B2B lead generation: how to collect qualified leads 

B2B lead generation plays a crucial role in your company’s chances of achieving success and establishing itself as a strong player in the market. Through a range of effective strategies, your business can gather the valuable leads it needs to boost sales and ensure continuous growth. 

In this article, we will explore what lead generation entails and why it is so important for B2B companies. We will also provide you with a list of 7 effective strategies to help you and your company generate the right leads.

What is a lead?

In short, a lead is a person or business that has shown interest in your company’s products or services. B2B leads can be collected in many ways, including via a landing page, an online shop, on social media, and through direct contact.  

Leads are important because there is a high chance of converting them into paying customers. If you understand which B2B leads are relevant to your specific business, you can tailor your strategies and content to draw them in and maximise your chances of reaching your sales goals.

What are the benefits of B2B lead generation? 

B2B lead generation involves collecting contact information from potential customers who have already shown interest in what your company offers. The key aspect here is the interest. Since you know that this person is curious about your products or expertise, you’re starting with an advantage and not from zero.  

Let us look at some of the specific benefits of lead generation.

Targeted and cost-effective marketing

Once you have collected qualified leads, you can target your marketing efforts towards them. A higher chance of success with your marketing efforts reduces the risk of spending money on marketing that does not result in sales.  

You can also utilise inbound marketing with interested leads. This generally requires fewer resources from both your marketing and sales departments.

Higher conversion rates

By working specifically with qualified leads, your company can increase the chances of achieving higher conversion rates compared to companies that only target a very broad audience with their sales and marketing activities. 

Scalability

Once you have identified which B2B lead generation strategies yield the best results for your company, you can start scaling up based on your findings to achieve a larger customer base and continuous growth. 

A stronger brand

Effective B2B lead generation will, in the long run, lead to your brand becoming more visible in the market, as your company gains loyal customers who can help strengthen your brand through social proof and word-of-mouth marketing. 

7 effective strategies for B2B lead generation 

After reading the sections above, you grasp why it makes sense to work with B2B lead generation. Now it’s time to dive into 7 effective strategies your company can use to generate qualified leads. 

To illustrate each strategy more clearly, we will use the fictional company ‘AccuFinance’. We’ll say this company offers an accounting system for small and medium-sized businesses. 

1. Create attractive landing pages 

Creating landing pages is crucial when your company needs to generate leads. A landing page should be visually appealing, user-friendly, have a clear CTA, and be tailored to encourage visitors to share their contact information with your company. 

Example

AccuFinance creates a landing page for its new cloud-based accounting system. The page has a catchy headline, a short video, and a CTA button with the text “Try AccuFinance Cloud free for 14 days.” 

When visitors click the button, they will be asked to fill out a contact form to activate the free trial period. In so doing, AccuFinance collects important leads consisting of businesses or employees interested in the accounting system.

2. Create lead forms

A lead form is a contact form where a user can fill in their contact details and share them with your company, typically in exchange for something of value to them, such as information or a trial period.

A good contact form for leads should be simple, easy to understand, and only ask for the most necessary contact information. If you ask for too much information, you risk overwhelming the user, who might then not complete the form.

Exempel

AccuFinance has a blog on their website. Here, they have placed a contact form with a CTA encouraging users to download a comprehensive guide to optimising their accounts. When visitors have filled out the form with their name, company name, and email, they can download the guide. Each time this happens, AccuFinance generates a new lead. 

3. Offer a demo or trial period

In our first example, we mentioned that our fictional company AccuFinance had a landing page where they allowed users to activate a free trial period. This strategy is both popular and effective because potential customers can get a first-hand impression of the benefits of a product or service.  

If your product or service cannot be offered as a trial period, you might consider offering a free demo instead, where you or a team member demonstrate the product via a video call or an in-person meeting.

4. Lead ads

On social media platforms like LinkedIn, you can create lead ads that target a specific audience. Using this type of ad, your company can collect B2B leads without users having to leave the platform they are on. This makes the process simpler and increases your chances of conversion because you capture users where they already are. 

Example

On LinkedIn, AccuFinance runs a targeted lead ad promoting a free webinar on accounting efficiency for small and medium-sized businesses. Through the ad, they collect contact information from leads directly on LinkedIn. 

5. Create a referral program

Another effective strategy is to create a referral program. By offering an exclusive discount or a special offer, you can encourage satisfied customers to refer new leads to your company.  

This strategy often results in valuable leads that are easier to convert because they can see that other customers are already using and benefiting from your products or services.

Example

AccuFinance launches a referral program where existing customers can get a free subscription month for each new customer, they refer to AccuFinance. The referral program is marketed through targeted email marketing and internal platforms that existing customers have access to. 

