Best Practices for Generating Leads Online For Your Business

Are you struggling to get the leads you need? Whether you have a brick and mortar store or you are selling exclusively online, everyone has to remain competitive to get customers. A sound and sturdy approach for generating leads online is essential but can be difficult to find. But -  you’re in luck! Here, we’ve curated a list of our best tips, tools, and platforms for getting more qualified leads online using just your website. 

Why Does Online Lead Generation Matter? 

We are in an age where so many salespeople are struggling to get by; people think that they have hit their limit with regards to how many people they can sell their products to. In reality, this is not the case. Those that work hard to target new leads find solutions using online lead generation. The modern business depends on generating leads online as it allows you to get more traffic, and turn into customers. The foundation of this is a good quality approach to generating leads online.

Platforms

Generally speaking, the platforms for generating leads online fall into two categories; paid and non-paid media. 

Paid

Paid media is a tactic where you pay money to promote content on a third-party platform. The usual outlets relating to paid media include social media platforms like Facebook or Linkedin as well as PPC tactics, and many more. It gives you more control over what you want the viewer to do. Using paid media drives traffic with a specific objective in mind.

The reason this is so effective is that you will see the results straight away. By paying for a placement you will see your content reach readers quickly. Because it's dependent on your budget, you are able to scale the approach as you want. You can reach as many or as few people as you can afford. Paid media is all in your hands. By having control, you can do exactly what you want in the way that you want.

Non-Paid

Non paid media is a tactic where you don't pay any money to promote. This comprises tactics like Search Engine Optimization or keyword ranking. It's a more organic approach to getting your content out there so you can generate leads online. It falls into two basic categories: owned media and earned media.

Owned media is a platform or channel that a brand controls. Therefore, they do not have to pay for the usage. It can consist of components like your website, blog, or social networks. Owned media is effective because it builds relationships with potential customers. Having useful content on your website that is easy to access can be shared by consumers and can generate positive word of mouth. The great thing with owned media is that it can be a mix of content so you can cater to your audience and be flexible without spending money. 

Earned media is content curated by a third-party publisher. Earned media could consist of reviews, mentions, or reposts, anything that is shared. Because this is a more tactical approach to word of mouth, which is what prospects will rely on more, it is considered to be more authentic than owned media. As a result, this can mean people will trust you more. It's important to be transparent and trusted, especially when generating leads online. Because earned media is content that isn't created by yourself, this will work at generating positive word-of-mouth.

Before you decide which one is best for you it's important to recognize the benefits of both at each given time, and both can certainly work in your favor.

How Can Your Business Generate More Leads Online?

Whether you are running an online store or you operate in the “real world”, generating leads online is all about the value you offer.

For Online Businesses

When you sell online you don't have the benefit of face-to-face interaction with customers. This means you need to provide value to those that visit your site by incorporating lead magnets with an exit pop-up. It's also crucial to use CTAs with the same approach to offering a lead magnet. When you are offering value to a customer you are relying on people to reciprocate. 

By giving something of value for free, it's appealing to people's good nature to return the favor. But in order to do this effectively, you still need to offer unique content that is thought-provoking. You do this by researching your current customers and seeing what they want to know most often. If you look into the customer support email account and see what people really need to know, you can answer these questions on your video or blog. It's important to test which types of lead magnets are best for your audience. 

And if you haven't done it already, optimize your home page landing page and other key pages of your website. Incorporating a CTA button and ensuring that your website communicates your brand effectively is crucial. And don't underestimate the impact of social media. When you set up accounts on every social media outlet, you are spreading yourself too thin. Choose up to three social media channels and go to town on posting really interesting content that links back to your blog.

The Brick And Mortar Approach To Generating Leads Online

For services that sell in-person, it is arguably more difficult to generate leads online, but that's not to say it's impossible. The most important thing to consider is what your impact is like online right now. Many brick and mortar companies rely on social media to be their digital presence. But it's important to go beyond this. In order to build an email list of customers, you need to answer their most pertinent questions. Starting a blog is the first port of call in this respect, but when marketing content locally, you have to diversify your channels. If you can find local blogs that have a high domain authority and become a guest blogger on those sites, this will serve you well in terms of Search Engine Optimization which will refer traffic to the blog.

