of that matters if you don’t convert.

Having engaging content is one thing – converting interested prospects into customers is another. No corporate blog post is complete without a clearly written “Call to Action,” inviting the reader to opt-in. What specific action you want your reader to take will depend on your unique goals. You could invite your prospect to sign-up for your company newsletter, download your latest white paper or direct them to an inquiry form.

Of course, the best way to figure out what works for your business is to test different strategies and track them over time. You can use Google Analytics to determine which posts are getting the most views and which are getting read the longest. You can also create unique “Call to Action” links with each post to determine, which type of calls are getting the most traction.

Finally, don’t forget to optimize your posts using best SEO practices. That includes incorporating strategic keywords into titles, writing meta description tags and maintaining a mobile friendly Website. According to a recent Google report, 61 percent of customers will leave a site if it’s not mobile friendly. Mobile responsiveness will only continue to grow more important when it comes to yielding favorable search rankings in the years to come.

As you can see, maintaining a high functioning company blog can be a valuable tool for generating leads, sales and revenue. Above all, remember your blog will only give back the effort you put into it.

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