Do you want to develop leads online? The Internet can be a great place to develop and grow your business. In particular it offers a perfect opportunity to attract customers, build your prospect list and ultimately help you close new business. The good news is that internet lead generation is not all that different from traditional offline lead generation.
Yes, the Internet changes the way that people look for information. Yes, the Internet allows you to automate lead generation. But, ultimately the steps involved in good lead generation are the same:
Let’s take a look at each step:
Imagine your website as if it were a store. Your first job is to attract people to your store using effective marketing techniques. You can’t sell anybody anything until they’re in your store. Some of the marketing techniques to consider include:
It’s also worth remembering that you can still use effective offline strategies like direct mail to drive traffic to your website as well.
Once you have started to generate traffic to your website then the next step is to turn some of that traffic into a list of prospective new customers to follow up with. Usually this will involve you creating an incentive for them to provide their contact details, the first part of any good permission based marketing campaign. That incentive could be a special offer, or, more likely, further useful information.
What form this information takes is up to you. You could consider a blog that people can subscribe to, a free newsletter, or a webinar that people can take part in, for example.
Once you start building a list the next question becomes, ‘what do I do with this list?’. The goal has to be to move people from being interested to being willing to buy your product or service. Of course not every prospective customer on your list will end up becoming a customer.
That’s fine.
However, it is important for you to find ways of separating those with a genuine interest from the ‘tire kickers’. Tools like newsletters and autoresponders can help you automate much of this process.
Of course the final step is to close the sale. You can create online marketing tools that will encourage customers to buy from you. But unless you are actually selling a product via your website, you will almost always have to close the sale through direct contact with your prospective customer or client.
However, if you set your lead generation program up effectively; the advertising you use, how you build your list and what you do with that list can all help ensure that the people you actually spend time selling to are the most qualified prospects you could hope for.
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Are your lead generation techniques working for you?
Have you tried different lead generation techniques, only to fall short of your goals for inquiries and new business?
If so, here are our top ten techniques to increase sales and new business inquiries.
1. Market and Advertise Offline and Online
A lead generation strategy is useless without a way of getting prospects to the first rung of the ladder. This means successful advertising and marketing of your business. A good marketing strategy can motivate cold prospects to become warm leads and take the first step in doing business with you. Read my FREE eBook for more information on this.
2. Build a List
Your list is your most important asset. Most prospects aren’t ready to buy the first time you come in contact with them, but they may be ready at some stage in the future. A well developed list, packed full of prospective customers allows you to see better returns, cut marketing costs and maximize the returns from the money you do spend.
Of course good list building is not just an excel sheet with everybody’s email address. A good list is detailed, segmented into different types of buyers and is regularly updated with new information. It’s the backbone of every good lead generation system.
3. Schedule Appointments
For those businesses with a more complicated sales process that requires a personal approach, the next step after a prospect shows interest is to arrange for a meeting. Depending on your business and resources, you might consider using a professional appointment setter to do the legwork.
4. Close the Sale
If your prospect expressed an interest or met you for an appointment, they’re interested in what you have to sell. How interested? Ask them to buy it. They can either say “yes”, “no” or “not now”.
Whatever the result, by closing the sale you’ve moved the process along. You may have a new sale. You may move a prospect along your sales system towards a future sale. You may have eliminated a prospect that could have cost you time in the future. Of course you don’t want to come across as pushy, but don’t make the common mistake of shying away from asking for the sale.
5. Build a Follow Up List – Clients and Prospects
As your list grows you’ll want to split it into two (or more) kinds of follow-up lists. One is for current and past clients. You’ll ask them for future business, sell new products and services and ask for referrals. For existing customers you’ll also need to use effective customer retention programs because these are the people you need to pay the most attention to. After all, it’s always cheaper to keep existing customers than to acquire new ones.
The second is for prospects who aren’t clients – yet. From that list you’ll want to implement Step 6.
6. Identify the Most-Qualified Prospects
As your list grows even more you’ll want to segregate it to make more money by spending more energy and time on your “A” prospects. Spend less time and energy to your “B” and “C” prospects. The first step is to create profiles of who the A, B and C prospects are.
The next trick is to starting using your automated systems to make C prospects into B’s and B prospects into A’s (and A prospects into paying customers.)
7. More Closing
If your prospect didn’t buy from you the first time, you should have put him on your mailing list. Find ways to follow up with him so you’re there when he is ready.
[Alec Baldwin - Best Performance On Closing]
8. Keep in Touch with Prospects
Keep delivering useful content to your prospects, keep making offers, closing, and asking for the sale with all your prospects who haven’t bought yet. You never know when they’re ready to buy. But when they are, you want to be there.