Running a small local business isn't a disadvantage. In fact, you can become a local authority. When you provide content to your audience about the geographical area this can improve your SEO results and attract leads online at the same time. You can do this by creating lists of local facilities. It's also a great way to add personality to your content. Partnering with local businesses can work in your favor here. By cross-promoting services, you are potentially doubling your exposure. When you offer discounts online that are redeemable in-store as well, this will improve your turnout in both ways.

For all of the complexities and getting your business the traction it needs online, you can still benefit from the basics. Getting mentions in the local press will help to increase word of mouth on a local level. And if you haven't conducted any market research or aren’t consistent with the “NAP” approach (name, address, and phone number) for building leads online, keep focused on these as well. 

Different Methods To Generate Leads (Lead Magnets)

Generating leads online is all about enticing prospective customers. Lead magnets are numerous but effective. This is an offer that you can use to promote yourself to potential customers. In return, they provide you with valuable information, like their email address, name, and phone number. It is the key to building an effective email list. There are numerous approaches lead magnets can take.

Forms 

Forms are an easy way for a potential customer to opt-in to your services. The user submits a form in exchange for some sort of value. This could be downloadable content, results in a fun or informative quiz, etc. Forms are a great way to get a high number of leads with very little effort.

Downloadable Content

Downloadable content is something long-form, like a PDF or an ebook. It's important to note that many books are too long for leads to consume in full, but that's not to say it won't work for you. If you thrive on giving short, sharp content, this might not work as a lead magnet for you. 

Checklists

This is one of the best ways to get through to a customer. Checklists are short, sharp, and to the point. Checklists are also useful as a nurturing tool, as you can add steps that involve reconnecting with your business. 

Quizzes

One of the big problems many businesses have with generating leads online through lead magnets is that it's a one-sided effort. Quizzes generate a lot of positive results due to the nature of the content. And besides, everybody loves a quiz!

Contests

If you love a quiz, no doubt you love the opportunity to win free stuff! But one of the biggest mistakes many businesses make in this area is that they give away something irrelevant. The trick is to incentivize participants to take part in the process by sharing the details with others, thereby increasing the number of leads.

Infographics 

Infographics are incredibly popular right now, primarily due to the easily digestible content, and satisfying visuals. It's a very educational approach that does very well on social media. People can struggle to understand a new or complex concept, and this is where an infographic cuts through the competition. Rather than giving consumers a boring text to wade through, an infographic provides a level of detail beyond a pile of words.

Blogs

Using blogs as an organic part of your content is a way for you to give your business a voice. Creating a lead magnet from blogs is about engaging users to interact. Many blogs include a CTA of sorts so people can comment at the bottom of the blog. One of the most popular approaches is to write a blog post with resources from other experts. You can use this curated list of tips and tricks from experts within your industry to create a high-value piece of content for your reader. By interviewing various people and putting all of the information together in one post, you are asserting yourself as an authority. Websites like Forbes use this to great effect.

Service Pages

Using a page to highlight your services can generate leads as long as you follow a quality structure. By incorporating an elevator pitch as well as offering proof that your services are popular with customers and incorporating a conversion opportunity at the end, you are making the most of a page that can be generally overlooked.

There are also other approaches to generate leads online through your on-page content such as videos, whitepapers, case studies, and podcasts.

How To Optimize Your Website

Writing content for SEO is more than just a few keywords throughout your text. You risk getting penalized by Google. Keywords are still a very useful way of checking where you stand. Here are a few key areas to focus on.

Keyword Research

This gives you a chance to find information that will give you a better insight into any website, including stuff like keyword rankings, traffic, search volume, keyword difficulty, and traffic cost. Choose the keywords you already rank for which have a search volume of 1000 or higher.

Write With Specific Keywords In Mind

Inserting a few key phrases which make sense to the article and aren’t guilty of “keyword stuffing” is sensible. Aim for 1% to 3% keyword density when inserting your keywords, while making sure the content is readable.

Write Long Posts

Posts between 1000 and 1500 words provide more value and more useful content. Google prefers longer articles because they have more material to analyze. On top of this, it will keep your readers on your website for longer and will get you more comments, links, and shares. 

Incorporate Short-Head Keywords And Long-Tail Keywords

Long-tail keywords means much less competition for rankings and those looking for the specific term will come straight to your website. Short-head keywords are less specific and you will face a lot of competition, but as you produce quality content and become a reliable source of information, this will start to work in your favor.

Website Analysis

It’s vital to assess your website for specific issues. Focus on analysis of meta sets/keywords, visible text, and code to see how you're positioned for search engines. Also, use competitive analysis to examine content keywords. 

