TIPSHEET

Ideas for B2B Lead Generation

IDEAS FOR B2B LEAD GENERATION

Sales leads have always been a high priority in B2B marketing,

and while there is no doubt that generating leads can be

challenging, the ability to provide qualified opportunities to your

direct and channel sales force, is one of the highest ROI

marketing activities you can undertake. The abundance of

information available online has changed the traditional buying

process, and marketers need to find new ways to reach

prospective customers. This tip sheet discusses some of the most

effective modern approaches that have been shown to generate

high quality B2B leads for companies in the technology sector.

CREATE ARTIFICIAL SCARCITY AROUND CONTENT

Product information is no longer a scarce

resource, a result of which has made the ability

for B2B marketers to generate a stream of

qualified leads a lot less straight-forward. The

growth of the internet and the subsequent

increase of readily available information has

served to diminish traditional lead gen

approaches, i.e. bingo cards, which enabled

readers of tech publications to request more in-

depth product information to that identified in

specific articles. While marketers may have

adopted modern approaches to lead generation,

there is still an opportunity to consider

traditional approaches, for instance by creating

an artificial scarcity around additional content,

giving readers the opportunity to request more

detailed expertise on technology or market

intelligence, by putting the content behind a

registration wall. If potential customers see

value in the content made freely available on

your website, they will happily give up their

content details to get further information.

DON’T RELY ON ONE TYPE OF CONTENT

There is no one type of content that you should

use to generate B2B leads – in fact we

recommend to our clients that they use several

types. The key to making any campaign effective

is to deliver materials that offer the readers true

value, give help that goes well beyond making it

easier for the customer to use your product and

service, and that isn’t just promotional material

dressed up as a whitepaper. The most effective

– and easiest to generate – content includes

white papers, technical guides, technical &

customer videos, webinars and screencasts.

Additionally, you should consider using content

from other sources, for instance in some

technology industries, analyst reports are highly

valued, and a customised analyst report will

appear to be unbiased and independent.

OLD SCHOOL METHODS CAN STILL WORK

Whilst much of the recent talk about leads

focuses on the move from requesting printed

literature to finding content marketing

strategies that work in the 21st century, some

old school methods still work. Companies that

sell products and services direct from their

website can experiment with offers – this is

particularly effective when customers buy

development tools as the first step of an

evaluation or development process. Offering

promo items at trade shows can still generate

targeted leads – although today you’re likely see

competitions that allocate prizes based upon QR

codes, rather than business card draws. Reader

offers and competitions remain effective in

many industries, and in some cases even a low-

value prize can attract a significant number of

high-quality entries, provided that it is

something people want. Even telemarketing can

still be used as an effective B2B lead generation

tool.

LANDING PAGE OPTIMISATION

Any B2B website should be designed to optimise

prospect acquisition and nurturing. Having

good-quality, highly effective content is no good

if it cannot be easily located on the website. To

overcome this you should use customer-focused

navigation which targets your prospects needs

so that they can find exactly what they want to

know. While website optimisation has become

an obvious thing to consider, it can be all too

easy to lose track of older pages and outdated

offers on your website. Consider reviewing your

website every six months to determine which

pages and forms aren’t proving effective,

enabling you to turn around pages that aren’t

delivering on their potential value.

Despite the fact that customers may no longer

call companies or circle bingo cards to request

basic information, there are still many ways to

generate high-quality B2B leads. We

recommend that companies link the sales

generated to the source of the lead to identify

the most effective tactics. Campaigns should not

base metrics on a simple cost-per-lead analysis,

but on quality metrics to get a better view of the

value that the campaign delivers. Working

closely with an experienced agency such as

Napier will help you build campaigns that

deliver the best return on your marketing

investment.

t: +44 (0)1243 531123

f: +44 (0)1243 779070

e: info@napierb2b.com

w: www.napierb2b.com

Donnington Park

Birdham Road

Chichester

West Sussex

PO20 7DU

United Kingdom

Launched in 1984, Napier was one of the first agencies in

Europe to specialise in the electronics market,

subsequently expanding to help clients in a range of B2B

technology sectors. Initially a PR agency, Napier responded

to the clients’ need to manage information across every

element of the marketing mix by bringing together a team

of multi-talented and multi-lingual engineers, linguists and

technical journalists as well as PR and marketing

professionals.