Lead Generation

If you want to understand lead generation, why it is important to your company, and what the best strategies are, this guide is for you. Generating quality leads is a priority for 69% of businesses, according to the State of Content Marketing 2023 report.

Why do you need to generate leads?

Effective lead generation is crucial to provide the sales team with qualified business opportunities. This strategic approach is designed to attract a larger audience, qualify potential leads, enhance their readiness for sales, and ultimately guide them to the sales team, significantly boosting the chances of successfully closing a deal. By incorporating these tactics, businesses can streamline their sales processes and maximize conversion rates.

What is lead generation?

Lead generation is the process of transforming strangers into acquaintances. In essence, it involves attracting, engaging, and capturing the contact information of individuals who may be interested in your product or service.

👀 Traffic Generation

The user discovers your company through channels such as a blog, website, or social networks. They are attracted to your website or landing page through campaigns conducted on these channels.

🧲 Lead Generation

The visitor is on a channel of your company, clicks on your Call To Action (CTA), and lands on the landing page, where they provide their contact details in exchange for an offer.

✅ Qualification

In addition to basic contact information, such as name, phone number, and email, the company can request additional details to aid in identifying and filtering leads that genuinely qualify as opportunities for the commercial team.

🌱 Nutrition

The lead that arrives on the site is not always ready to make a purchase. In such cases, it may be necessary to nurture it with blog content, newsletters, email marketing, etc.

🚛 Distribution

When the leads are ready to make a purchase, it's time to distribute these contacts to the sales team, who will continue the negotiation.

What is a lead?

A lead is a contact who shows interest in a product or service, becoming a sales opportunity for the company. There are several types of lead, and it is very important to know how to differentiate them.

👤 Lead

The lead is any user who shows, in some way, interest in the company's product or service.

The user provides some contact information, such as name, phone number and email, becoming a lead.

🎯 Qualified Lead

The qualified lead is the one who has characteristics that stand out as a potential buyer, where it is within the customer profile desired by the company.

These characteristics are defined together by the marketing and sales teams.

🪄 Marketing Qualified Lead

Marketing qualified leads or just MQLs are leads that have already contacted and developed with the efforts of the marketing team.

For marketing, they already have a number of characteristics of a potential customer and are ready to receive a first contact from the sales team.

😇 Sales Accepted Lead

When marketing transitions from lead generation to sales, the commercial team typically validates the lead's interest, often relying on the performance of an SDR (sales development representative) to determine if that lead is genuinely interesting.

As much as the two teams are aligned, there may be a break between the previous stage and this one, because the information filled in by the lead does not always reflect reality.

🤝 Sales Qualified Lead

After the lead is accepted by the commercial, it is usually forwarded by the SDR to a seller, who will continue the deal.

Sales qualified leads, SQLs or qualified leads for sales are the contacts that indicate, through their profile and their engagement with the seller, interest in becoming customers of the brand.

💡 Product Qualified Lead

Contacting an SDR or seller is not the only way to qualify a lead.

Especially in Software as a Service (SaaS) companies, users who have already taken a free trial or had access to a demo can be considered as qualified leads by the product's own use (PQLs).

👣 Service Qualified Lead

SQL, service-qualified lead or service qualified lead is the user who arrives through a different channel: customer service or customer success.

These cases may include free customers who wish to subscribe to a plan or those who wish to upgrade the contracted services.

How does the lead generation process work?

Here is the user's path to becoming a lead:

1. Attract: You must engage this user with an offer, whether it's compelling content or a value proposition directly aligned with their needs.
2. Engage: Using good content and persuasive copy to further connect them with the offer and thus convince them to take action.
3. Capture: This action involves providing your contact details through various instruments, such as landing pages, pop-ups, forms, or chatbots, accompanied by a compelling call to action (CTA).

What are the differences between capturing inbound and outbound leads?

An essentially Inbound campaign should dominate Google, whether in the organic aspect ⏤ SEO ⏤ or inorganic ⏤ paid media. The focus is on attracting traffic to the brand's website and converting leads from its offers.

On Outbound, the main channel is LinkedIn. The corporate social network is a great channel for identifying decision-makers, but it is not ideal for the approach. Therefore, opt to create lists from LinkedIn and approach these contacts via email or phone.