6. Webinars, e-books, and guides

In the lead ad example, we mentioned that AccuFinance promoted a free webinar on LinkedIn. Both webinars and other types of free content, such as e-books and guides, offer users something of value. This makes it more attractive for potential customers to complete your lead form because they immediately receive a reward. 

Example

AccuFinance has created a series of different budget templates suitable for small and medium-sized businesses. The templates are strategically placed in blog posts related to budgeting. Visitors can download a template by clicking a CTA button and filling out a contact form.  

The templates are both useful and popular. As a result, AccuFinance gains a wealth of valuable leads and new insights into B2B segments they had not previously considered as potential customers.

7. Competitions and giveaways

Gamification in the form of competitions and giveaways can help create attention and excitement among the target audience, which can increase the chances of generating leads. If you choose this method, it is important to ensure that both the tone of voice, prizes, and any free products are tailored to the target audience.  

This is crucial because a prize attractive to people outside the target audience or segments of the target audience can attract low-quality leads. A consistent tone of voice in communication around competitions and giveaways ensures that potential customers get a good impression of your company and remember it.

Example

AccuFinance creates a competition where participating companies can win a 6-month free subscription to their premium accounting software package. To enter the competition, companies must fill out a form with contact information and write a brief description of their current accounting challenges.

Through the competition, AccuFinance generates many valuable leads and gains insight into the accounting challenges faced by participating companies. 

Collection B2B leads: 5 things you need to get right

When you start working on B2B lead generation, there are five essential things you need to get right to succeed. 

A professional website

The first and most important thing you need is a professional website for your company. This is where you can create landing pages, provide important information about your products and services, and establish a strong and competitive brand. Your website should be easy to navigate, user-friendly, and include content tailored to the target audience. 

At one.com, you can create a website for your company in several different ways. If you want to quickly get started with creating a simple website, you can use our Website Builder with built-in AI. Here, you can create a complete website in a few minutes. Our AI assistant can also help you write content for all parts of your website.

If you need more functionality, WordPress is a good choice. You can also quickly get started with our 1-click installation, and you can choose from a wide range of professional themes that make it easy to create an attractive and user-friendly B2B website. 

Clear CTAs

Regardless of which lead generation strategies you choose; sharp and clear CTAs (calls-to-action) are crucial. The CTA buttons on your website, landing pages, lead ads, and in your email marketing should effectively and concisely communicate what potential customers will gain by clicking on them.  

If you want to know more about how to write clickable CTAs, we recommend our article What is a Call to Action? 

The right target audience

To create targeted content that generates warm leads, it is essential to have a basic understanding of your target audience and the different segments within it. Without this insight, you risk generating leads that do not lead to conversions.  

Understanding the segments in your target audience increases the chances of collecting valuable leads, and B2B lead generation can often provide new insights into your B2B segments.

Understand customers’ challenges

Good knowledge of your target audience also means having insight into the challenges and problems your various B2B segments face. This helps you tailor your communication by addressing their challenges and showing how you can solve their problems.  

This knowledge is also essential if you choose to offer webinars, e-books, or other content, as you can more easily create content that appeals to the target audience.

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)

An SEO strategy is necessary to ensure that you attract organic traffic to your company’s website, landing pages, and blog. With the right strategies and keywords, your company can achieve a good ranking in search engine results and reach more potential customers.  

If you have a WordPress website, we recommend Rank Math PRO, which automates part of the work for you and increases your chances of qualified leads finding their way to your landing pages. Learn more about SEO. 

At one.com, you can quickly get started with Rank Math by installing the plugin during the WordPress installation process.

Track and measure performance of your lead generation

To establish an effective B2B lead generation strategy, you’ll need to continuously measure and track the effectiveness of your campaigns and landing pages and assess the quality of the leads you collect. 

Conversion rates

Monitor your conversion rates and keep track of how many visitors to your website and individual landing pages end up becoming leads. This will give you a good overview of where you have succeeded and where you might consider making improvements. You can track your conversion rates using Google Analytics or another tracking tool. 

If you have created your website with one.com, you always have access to an overview of important website statistics, such as the number of visitors, popular pages, demographics, users’ devices, and much more.

Lead quality

Having high-quality leads is crucial. If you’ve collected many leads but only converted a few of them into customers, there is likely something you need to improve. Look at the information your leads have shared with you and compare qualified leads with poor leads to find out how best to target your efforts to generate the most qualified leads. 

A/B testing

With A/B testing, you can experiment with different aspects of your B2B lead generation strategies. Test different CTAs, landing pages, and email campaigns to find out which ones generate the most qualified leads. 

Boost sales with effective B2B lead generation 

Effective B2B lead generation requires continuous effort and ongoing adjustments based on your results and findings. By following the strategies we have outlined in this article, you can attract and convert more qualified leads.  

Although lead generation requires a lot of work, it is well worth the effort because the right leads can lead to increased revenue, a stronger brand, and a lasting advantage in the sales process.