Online Marketing Tactics that Generate the Best Leads for Sales

As an experienced marketer, you don’t need us to tell you that the digisphere can be a goldmine for leads. But how many times have you gathered what you thought were warm leads online, just to pass them to sales and find out they’re not viable for one reason or another? You’re not alone. One study found that the average conversion rate from a marketing qualified lead (MQL) to a sales qualified lead (SQL) was just 13 percent… which is staggeringly low, of course.

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So, clearly, it’s not enough to just generate leads online; in order to make this practice worthwhile, you’ve got to choose the right digital marketing tactics that actually yield quality leads sales will love. Here are a few of our favorites.

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1. Customized referral process

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Creating customer advocates is basically the holy grail for new customer acquisition. We all know that buyers trust recommendations from their family and friends, so it’s basically the best form of free advertising when you can get a happy customer of yours to share your brand with their own trusted network. But the problem is - if we don’t incentivize this behavior, it often doesn’t happen. Or if it does, there’s often no proper feedback loop to ensure we thank the customer who did the referring.

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So, a great solution is to create customized referral codes. Give a unique one to each of your current customers that offers some sort of discount or deal, and invite them to share the code with their friends or family who may want to buy something from your site online. If the friend or family member uses it, the customer who referred them gets to enjoy the same deal. This way, you can track who gave the referral, and you can trust that the quality of the lead you’re giving to sales is top-notch.

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2. Retargeting

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Even the best marketers among us sometimes hesitate to start a retargeting initiative because it can feel… well... a little creepy. But if you’re missing out on retargeting, you’re also missing out on some really great leads. And there’s a tactful way to do it. Since someone you retarget would have had to first spend some time on your website, you’re getting your brand in front of a lead who has already shown some level of interest.

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You can even get very personalized in your retargeting, by creating a different retargeting pixel for different pages of your site, so the content in your ad is tailored even more to the lead’s interests. If you ultimately attract that person back to a landing page on your site, odds are good that their interest in what you have to offer is high. This is a great time to pass them into sales’ very capable hands, so they can continue the conversation you started.

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3. Sharing - the right way

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It’s never okay to distribute personal information about a lead or customer to anyone else. But if there’s a business that could be a great partner to you, and offer your client base something of value, collaboration with another company on lead acquisition can go a long way. For example, if you own a health club and know of a business that sells premade, nutritious meals for busy families that want to stay healthy, a partnership between your brands could make a lot of sense.

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Consider creating joint content and then using the same link on each of your sites to direct potential customers to a shared landing page. On this landing page could be a webform, from which both of your companies can have access to the leads’ information. This is an ethical way to tap into the network of a related, but not competing, business, and get access to more high-quality leads than you might get on your own.

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What are your favorite digital marketing tactics to generate leads online? We’d love to hear them. Or, if you need help with your digital strategy, we’re standing by. Contact us to learn more.