Optimize Your Content

You can do this by creating page titles, creating meta tags, placing strategic search phrases on pages, and integrating selected keywords into your existing content.

Creating Service Pages

Trying to put too much information on your homepage can be counterproductive. In general, you want your homepage to be concise and inviting. This is where a service page comes in handy.

It’s a great way to collate all the necessary information about your services in one place with as much detail as you want. It’s very useful for companies offering a range of services instead of just one thing. It's important to include the following for maximum impact.

1. A list of your services laid out and highlighting that each service is clearly distinguished from the others providing detailed information about each one, making the benefits clear. 
2. Links out to relevant information and documents, and/or examples, such as videos explaining certain features, or examples showing the service in action.
3. A Call To Action (CTA), which is a link, button, or sign-up form that tells visitors to your site what to do next. 

Convincing visitors to use your services about explaining what you’re offering and how it will benefit them. A dedicated services page is easy to set up, and an ideal technique.

How Do You Create Content That Supports Your Overall Marketing Plan And Keyword Strategy?

Creating content is a considerable task which means you've got to have it work within your marketing framework. This is where this 9-point plan will provide you with that crucial structure... 

1. Set your mission and goals.
2. Establish your KPIs.
3. Understand your audience by getting feedback or data.
4. Assess your current position based on your current content.
5. Find the best content channels for your work.
6. Identify and allocate resources in terms of your workflow, digital tools, as well as your human ones.
7. Create a content calendar (using software like Google Calendar).
8. Create, distribute, and market the content.
9. Measure the results.

Are Backlinks Important?

Backlinks, an internal link going back to your site, are essential for SEO because they represent a signal to search engines that others view your content with high regard. If many sites link to the same website, search engines will believe that content is worth linking to, having a positive effect on a site's ranking position. 

Earning backlinks is an essential part of SEO, and obtaining these links is known as link building. Some backlinks are more valuable than others. For example, being mentioned on a high-quality, popular website can give your business a much-needed boost. The big problem is that backlinks can take a long time to “earn”. This is where competitive backlink research comes in handy. When you examine the backlink profile to someone that is ranking well for your target keywords, you can see what may have helped them. View backlinks as the “seal of approval” for your site!

Do I Need SEO For My Business?

It's crucial to have an SEO strategy, as it will improve your website’s searchability and visibility. Search Engine Optimization is the ever-evolving tactic to get your website further up the search engine rankings. In essence, it is more than essential. 

Why Are SEO Services Important For Lead Generation?

The Benefits of SEO for businesses

Many businesses know they need SEO for their digital properties, but why is this?

• The “organic search” is a huge part of most businesses’ website performance and gets users to complete a conversion or engagement.

• It builds trust for the brand, via a website with an effective user experience that is easily discoverable and the better user experience means better rankings and visibility. 

• Increased engagement, traffic, and conversions via local search, which has become a key part of the success of small businesses by optimizing the brand’s website and content, as well as local citations.

• It keeps you sharp, as you need to re-evaluate the site consistently over time and check Google for changes to get to, and stay, on page one.

• It is (quite) cheap, in the grand scheme of things, and Good SEO implementation will mean your business will benefit for years, and the more time, effort, and money you put into it, the better and longer a website will last.

The Costs Of Ignoring SEO

There could be many reasons why a business chooses to stop focussing on their SEO Strategy, or ignoring it altogether. However, by failing to prioritize SEO, you could be handing your customers over to your competition. Here are some of the negative effects of ignoring SEO:

• If you stop posting content correctly you stop targeting new terms which result in fewer new keyword rankings and traffic. 
• You stop getting new visitors to your site.
• You stop generating content that can be used to create hub pages, which rank very well.
• You stop creating shareable content for social media which generates less traffic.
• Technical problems occur, such as blocking your website with robots.txt, generating duplicate content, and pushing your development site into the index. 
• Your backlink profile can go awry, resulting in spammy links.

This is merely scratching the surface. Put simply, SEO should not be ignored. It is the digital marketing equivalent of dying a slow death.

Can You Perform SEO By Yourself?

Naturally, for many people, the budget is an issue, so they need to undertake the best practices. There are things that you can do to perform SEO techniques by yourself such as: 

• Optimizing your site for Google RankBrain
• Looking for broken link building opportunities on websites like Wikipedia
• Appropriate your competitor’s best keywords
• Create mini blog posts for YouTube descriptions
• Make “best of” lists
• Creating content with at least 1,800 words
• And even creating your own keywords!

