8 Lead Generation Strategies That Will Boost Your Sales

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HOW-TO 💬 
How do you find and reach your target
audience? Sales and digital marketing
8 Lead Generation Strategies That Will
Boost Your Sales
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SOFTWARE
experts share their tips on the best ways
to garner qualified sales leads.
The world is full of millions – make that billions – of
potential customers for your products or services. But
how do you find and reach your target audience,
without spending (or wasting) too much time, money
and resources? And how can you help ensure that the
people who visit your Web or social media site are
truly interested in your offerings?
We put those questions to sales and
marketing experts who shared their top
eight suggestions on how to find and
connect with qualified sales leads.
[ Related: 7 Ways You Can Help Your
Sales Team Be More Effective ]
for connecting businesses with...
By Jennifer Lonoff Schiff
CIO | Feb 17, 2015 5:32 AM PT
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1. Referrals/Word of Mouth
“For most businesses, the best lead
generation strategy is to focus on getting
repeat business and referrals from the
customers you've already won,” says
Branndon Stewart, CEO, OutboundEngine.
Besides offering great service, provide loyal customers an added incentive to
come back, such as 10 or 20 percent off their next purchase. Similarly, get
them to refer their friends and family (and colleagues) by including a friends
and family coupon with their order.
And don’t hesitate to ask clients to refer you to their friends, family and colleagues. (Don’t
ask, don’t get.)
“One of the best ways that I find gets new leads is to ask current clients to refer us,” says
Allan Madan, the founder of Madan Chartered Accountant. “We do get no’s, but from the
people who do refer us to their friends or family, on average we get three new leads from
each client who refers us.”
2. Free E-Books or White Papers
Providing useful information for free helps “make consumers trust your brand,” says Lisa
Chu, CEO, Black N Bianco, which provides formal wear for boys and girls. “By offering

quality educational content regarding your niche, your brand will organically attract those
in your target audience.”
“Your company’s lead magnet could be a free e-book, template or webinar,” adds Jeanine
Blackwell, CEO of 4MAT 4Business, a performance improvement and brain-based
instructional design company. “The trick is to deliver the resource in exchange for a
prospect’s email address, which fills your sales funnel with potential clients.”
3. Webinars, Live Chats and Hangouts
“One method that has been successful for us and is
also very cost effective is webinars,” says Robert
Armstrong, cofounder and CEO of Appstem, a
mobile design and development firm. “We choose a
topic relevant to [our audience and discuss] trends
we see or industry pain points – and invite a few of
our technology partners to join. It’s a great way to
create value for industry related people and
introduce your company.”
“We generate over 3,000 leads per month, mainly for free, by offering free webinars,”
says Ray Higdon, a marketing and lead generation expert and founder of Top Earner
Academy. “Then we take the webinar recording and place it behind a capture page,”
which results in additional leads.

Another way to attract potential customers or clients is to conduct a Twitter Chat or
“create a Google Hangout on a topic that connects with the needs of your target
audience,” says Jeff Beale, aka Mr. Marketology. Show the audience “you understand
their needs, and how you approach a solution and the benefits of that solution,” he says.
When conducting a live Twitter Chat or Google Hangout, it’s also important to respond to
questions promptly and provide participants with contact information, where they can get
in touch with you or learn more after the Chat or Hangout is over.
4. LinkedIn
LinkedIn can be a great way to find potential customers, if you know what, as well as who,
to look for.
“When searching for potential clients on LinkedIn, use specific qualifiers such as
geography, common education or previous work history,” suggests Brian W. Sullivan,
vice president, Enterprise Selling, Sandler Training. Similarly, identify companies or
organizations that may be relevant and “mine the entire enterprise for insights, leads and
connections that can help you develop the relationship.”
LinkedIn Groups are another source of leads. Join
Groups most relevant to your business, or where you
are most likely to find people interested in your
product, service or expertise. Then “participate in
Group discussions by being a resource, sharing best
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practices and knowledge gained from experience,”
says Lydia Sugarman, president, Venntive, which
provides a digital marketing platform.
Finally, “follow up with people who’ve made interesting
comments [on your posts or related posts] with
personalized emails and schedule a call or coffee to
connect and build the relationship.”
5. Facebook
“Rather than throwing money at advertising, SEO and other services, invest in valuable,
engaging content and distribute it via social media [sites, such as Facebook],” says
Stewart.
Having a company Facebook page and providing fun, helpful or informative content of
interest to potential (and existing) customers “is a great way for business owners to build
credibility, nurture customer relationships and increase marketing ROI.”
Also consider Facebook ads.
“We've found Facebook ads effective for both B2B and B2C purposes,” says Brian
Carter, an author, speaker & consultant with The Carter Group. “Facebook ads [give you]
access to hundreds of millions of people, [offer] more than a dozen targeting options and
[are] low cost.” Moreover, “Facebook can automatically find people within your target
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audience that are more likely to convert.”
6. YouTube Videos
“Video content can be a boon for email and demand generation strategies, and some
studies have shown that simply including the word ‘video’ in an email subject line can
increase click-through rates by more than 7 percent,” says Brendan Cournoyer, director
of Content Marketing, Brainshark, which provides a sales enablement platform.
“Video can be used in a number of ways to
support lead generation,” he continues. “You can
create short video teasers for a new [product or
service] or repurpose live webinars into on-demand
videos that visitors can register to view,” he
explains. “And with today's technology, practically
anyone can create effective video marketing
content like this quickly and easily.”
7. Third-Party Lists
If you are a new business looking for certain types
of customers or an existing business launching a
new product or service and looking to find potential buyers, buying third-party validated
data (aka lists) can be a good option.
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“For example, if you sell iPhone accessories that assist people with live navigation while in
their car, knowing that they drive a car that is Bluetooth enabled [is a valuable] piece of
data that you may not have access to otherwise,” explains Ted Prince, senior vice
president, Information Services, Neustar, which provides real-time information and
analytics.
“Another example when validated third-party data can be extremely helpful is when a
company decides to open a new retail outlet,” he says. “They would want to know the
density for potential buyers [or buying patterns or average income of the population]
before they make a large investment.”
8. Google AdWords (PPC)
Whether you are a new business, especially a new ecommerce business, looking for
customers or want to attract Internet users to a new product or service you have on offer,
Google AdWords can help you find potential customers quickly.
[ Related: How Ecommerce Businesses Can Beat the Competition in 2015 ]
Signing up for Google AdWords is free. You determine, and can adjust, your budget.
Pick the key words or phrases you want to use (or can get Google to help you). Target
specific regions (advertising locally, within a certain region or internationally). And only
pay when someone clicks on your ad and goes to your website or landing page.

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Jennifer Lonoff Schiff
Jennifer Lonoff Schiff is a business and technology writer and a contributor to
CIO.com. She also runs Schiff & Schiff Communications, a marketing firm focused on
helping organizations better interact with their customers, employees and partners.
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