Top 7 Ways to Generate B2B Leads from Your Blog
When it comes to the best way (or ways) to generate sales leads, or find new customers, there is a lot of buzz surrounding blogging. Truth be told, the hardest part about generating sales leads is getting people to contact you in the first place, whether offline or online.
If you’re a marketer or business owner that blogs, you may know a variety of ways to distribute and promote your articles. Obviously, the more traffic you get, the easier it will be to generate leads. But you don’t need a ton of traffic to make it work.
This is the difference between how many and who. Old marketing was about how many. New marketing is about who. If five, ten, or twenty people are coming to your blog, but they are the right five, ten or twenty people with large amounts of buying power, that’s what matters.
So don’t worry about becoming a top-ranked blog. To successfully sell your services, you just need the right kind of people. The more specialized you are, and the more targeted your articles, the more likely this will happen.
Of course, attracting people to your blog is one thing. Generating leads is another. Here are top seven ways to generate B2B leads from your blog:
- Contact Form — If you’re in business and have a blog, you almost certainly must have a contact form. And that “almost” is close to absolute. However, the standard contact form is not enough. You should modify your form to match the service you sell. Take a look at the highly specialized form we use.
- Email Newsletter — This is an easy way to stay in touch with many people and provide great value while you’re at it. Since we specialize in strategic marketing, our newsletter features articles and information on the subject. We have over 500 subscribers and a percentage of our new clients say they became pre-sold on our abilities by subscribing.
- Free Education — While a newsletter requires an ongoing commitment, a eBook or special report is a one-time effort. Write it, post a contact/request form, and send a link to the PDF when requests come in. You could also automate the process with an auto responder. Our eBooks on strategically marketing your business generates requests every month.
- Marketing Kit — If you’ve built a blog or site around your services, you should provide plenty of information online. However, you can offer pricing, forms, a client list, and other information in the form of a downloadable PDF. Remember, when someone requests information, it gives you the opportunity to capture contact information.
- Webinars or Teleseminars — These days it’s fairly simple to put together an educational class using services such as GoToWebinar or Freeconferencing. You can also create non-interactive presentations with software like PowerPoint or OpenOffice. The idea is to provide something of value that enables you to collect contact information.
- Videos — Using software and hardware built into many computers, you can create simple, informative videos. They don’t have to be fancy. Just look into the camera and talk. Or edit together simple footage demonstrating your work or how you solved a problem. Video can also be a helpful tool to encourage people to sign up for your newsletter, webinar, or other information.
- Pay Per Click — If you write and promote a good blog, you’re probably getting a fair amount of natural traffic. But pay-per-click ads can give you a boost for people looking for your particular services. Your results will vary depending on the level of competition and amount you’re willing to spend, but it’s worth a test.
Take Note: Your blog is a means to an end. If you use your blog to attract the right kind of traffic, and follow the advice above to generate sales leads, you should see a dramatic increase in your business.
Questions: What questions do you have about generating leads? What else would you recommend?
Indispensable Marketing takes a process approach to developing and installing your small business marketing.