What SEO Products Are Out There?

It’s a big wide world out there in SEO land, and finding the best products can be like finding a needle in a haystack. Here are some of our recommendations:

Ahrefs. Second to Google in website crawlers. It covers keyword research, rank tracking, competitor research, SEO audit, viral content research, and much more. 

Ubersuggest. A keyword finder tool that helps you identify keywords and also the search intent, such as short to long-tail phrases.

Answer The Public. A great way to help create content for an ecommerce blog around specific keywords for better ranking. 

SpyFu. A way to view the number of times a keyword gets searched each month and finding the difficulty to rank for that specific keyword. You can search competitors’ sites to see how many organic keywords they have, who their paid and organic competitors are, and so much more. 

Woorank. Helping you track and report on your marketing data to see which keywords your rivals are targeting. It also helps you understand the things your website is lacking, such as duplicate content or slow running speed.

Majestic. Considered one of the best marketing SEO tools, you can see a general overview of your store and how many backlinks you have. It also works as an SEO keyword tool to find the best keywords to rank.

What Are The Other Costs Related To Hiring In-House?

It’s a massive investment for your business to build and maintain a robust marketing team in-house. For a company with 25-49 employees, your business may invest more than $200,000 each year in the marketing department alone, which is why a marketing agency is much more cost-effective than in-house marketing.

Other costs include the software expenses, such as SEO tools, as well as web development software, upskilling and upscaling your infrastructure. You have to remember that hiring the right people comes at a massive cost in giving them the skills they need to benefit the company. On a practical level, you also need to think about the taxes as well as the appropriate business insurance policies.

Suffice to say, it’s harder for in-house marketing teams to scale in comparison to agencies, primarily because agencies have access to a higher number of team members with different skill sets. Working with an agency means you don’t have to worry about your vision being put on hold due to financial or skill-based concerns, making you able to focus your attention on other parts of the business.

Tools Required For SEO

Search Engine Optimization requires good quality tools that can be broken down into two categories; tracking tools and keyword tools.

Tracking Tools 

Google Search Console gives easy access to key metrics and is easy to use, making it suitable for any beginner. The suite of tools provides you valuable information about your site by assessing its performance and observing potential problems to troubleshoot.

Moz Pro provides a wide range of tools giving you access to a vast amount of data as well as the ability to audit your own site using the Moz Pro spider and the opportunity to track your site rankings over thousands of keywords per website.

SEO Spider allows you to perform a quick search of URLs, and check your site for broken pages, those pesky “404 errors”. You can also check for pages with missing title tags, duplicate meta tags, tags with the wrong length, and the number of links on each page.

Keyword Research Tools

Soovle gives you suggested keyword ideas from Google, Bing, Yahoo, Amazon, and other sites to find untapped keywords.

Google Search Console is also great for keywords, due to its Performance Report feature which lists the pages on your site that get the most clicks and the exact keywords that brought them to your site.

SECockpit is a great tool. You input a seed keyword and you get in-depth details on search trends, organic competition, and traffic estimates.

Moz Keyword Explorer is another part of the Moz brand that makes it an authority in SEO. It helps you find “lateral” keyword ideas, the number of clicks you can expect to get if you get on page one of Google, and a metric to find keywords that will get you the most traffic.

There are many other tools out there, such as Keywords Everywhere, Keyword Snatcher, SEMrush, KWFinder, and Serpstat.

Content Creation Tools

Creating content isn’t always easy. Tools like GIPHY, SurveyMonkey, Meme Generator, NoNotes, and PhraseGenerator are a handful of tools that can help you to create unique content for your business and brand.

What Does It Take To Set Up And Manage An In-House Marketing Team?

If you decide to set an in-house marketing team, it will likely vary in size and role depending on your budget and need, but the roles like campaign manager, project manager, marketing strategist, marketing producer, marketing analyst, as well as the ad manager, ad producer, 

ad analyst, and developer is merely scratching the surface. It requires a significant budget to get this setup as well as hiring the right talent. This can be a considerable amount of time, effort and money. The budget for a developer alone would be in the region of $100,000 per annum! 

And when you see that a digital marketing manager’s salary is in the region of $65,000, a digital marketing specialist is $49,000, and an SEO specialist is $48,000 per annum, the cost mounts up.

