Generating new leads for your small business is going to be crucial to its success. All businesses need a consistent flow of customers if they want to grow their company.
The trouble is, figuring out how to get new leads isn’t always easy.
At one time, businesses would buy a list of leads. However, today this practice is highly frowned upon, and could land you in serious trouble for breaking data protection laws.
So, how can you generate new leads without getting into trouble? Here, you’ll discover X lead generation ideas for small businesses you can utilize today.
- Create and maintain a blog
The best way to generate new leads is to get them organically. That is, your leads come to you.
A blog is a powerful lead generator when done correctly. Creating and maintaining a good blog will build up your audience, improve engagement, and generate more sales.
The key is to make sure you are providing useful, relevant and non-promotional content. Your goal should be to build up your reputation as an authority figure in your industry. That means answering problems your customers might face, and providing useful tips they can utilize.
Ideally, you should post on your blog as often as you can. At least one blog a week will be required if you want to see significant results.
2. Utilize social media
Another powerful way to generate new leads is through social media. All local businesses should aim to build up a strong social media presence. This will help you to attract a larger audience, as well as build up trust with your customer base. It’s free to set up a business page and you can use it to market your services and keep in touch with customers.
There are several different social media platforms you can utilize. For best results, start by focusing on just one platform. Consider where the majority of your customers hang out, and focus all of your efforts there.
Maintaining a social media page for your business takes a lot of time and effort. However, it also delivers fantastic results.
3. Create an opt-in offer
Do you currently offer your customers an opt-in offer? If not, you’ll want to create one!
Opt-ins are the best way to generate new leads. They encourage customers to opt-in to your email list, allowing you to send them regular content. Generating leads for an email list isn’t always easy, but an opt-in offer can help.
So what kinds of offers can you provide? Well, the most effective tend to be reports, eBooks, and discounts. Think about a problem your audience has and then create something that solves it. This is a sure-fire way to encourage more opt-ins.
4. Ensure your website is optimized
Is your website fully optimized? If not, you could be missing out on a lot of organic leads. You need to make sure your site is easy for your potential customers to find.
Use relevant keywords throughout your content and register your business details on listings such as Google My Business. Do some keyword research to see what keywords you should be focusing on.
When your website is well optimized, it’s going to attract a lot more traffic.
5. Run paid ads
Paid ads can be a goldmine for new leads. Using the right keywords, you could reach and attract a massive audience. Some of the best places to run paid ads for your local business are search engines and social media sites.
Google ads can be particularly lucrative. However, they can also be highly competitive. This means you may need to pay more to use popular keywords in your industry. Long-tail localized keywords tend to work better as there is less competition. They are also highly targeted, meaning your leads are more likely to turn into conversions.
These are some of the best lead generation methods you can use for your local business. Whichever method you choose to start with, it will take a lot of time and effort to start seeing results. For this reason, you may want to consider outsourcing.
Outsourcing your lead generation strategies frees up more time that you can then spend on other aspects of the business. The key thing to remember is not to purchase a list of leads. You will experience the best results when you generate leads organically.