The best channel continues to be LinkedIn, as it is the source that offers the greatest granularity and accuracy of data. It allows you to find out the position, seniority level, segment, size and geographic region of the company. However, remember to approach contacts through different channels (email, telephone, chat). The level of contact intensity of the cadence varies depending on the ICP and inherent characteristics of each company's sales.

The approach involves a concept that makes sense:

• In Inbound, you attract those who have a need and then qualify those who are a good fit.
• In Outbound, you qualify those who are a good fit and then approach to address their needs.

After the lead is generated, the inbound and outbound sales processes tend to be similar.

What are the main difficulties in generating leads?

With more and more companies adopting digital strategies for generating leads, the challenges in the area are also growing.

💸 Centralized And Increasingly Expensive Procurement Channels

In digital media, most of the investment goes to the big players, such as Google and Meta (Facebook) ⏤ which makes sense, since these brands also concentrate the majority of users.

But when everyone wants to advertise in the same place, the result is a much more competitive market, increasingly expensive ads, an increase in cost per click (CPC) and customer acquisition cost (CAC).

🔒 GDPR, Privacy, And The Extinction Of Cookies

The creation of the General Data Protection Law (GDPR) brought drastic changes to digital advertising ⏤ among them, the extinction of third-party cookies by major brands such as Apple, Google and Mozilla.

Good news for users, who gain more control over their data on the web, but bad news for advertising platforms, which depend on this type of information to feed the intelligence of their ads.

While platforms look for other ways to deliver results, what happens is a loss in ad intelligence, damaging their targeting, conversions and measurement.

🤔 Reduced User Attention Window

Between social networks, television, radio and "real life", a person is impacted by up to 10 thousand advertisements every day.

With so many stimuli, it is increasingly difficult to hold the user's attention. Studies show that most users will abandon a page within the first 10 seconds if they don't have a good reason to stay.

📊 Lack Of Investment In Conversion Optimization (CRO)

If the digital advertising landscape is chaotic, that leaves advertisers with their hands tied, right? Wrong!

A great opportunity for brands lies in conversion optimization (CRO) strategies, which involve knowledge of copywriting, website optimization, UX and psychology applied to design.

The difficulty lies in the lack of information: there are still few brands that invest in this type of strategy.

✏️ Little Attention To Website Content

In order for the content of the website or conversion LP to truly capture the user's attention, it is necessary to be detailed when creating this content.

Try to understand the pains and objections of your personas and invest in complete, objective content (remember that the window of attention is scarce) and that answers essential questions.

Also use copywriting techniques and try to include mental triggers, such as social proof and authority, to increase your brand's trust.

What are the top lead generation channels and strategies?

Lead capture strategies are divided into two broad categories: organic and paid. Which doesn't mean one of them is free, even organic strategies require investment.

The difference is that you do not pay directly for acquiring the lead, and both the investment and the return are realized in the long term.

In paid strategies, the results tend to be more immediate, with a higher monthly investment. But if you stop investing, the results disappear quickly.

Tip: Organic and paid traffic strategies can complement each other. Organic strategies help increase visibility and brand authority in the long term, which also increases conversion in paid media. Meanwhile, paid ads can "give a boost" to organic strategies, accelerating results. And what we call a virtuous cycle.

🆓 Organic Channels

Organic marketing channels leverage non-paid methods to naturally grow visibility and engagement. These strategies are fostering authentic connections with audiences without relying on paid advertising.

💰 Paid Channels

Paid marketing channels involve investing financial resources to promote products or services. These strategies enable businesses to reach targeted audiences swiftly through paid placements.

What is the average cost per lead in each channel and segment?

Remembering that these values ​​are only for comparison between channels, as the real cost depends on many variables, such as funnel stage (whether the conversion occurred at the top or bottom of the funnel), company segment, location, etc. ⏤ and the cost per lead must be analyzed in conjunction with other metrics, such as return on investment (ROI).

What are the best lead generation tools?

After defining a strategy for generating leads, the question arises: "Where will the conversion, or data capture, take place?"

• Chatbot: Lead capture tool that works through pre-defined texts and scripts, generating automated conversations.
• WhatsApp Button: The WhatsApp Button serves to direct website visitors to a direct contact channel.
• Landing Page Builder: Landing pages are great allies for launching campaigns and capturing leads.
• Pop-Up Creator: Pop-ups are windows that overlay the website or page visited, with objective language and a strong CTA to encourage conversion.
• Advertising Platform: Some advertising platforms offer the option of capturing leads directly through the campaign, without redirecting the user to the brand's website. A good option to speed up data filling and bring faster results.
• Outbound Prospecting Software: Another way to generate leads is through active prospecting and creating segmented lists, designed for the sales team to take an active approach (Outbound).

