The first rule on the laws of motion is clear: An object will remain at rest or in a uniform state of motion unless that state is changed by an external force.
That’s common knowledge that can be applied in various contexts, like in business.
The road to one single sale is long and at times, winding. But getting started is essential to any accomplishment.
Just like the first rule of the Laws in Motion suggests, in order to get things started, you need an external force. In the context of business, to land a sale, earn revenue and eventually have a return of investment, you have to start somewhere.
How do you start? You start by generating leads. But don’t go right into making calls and boring someone else with dull, monotonous scripts. They will most likely hang up on you. There is a better way.
You go Inbound! When reading that term, you’re probably now wondering about how to generate an inbound lead, and that’s where we can help!
Keep scrolling to learn more!
There was a time when everything had to be done manually and the only way to get great results is to breathe down people’s necks. To generate leads for your business for example, you had to hire about 50 people who will each call 500 prospects, only to have about 10 of the 50 people you initially hired to make calls, land about three or five interested prospects each. And take note, these are prospects, not actual buyers just yet.
That spells a lot of effort for very minimal results. Good news is, this era of marketing has made lead generation easier, and in a lot of ways, cheaper.
Think about it, nowadays people have a penchant for anything that promises them results while demanding less and less effort. Special coffees and dubious pills that promise you a quick and easy trim down make people believe they can, in fact, shed weight without doing anything. These advertisements are almost always unreal. Luckily, inbound lead generation promises none of those too good to be true turn outs– but what it’s been proven to generate by far, is one that is desirable for business owners, still.
Inbound Lead Generation utilizes the Inbound strategy, a strategy that draws people into a brand of product or service without the usual disruptive, annoying strategies that traditional marketing is known for. So, now, we deal with the question– how to generate an inbound lead?
Simple.
Just as the Inbound Methodology is implemented through the Attract, Engage, and Delight stages– the process of Inbound Lead Generation is molded in these exact stages. You attract, engage (within this stage you convert and close), and then you proceed to the delight stage.
You begin with content creation and posting. This is where you attract. You can do this by posting content on your marketing channels such as your website, blog, and social media pages.
When a curious page visitor clicks on your call-to-action (CTA), this CTA button takes the said visitor to a landing page that is designed to capture lead information just as soon as the said visitor takes your offer which could range from an eBook, a course, a template, or just about anything that the said visitor wants and needs that they value it so much that they will input their information. This is the engagement stage.
The offer will, of course, only be acquired by the visitor after filling out a form that contains a series of questions that are basically asking for their information. Once they fill these questions, you earn a lead! Congratulations!
Keep in mind however, that this is still just in the engagement stage, you converted a random page visitor into a lead. But you haven’t quite closed the deal yet.
Once you have their information, normally this information includes their emails, you can then go ahead and send them newsletters and various other subtle promotional tools that carefully guide them into making the decision to purchase a product or avail of your services.
As soon as they make the purchase, you close the deal. You proceed into the delight stage. Here, you keep giving informative and helpful content, every now and then you give out survey forms letting them know they are valued enough for their opinions and suggestions to be taken into consideration in your business.
There you have it.
Attract. Engage. Delight.
And mission accomplished.
Generating leads using the inbound strategies seems simple and doable, but understanding how it’s done then brings us to the question, why generate inbound leads when you can stick with the traditional lead generation? It’s been proven to work before, right?
The answer to that question is pretty straightforward.
You generate inbound leads to keep up with the times. You generate inbound leads because it is a cheaper and more efficient way of lead generation that, surprisingly enough, earns you more leads in the long run.
When you use the traditional marketing methods in lead generation, whatever lead generation campaigns you implement and however long it lasts is how long you can try to generate leads. The inbound lead generation methods are different, in a real good way. Months or even years after you have put up those websites and social media channels for your lead generation purposes, those will never stop.
As long as they’re up there, they will continue to attract visitors, draw them in, and possibly convert them into leads.
The key benefits of generating inbound leads vs. buying leads all boils down to the main reason why businesses go inbound in the first place: you want buyers and clients who actually believe in your product and respect you as a brand.
Buying leads can be tempting because it gives you quick results, but it is also more expensive. And if the fact that it will make you spend more is not enough to dissuade you already, let's put it this way: the leads that you buy are not really interested in your products, this means that when you send them what you think is helpful content, when you email them, or try to engage with them, you don’t really cultivate their curiosity nor entice them. You are promptly sent to spam.
So at the end of the day, the leads you buy aren’t leads at all. And that just defeats your purpose.
So the key benefits of generating inbound leads vs. buying leads is really just that, you waste no time and effort in organic inbound lead generation.
Generating inbound leads organically means you get to find prospects that actually want what you have to offer. And at the end of the day, those are the leads that you should want!
Want to become an expert on Inbound Lead Generation and grow your business in no time? Download our eBook today!