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One of the biggest challenges that marketing teams face is generating quality leads that convert into sales. Whether you’re a new business or you have a well-established company, lead generation is as important as ever in today’s competitive marketplace. There are some common mistakes in lead generation that can really hinder the growth of any business – here are the top common lead gen mistakes and how to mitigate them in order to get better results and ROI.
Quality vs Quantity
A common mistake that a lot of businesses make, regardless of their tenure in the marketplace, is going for quantity of leads over the quality of leads. While it may be true that going after a large number of leads should net you more conversions, that’s not always the case. Marketing campaigns should always be targeted so you can draw in the right audience for your product or service.
Focusing on a ‘shotgun method’ of lead generation is a waste of time, money, and resources. When you’re wasting resources on a non-targeted lead generation campaign, you’re hindering what you can do in other marketing areas. In fact, 37% of marketing groups state that budget is the top reason that marketing automation is unsuccessful in their organization. By creating a targeted lead generation campaign, you’ll save time and money by being efficient in your campaign strategy, all while bringing in more quality leads.
No Clear Call to Action
If your lead generation campaign does not have a clear call to action, your viewers aren’t going to take that action and provide their valuable contact information. A lead generation advertisement that does not have a clear call to action is not effective – your campaign has to entice your viewers to provide their contact information to you. Coupled with this is the use of a ‘landing page’ – a dedicated, stand-alone page where you direct paid traffic. This page focuses on driving a singular action and eliminates all other distractions, like menus or other navigation that will take the user off-track.
Content
The most common way to get your viewers to provide their contact information is through valuable, meaningful, and relevant content. Most readers are accepting of trading some of their contact information for a relevant eBook, white paper, or webinar. Simply asking them to provide their information without providing them something in return is not effective.
Poorly written or irrelevant content is a very common mistake in lead generation strategies. In today’s lead generation world, content is king. If you’re not producing content that’s informative, relevant, and high-quality, there’s no reason that your readers should convert to customers.
Ignoring ROI
Everything has a price, especially in the world of marketing. Companies that are not cognizant of their return on investment for lead generation strategies are making a massive financial mistake. Thinking back to quality vs quantity, spending money on a campaign that isn’t targeted to a specific audience has a much lower return on investment than a targeted campaign for a smaller group of consumers.
Understanding return on investment is vital for a marketing team to be successful. ROI analysis helps business leaders understand which tactics are working and which ones are not. Currently, only around 23% of B2C marketers say they are able to successfully track their ROI for their marketing campaigns.
Bad Website Design
With so much business traffic taking place online, ignoring your website design and functionality is a huge mistake in lead generation. Let’s say you’re running a social media lead generation campaign that links back to your landing page. If your website isn’t clear or is difficult to navigate, chances are you’re going to lose that lead. Consumers spend mere seconds on a web page, especially when on a mobile device, before making the decision to leave, so every detail on your website counts.
Tunnel Vision
There are some marketing groups out there that are only focused on one platform for their lead generation campaigns. While we always suggest continuing what works for you and your company, it’s always a good idea to branch out to other lead generation platforms.
If you’re only focused on social media lead generation, try introducing a small-scale seminar or email campaign. One of the top reasons that lead generation campaigns plateau is that they take place entirely in one format. Using a mix of formats is a great way to maximize your response rate.
Not Nurturing Leads
While most of your leads aren’t going to quality when they initially come to you, you shouldn’t simply ignore those leads because they’re not ready to buy right now. By not nurturing your leads, you’re missing out on a large portion of your potential sales.
Always follow up with your leads regardless of where they are in the buying process. By taking the time to create a connection, a long-term lead is much more likely to buy from you over time.
No Internal Sales Process
Getting leads is only half the battle. After you’ve captured contact information from potential prospects, nurtured them, then you need to follow up with a sales process. You need dedicated resources to qualify your leads, segment them, and conduct direct outreach efforts. Particularly for high-value services or products. Without a solid sales process, lead generation alone is done in vain.
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These are some of the more common issues that many businesses face when generating leads online. From simple follow-ups to more complex tracking systems, there are a decent number of steps to take to make your lead generation campaigns successful. If you’re struggling with generating leads, or converting leads into customers, reach out and we’ll do our best to help – we have been recognized as a Top Web Design Agency in Tampa by DesignRush so we can definitely help figure out your website conversion issues.
