If you are using social media as part of your multi-channel lead generation strategy, you may be seeing some results or you may be battling to see any real growth. While this channel might not seem like the most logical channel to generate leads, it offers a number of unique benefits that help to drive trust, engagement, and loyalty. This, in turn, gives you the ideal foundation to craft a highly targeted lead generation campaign designed to attract the right leads.
With that said, pushing out content and then waiting for the leads to come rolling in will not get you too far. Rather than treating your social media channels as ‘set and forget’, you will need to begin with a strategy that allows you to see the real growth. Keep reading to find out how to get the most from your social media strategies for effective lead generation.
Lead Generation to Optimise Social Media Growth
Used correctly, social media is without a doubt a highly effective way for lead generation. To get the most from your lead nurturing efforts, here are some tips to keep in mind.
Choose your social channels carefully
Assuming that you need to use every single available channel is a big mistake. Instead of going for a one size fits all approach, first identify the channels that are best suited to your specific brand, needs, and audience. Being able to identify the channels that are already primed towards your lead generation goals will help make your strategies far easier to implement. That does not mean choosing channels without doing any research, however.
To make sure that you choose the right channels, take the time to do your research. Dive into your analytics, look at the numbers, consider your target audience and your lead profiles, and then determine which channels are already showing the most growth. You can also dig deeper to find out which channels your buyer persona frequents.
Make use of gated content
Once you have identified the best channels, you can get started with your campaigns. Gated content is one of the simplest and most effective ways to generate leads through social media. You can either update some of your content that has already performed well – useful guides, relevant resources or anything else that is targeted and focused on your ideal customer – or you can create new content to use to nurture leads.
As readers need to fill out a basic information form to access the content, you have far more chance of attracting potential leads who are willing to swap information in return for content that is useful and focused on their needs. You may get some clicks to your content landing page without any downloads but those who are genuinely interested will share their details. Gated content can be shared across your chosen social channels and promoted through sponsored posts, which reach a far more targeted audience.
Make use of social media advertising
On the topic of sponsored posts, there is another powerful way for lead generation. Social media advertising allows you to target in a highly specific way, reaching your key demographic according to location, gender, age, income, and various other specifics. You also have the chance to drive social engagement, which further helps your lead generation efforts. Essentially, you are putting your lead offer in front of your ideal audience, in a highly visible way.
Social media advertising has evolved greatly over the years, in many cases working in a way that is similar to gated content. Aside from simple sponsored posts, you can also create posts that are linked to landing pages, with personalised offers, discounts, content or other incentives available once leads complete forms. Many plugins automate much of this process, making it even easier for leads to enter the lead funnel.
Run targeted contests
Social media contests are useful in many ways, from brand exposure to engagement. These are also a great way to attract leads if done correctly. The problem here is that many brands approach contents in the wrong way, offering prizes that are either too valuable or generic to attract the right leads or not valuable or interesting enough to attract any leads at all. Ideally, what you want is a prize that is somewhere in the middle – interesting, valuable, and relevant.
As an example, if your pet accessories store ran a contest offering winners a free holiday somewhere exotic or a highly sought-after item such as brand new iPhone, you would likely get a huge number of leads. Very few of those will be warm leads, however. If you were to run a contest offering an assortment of free smaller accessories or a luxury dog bed, you would get leads that are already interested in your product. Those leads would have far more chance of converting once entering your lead funnel.
Host hangouts, webinars or live videos
Video – and especially live video – is leading the way in social media right now. Webinars, hangouts and other types of live streaming events are very effective for gated content and for other lead nurturing campaigns. There are a few ways that you could make use of live video and similar tools to bring in leads.
Offering and promoting videos as gated content is one way. Using this approach, you would build interest before the live event, requiring those who want to view to register in advance. Another way to use video is to make the video available to a wider audience and then nurture leads from your audience. With this approach, you could direct views to landing pages, custom Facebook tabs, offers, contests or any other content that you are promoting. You could also encourage interaction during live broadcasts by offering rewards for engagement. You would need to respond to comments and ensure that you are actively involved throughout the broadcast for this to be effective. Encourage questions, prompt discussions and get your audience interested, and you will have far more chance of attracting leads than you would if you offered no engagement at all.
Utilise geotargeted search
Finally, another powerful strategy that works especially well for brick and mortar or local businesses is geotargeting. You may be using this to some degree already in your social media posts and sponsored posts. You can go one step further by using geotargeted search as well. This can be a very effective way to discover local leads.
Every single moment, social media users are publically sharing posts that relate to a huge variety of topics. Using our pet accessories store, let’s say that you have a local branch as well as an online store. The best leads for your business would obviously be pet owners (current and potential). What are some of the posts that these leads may be sharing? They could be complaining about not finding the right dog bed. They have a cat who is scratching up furniture or a puppy that seems to chew everything in sight. Geotargeted search allows you to find these types of leads and either invite them to like your page or offer a personalised lead magnet.
Lead Generation for Social Media
Once you start to see how effectively you can connect to your target audience through personalised social media campaigns, you will soon start to see an impact on your lead generation efforts.