9. Keep in Touch with Customers and Clients
Once you convert a prospect into a customer, don’t ignore them! It’s more profitable to do business and keep in touch with clients who know and trust you. Advertising and prospecting for new business, in the cold marketplace, is the most expensive kind of business development.
10. “Rinse and Repeat!”
Turn your long-term lead generation techniques into a repeatable cycle. Turn lead generation techniques into a system. Don’t reinvent the wheel.
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Why do you need a lead generating system at all?
Simple, a good lead gen system can:
In this brief overview we’ll consider both the advantages of an effective system and how you can create one for your business.
Lead generation starts with your external marketing, captures initial interest and passes the most qualified and interested prospects through to you.
Done online, it can be not only be hugely effective at attracting qualified prospects but also a huge time saver too.
1. Marketing and Advertising: The First Step in Lead Generation
The first thing to consider when constructing a system that generates leads is where and how to advertise. Offline marketing can include just about anything, from print ads to direct mail. Effective offline marketing needs to attract attention and lead the prospect into the first stage of the system – your website. Again, the point is to attract attention and then lead people to the first stage of your system.
Where and how to market your business – online or off – should be based on your ideal customer. Where do they hang out? What websites do they visit? What terms do they use to search for businesses like yours? Start with a detailed knowledge of your prospective customer and it’s hard to go too far wrong.
Online marketing can also include any number of tactics, including; search engine optimization (SEO), pay per click advertising (PPC), display advertising and social networking activities. Read my FREE eBook for details on how to do this.
2. Your System Should Be Automated
Once you’ve got your system set up, the system should be left to do its own thing. The less effort it takes to manually run the system, the more efficient it will be. That means automation. More specifically, your automated system should be able to:
3. Your System Should Develop Trust
Your lead gen system should also promote a trusting relationship between you and your customer. They should be made to feel appreciated and looked after. The better job your system does, the more responsive they will be.Your system should also provide you with a chance to demonstrate your knowledge and expertise, which is why so many lead generation programs start with an offer of information. By keeping these simple guidelines in mind, your system will be on a par with the best online. Moreover, you’ll be generating leads with enough regularity, accuracy, and effectiveness to ensure a healthy profit from whatever endeavor you undertake.
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Lead generation content is the most important, but most overlooked, part of a lead acquisition process. It’s easy for most businesses to focus on things like email marketing, advertising and buying leads. These can all be effective lead generation strategies but…
They all focus on outbound marketing – you taking your message out to prospective customers and clients. Lead generation content focuses on bringing business to you.
It is content in any form that is designed to educate or entertain and that encourages people to find you and engage with your business.
It can include:
The focus is on education or entertainment – rather than selling. When people search for products and services online they want information that they can use to help them make better decisions. Great content is that kind of information.
Creating great content has three main benefits for businesses:
When someone searches online for a product or service, their first port of call is often the search engines. Search engines scan the Internet to find the most appropriate content – not advertising – to display in the search results. If you create content that is based on the kinds of questions and keywords that your prospective customers are searching for online, you will do better with the search engines and get found by more prospects.
We cover this in more detail in our free lead generation report on search engine optimization. In addition to the search engines, your content can also be displayed in directories, on other people’s websites and in social media – all encouraging people to check out your website and your business. You can use the same ideas to make your content work offline too.
If you use your content effectively – and provide useful information – you encourage visitors to your website to want to find out more. As part of a smart lead generation strategy, you can use this as a way to ask your prospects to provide you with their contact details. For example, you could use a free report, a monthly newsletter or a special webinar to gather contact details. Once you start building this list of interested prospects, you can focus on lead management to help turn interest into buying.
People are often confused by the amount of information and competing claims of different businesses. Ideally they want to do business with someone that they trust and have some kind of relationship with. You can use great content to demonstrate your expertise in your area and show how your business can help them achieve their goals. This helps make you a trusted resource in the eyes of your prospects and it’s only a short step from being a trusted resource to becoming a trusted supplier.
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Are you using lead generation articles? Should you be?
Using articles for lead generation can be a great way to attract new prospects and demonstrate your expertise at the same time. They are simply short informative articles written about a topic that your potential customers are interested in. Once you’ve written them they can be placed in various places online or even used offline. Either way, by giving away free information, you can encourage prospects to visit your website and request further information.
Your lead generation articles should answer a specific problem that your customers might have. So, the best place to start is with them. The first thing you should do is some basic keyword research to find out what kinds of things your prospects are searching for online (get more information in our free special report). You will also want to have a basic understanding of the kinds of problems they are trying to solve. With those two pieces of information you can start to write a list of likely topics.