These numbers don’t include the costs that come with maintaining an in-house team. Taxes, insurance, retirement plans, and equipment all need to be factored in!

About Our Service 

Here at Digital Shift, we understand that businesses need to communicate their brand in no uncertain terms. We also know how difficult it is to be at the top of the pile when it comes to competing with so many other businesses out there. This is where we strive to empower our clients and business partners and make sure that they are performing as well as possible. We provide so many different approaches to helping your business generate leads online but also promote yourselves in a way that is natural to your brand. Our diverse service offering includes:

• Business listings management, which means you don't have to keep track of your NAP+W.

• Google My Business, so your profile is up to date without competitors attempting to make mincemeat of your Google rankings.

• Franchise SEO, local SEO, and national SEO, so you can be found on maps online. Whether you are local, national, or international, this is vital. Small businesses need to optimize their online resources to be found locally and on a bigger stage without excessive expenditure. 

• Local link building so you can appear on blogs that matter. One of the most important ways of generating leads online is about your natural placement on other content which will build fruitful relationships.

• Optimizing your content on the website so your rankings are higher but it also strengthens the bond between you and your leads online. The goal is to turn these leads into customers! 

• Fixing your online reputation is also incredibly important and this is done through monitoring your social media so you can keep track of how you are looking, but also how ahead of the competition you are.

• Managing your ads such as your Facebook ad campaigns and Google Ads. Both are crucial in terms of getting wide coverage. But achieving maximum results by analyzing the campaigns, this will provide you with crucial information on how to improve yourself and get the leads online you need.

• Your landing page design. This is also crucial. By providing copywriting services, CRM integration, and getting to the core of what makes your landing page appeal we can peel the layers and get to the real reasons you aren't generating leads online.

• We also provide services related to content marketing through social media channels like LinkedIn. Linkedin is the Trojan horse of social media. Most businesses feel that they need to promote themselves through more popular platforms like Facebook. But it's also important to build connections online with an appropriate program so you can turn these leads into clients.

• Finally, we provide Local SEO services. While there are white hat and black hat SEO approaches, we don't advise using black hat SEO techniques. We specialize in white hat SEO techniques which will get you higher rankings and will benefit you in the long run. 

Our mission is to provide the best local marketing solutions for every business that is struggling to realize their potential. If you want to be a leader in how you conduct business online and how you generate leads online, we strive for excellence as one of our core values. We also focus on building trust and integrity, focusing on the relationships, as well as giving back to the community. Since we started in 2007 we've worked hard to develop brands for the long-term, not just the right-now. We work with companies to provide the best options. It's not about giving you a handful of tools and sending you on your way! We pride ourselves on long-term support. It's not just before the project, but we also support your needs during and after the final product is long completed. 

Why Should You Use Our Service? 

Using our service is all about the long-term. We focus on growth. It's not about taking the money and running. We want to see a business grow from strength to strength. By focusing on the long-term we can develop an understanding of what will work for your business based on our past but the reality is that we just want to see you flourish. Generating leads online is not just about instant gratification, it's a fine art where you have to do business with a superior set of values. We focus on your needs and objectives. What's more, we focus on the people that you do business with. Because there are so many agencies out there that focus on instant gratification and use cheap and dirty tricks, this can work against the reputation of any business. Getting yourself noticed online isn't about using underhand SEO techniques. You have to remember that you need to generate a reliable brand that will foster future relationships. 

We focus on value as a core model. Fairness is key and we need to make sure that we bring value to everyone's needs. We need to minimize our overheads, but this means that we can pass the savings on to you. Value isn't just about the monetary needs but it's about feeling that your needs are met. Focusing on your needs means that we will manage the projects so your objectives are met and what you need every step of the way. Generating leads online isn't about us giving you the tools and letting you go. We keep track of the project at every step to make sure that you are getting what you need. And as we walk you through the process, focusing on the minutiae of each minuscule part of this massive task, you will understand what we're talking about. If you don't feel comfortable or confused, we haven't done our job.

Are You Ready To Start? 

It all starts with that one lead. Generating leads online is, in one respect, the family tree of what will set your business up for a strong future. One lead can turn into many but this means that you've got to have the right practices in place. We are incredibly competitive. And now the art of keeping your mind sharp and your online business agile is essential. It all begins with that one lead, and getting that lead isn't easy. Are you ready to start?