The 4 Basics of Lead Generation

B2B Lead Generation Strategies

Lead generation is defined as ”uncovering a potential opportunity/person who has an interest in purchasing your products or services. “ There are many ways to do this, including inbound/content marketing or outbound marketing via phone or text.

Here at Acadia, we embrace both of these methods, and we call it the OMNIBOUND™ approach.

Whatever your flavor is – you must be prepared before you begin, and be ready to manage and analyze your results. Be sure to focus on both the MATERIAL as well as the PROCESS. Yes, the PROCESS of lead generation.

4 Basic Lead Generation Ideas

The following are 4 basic elements, and a few questions to get you thinking in the right direction. We spend a lot of time with our clients asking these questions, and the many more that come up as we explore their lead generation needs.

1. The Content

   
   WHAT do you want to convey? How are you going to say it in a compelling fashion?

1. What are the details of the event or product?
2. Who’s your audience?
3. Do you have a script/call guide/content?
4. What’s in it for the recipient?
5. What tools are you using?
   
   

2. The Contacts

Don’t forget the importance of a list. I can’t tell you how many times we go to start an email campaign for a client and we have no emails (or no good ones). Or, we start a phone outreach with no numbers (or no good ones). Be diligent about having good contact data.

1. Do you have a list - or do you need to create one?
2. How old is the list? (insert data on list degrading)
3. How many contacts are on the list?
4. Do you have a CRM?
5. Was the list generated by a call to action such as a registration or a request for information? If so, what was that?
   
   

3. The Outreach

   
   What do you do when you get a response- and how do you define whether or not it’s qualified?

1. How do you define a qualified lead? 
2. Who is responsible for a follow-up?
3. How will you track progress?
   
   

4. Goals

    
   1. Do you have specific goals you are looking to achieve? They should be measurable.
   2. Do you have the ability to track the leads for future ROI calculations?
   3. Other than the leads- what other results do you want to see from the program? A sales process? Clean data? Metrics? Business intelligence?

Start simple – build upon what works- tweak what doesn’t. Do not get frustrated. It’s a process, not a task. Understand that you will be learning and adjusting with every campaign (no two campaigns are alike).  

Enjoy the lead generation journey!