Lead generation articles should be simple and provide a real solution – they are not a sales pitch. You want to demonstrate that you understand the problem and can provide a solution. Start with a basic bullet point outline of what you want to say. Usually you will have an opening paragraph that explains the problem. Follow that with a simple list of the key points or best solutions. Each point in this list can become a subheading for your article. Use bullet points or numbered lists when appropriate for easier readability. Finally, you should close off your article with a simple concluding paragraph to sum up what you talked about.
Using a simple structure makes your articles easier to write, logical and easier to read or skim. Aim for about 500 words total and if you are writing for the web, make sure to include your key words and phrases. Use examples to help illustrate your points and keep the tone light but professional.
There’s no point in writing articles for lead generation if you don’t promote them well. Writing articles takes time so the best bet is to try to use each article in a variety of ways to ensure you get the best results.
For example, you can:
Try to use each article in as many ways as possible to improve your results but remember to rewrite it slightly for each place that you want to use it. If you start with a good outline you can work from that and make the job of rewriting easier.
Informative articles can be a great way to generate leads, bring people to your website and show that you ‘know your stuff’ – but it is a long term strategy. Commit to writing regular articles, use a simple structure to help you and distribute them as widely as you can. If you do that over a period of time you will start to see real benefits.
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Creating effective lead generation ads is one of first and most important steps in any lead generation process. Of course, we all want plenty of eyeballs on our advertising and visitors to our websites, but those figures mean nothing to your business if you cannot convert them. Converting visitors to customers on any campaign is what generates income for the business.
Advertising works when it speaks to the needs of the prospective customer. The good news is that there is a simple formula that you can use to make your advertising more effective.
To create good sales copy for your lead generation ads, you can follow this guide – AIDA – which stands for:
Attention:
When writing your message, make sure the heading captures the attention of your target market. To appeal to your target audience, the heading has to be eye-catching, targeted and specific. Avoid jargon and marketing speak. Clearly state the specific benefit your audience will get from what you are offering.
Interest:
Once you have their attention, the next step is to keep them interested by giving more detail about the solution your product or service will provide. People want to know what’s in it for them. They don’t want to know why you think you’re so special. So, writing from the customers’ point of view, explain the following:
Desire:
Desire is emotion not logic. You covered the logical points in the Interest section above. Buying decisions are emotional too. Paint a picture for your customer of how their life or business will be better for having bought your product or service.
Action:
Get them to act! People don’t like making decisions. Making a decision is risky. This, of course, means your prospective customers need a little poke to get them moving – a reason to take the next step (and a clear picture of what that next step is). Create the sense of urgency, scarcity or savings. Now direct them to take the action you want them to (ex. buy now and save 40% off the total price).
Follow Up:
If you use the AIDA system to craft your marketing, you should be able to start generating leads – but remember, leads are not sales. Not everyone will buy from just seeing your first lead generation ad. You need to create a system that allows you to nurture the leads until they are ready.
With that in mind, your first line of marketing should encourage people to
(a) Buy if they’re ready or
(b) Find more info if they’re not. The ‘more info’ option is your chance to gather contact information for your list.
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No budget? No problem.
Try these five free lead generation strategies on for size.
SEO (search engine optimization) is the process of making the information on your website easy to find via the search engines and improving the position that it gets displayed.
You will find a great introduction to SEO in our free report. It covers five basic SEO techniques that every business should know:
When people are in search of solutions to their problems, their first choice is normally not a company’s sales brochure. They want simple, informative and largely unbiased information. Writing articles on your industry – specifically how customers can solve common problems or improve the results they achieve – cannot only get you found, but also positions you as a trusted resource. Articles can be written for your own website, for popular 3rd party websites or for offline use like your local paper or industry trade magazine.
Networking is a great way to build contacts, get yourself known and develop new leads. Attending networking events should be part of your ongoing free marketing strategy. The first tip for networking events is to make sure you network – there’s no point in standing in the corner talking to people you already know. Go with a goal in mind to meet certain kinds of people – they may be your customer type or they may be people who come into contact with your customer type. For example, if you target students then they are not likely to be at a networking event – but teachers from the local university might be. This could lead to their support with your project. Go with an open mind, a willingness to meet new people and plenty of business cards.
People looking for solutions like information. However, written content is not always the best way to present certain information. Live events are also a great opportunity to meet people in person and include more of your personality in the information you deliver. Consider working with a community group, business groups like the Chamber of Commerce,or other businesses to help save costs and ensure a good turnout. Make it easy for attendees to opt in to receiving more information.
Referrals can come from satisfied clients and customers, professional and personal acquaintances and even arranged referral partners. Referrals are generally free but you need to put some time into increasing the chances that people will refer business to you:
Generating leads for your business doesn’t have to be expensive. In fact, with a little thought you can create a great free leads program but you’ll still need to put the time in to make it work.
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