Generating leads is a must for us. How each business does it is different, how your neighbor may do it is different than how you need to do it. Which methods work better at generating more than others? Well, many of us have websites? Secondly, are you utilizing the website to generate leads or even updating it at all? Having a well put together website with an updated website is important. Use it to have updated content and ways that you can get leads to wanting to stay on and learn more about you. If you update and using your website then, you are already on the right path. But how can you generate leads using your website, what is going to make someone a lead? There are many factors in getting your website to work for you and generate valuable leads for you and your business?
Learning how to set up your website to attract and convince them to offer up contact information.
The key to generating leads from your website is to:
- Understand your visitors
- Provide relevant content
- Use lead capture forms
Automatically add leads to your CRM or marketing automation software
Understand your visitors most small to medium sized businesses mistakenly assume that the visitors coming to their website are ready to buy their product or services. In reality, your visitors spend a lot of time online researching you and your competitors before making an informed decision. Most people need to trust you before doing business with you. There is a buying process that most people go through before making a purchase or before becoming a customer:
Stage 1 ( Research) -> Stage 2 ( Consideration) -> Stage 3 ( Decision)
- Stage 1
Your visitors have the need to solve a problem and may or may not have formed an idea about the solution. They have just started their research at this stage. - Stage 2
Your visitors have formed an idea about the solution and have started to actively research you and your competition’s product and solution. - Stage 3
Your visitors are ready to see a demo, try your product, and make a purchase decision.
Your visitors will be ready to talk to you only when they are in Stage 3. To convert your visitors, you will need to engage them across all three stages throughout the buying process on your website.
Engage your visitors as early as possible to start building trust and knowledge with your business. How do you build trust with a potential customer? Provide relevant content, your target visitors are looking for different information at each stage of the funnel. The key to converting them is to provide that information exactly when they are looking for it.
Keep in mind that any form of content on your website should be completely focused on providing value to your visitors. Think about the problems or challenges that your product or services solve for your them. What would they find valuable? It is all about your target visitors and what they need.
Here are some examples of content for each stage in the buying process:
Stage 1 (Research) – Stage 2 (Consideration) – Stage 3 (Decision
- Blog articles
- Educational videos
- Check-lists
- eBooks
- White papers
- Webinars
- Product datasheets
- Product videos
- Comparison charts
- Live demos
- Trials
- Case studies
- Testimonials
Converting your traffic into a way to generate leads through lead capture forms this is where you turn anonymous visitors into leads. Use some of the content we mentioned in the previous section as an offer and ask your visitors to enter their information before you provide the content.
Content like eBooks, whitepapers, webinars, demos, and case studies are ideal for generating leads. You are giving your visitor something of value, and they, in turn, are becoming a lead.
The amount of information you would ask depends on the stage in the buying process. For contents in Stage 1, you should ask only for their name and email address. For content in Stage 2 and 3, you can ask for more information such as company name, location, and phone number.
Always have an option that asks visitors for their permission to email them relevant information. Keep in mind that visitors in Stages 1 and 2 are still not ready to get sales call even though they have accessed your content.
They may have downloaded your eBook or whitepaper, but have yet to read the information. Or, they may have downloaded it as a comparison piece to one of your competitors.
To get their contact information, you can create lead capture forms using three ways:
- You can have a web developer design and setup your forms.
- If you are using a Content Management System such as WordPress, you can use a form plugin to setup your forms.
- If you are using a CRM or marketing automation software, you can design and setup “web forms” and embed those in your website.
For options 1 and 2, you would typically receive the lead information in the email or you would download it in a spreadsheet. Automatically add leads to your CRM or marketing automation software.
This is option 3 from the previous section and our recommended way to capture leads.
Using this way, you can take the visitor’s information and automatically add it to your CRM or marketing automation software as a lead.
With lead capture forms that are part of sales and marketing software, you should be able to:
- Generate forms directly from your CRM or marketing automation software.
- Capture lead information and automatically put them into your CRM or marketing automation software as a lead.
- Automatically put these leads into email nurturing campaigns to send them relevant information that helps their buying process.
- Send an email confirmation to the lead right away.
- Show a thank you page thanking your visitor for their interest in your content.
If necessary, assign Stage 3 leads to a sales person and create a task for the sales person to follow up on the lead, especially for demo or trial requests.
After you capture a lead, do not sell to them unless they are in Stage 3 of the buying process and have requested a callback, demo, or trial. Instead, nurture them.
“Always have an option that asks visitors for their permission to email them relevant information.” Lead Nurturing is the process of keeping in touch with your leads by providing them with relevant educational content and information that helps in their buying process. That way, you gain their trust as they progress.