What are the best lead magnets?

After defining a strategy for generating leads, the question arises: "Where will the conversion, or data capture, take place?"

Think of lead generation tools as your "fishing rod." If you throw them into the sea without any type of bait, it is practically impossible to catch a fish.

These baits are called "lead magnets" ⏤ materials used to attract leads to conversion. For each type of strategy and user, there is a material that works best. Let's explore them:

Blog Post ⏤ Social Media Post ⏤ Whitepaper ⏤ E-book ⏤ Guide ⏤ Newsletter ⏤ Infographic ⏤ Template ⏤ Checklist ⏤ Podcast ⏤ Webinar ⏤ Workshop ⏤ Video ⏤ Course ⏤ Class ⏤ Quizz ⏤ Challenge ⏤ Contest ⏤ Assessment ⏤ Consultancy ⏤ Analysis ⏤ Audit ⏤ Case Study ⏤ Success Story ⏤ Demo ⏤ Discount ⏤ Coupon ⏤ Promotion ⏤ Product Release ⏤ Free Trial ⏤ Free Sample ⏤ Free Version ⏤ Free Training ⏤ Free Tool

What are the key lead generation metrics?

Conversion metrics serve to understand the volume and quality of leads generated, conversion costs and the efficiency of marketing and sales strategies.

👉 Conversion Rate (CR)

Conversion rates are crucial metrics in your lead generation strategy. You can calculate this metric at different stages of the funnel, such as converting visitors into leads or leads into sales. For a more comprehensive view of the results, compare conversions by channel (e.g., Facebook Ads conversion vs. Google Ads conversion), campaign, ad, and keyword.

👉 Cost Per Lead (CPL)

Cost per lead helps you understand the health of a given channel and make informed decisions about your lead generation strategy. For example, if the cost per lead on LinkedIn Ads remains much higher than that on Facebook Ads for several months, it is worth directing more investment to the latter.

👉 Return On Investment (ROI)

ROI, or return on investment, complements other conversion metrics. If a company has a high CAC, for example, but a high average ticket, the return on the investment that was made to bring this customer can still be positive.

What are the key performance metrics?

Performance metrics help you understand the health of your paid media and conversion optimization strategies.

👉 Cost Per Click (CPC)

CPC is the amount charged for a click on your paid media ads. A high number of clicks reduces the CPC and means that the ad has received users' attention.

Other metrics, like conversion rate and cost per lead, help you understand whether these users are qualified and are, in fact, converting on the landing page.

👉 Core Web Vitals (CWV)

Core Web Vitals are Google metrics that evaluate the technical quality of a website based on three points:

• Largest Content Paint (LCP): Measures website performance and loading speed.
• First Input Delay (FID): Evaluates the interactivity of the page.
• Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS): Measures the visual stability of the page.

It may seem strange that these metrics appear here... but they are essential for optimizing your website experience and conversion.

What are the best tips?

Looking to enhance your lead generation strategy? Our leaders will guide you along the proven path.

• Have patience to learn: Although it has many similarities, the lead generation process will never be the same in two companies. If you are starting from scratch, be patient to identify the particularities of your market before slamming the hammer saying that a certain strategy does not work.
• Don't underestimate good copywriting: When creating a website or landing page, it is common to pay a lot of attention to the design and leave the content in the background. Don't be satisfied with the first version of your copy. True persuasive writing is about testing, testing, and more testing. And a well-thought-out copy validated with your audience can make all the difference in the conversion rate.
• Let your value proposition shine: The value proposition is a promise to be delivered, where the benefit that your company has to offer the customer. Having a well-constructed and well-presented value proposition (preferably on the home page or in the first fold of the LPs) makes it easier for the consumer to understand what type of problem you solve and why your brand is different from others.
• Remove friction points that hinder conversion: Sometimes the user is even interested in a product, but the conversion experience is so bad that they end up giving up. Long forms, confusing or incomplete information, confusing layout, payment with many steps, excessive pop-ups or advertising banners and even the famous "inbox price" can end up harming your lead generation efforts. Pay attention to avoid and remove friction points in your process.
• Optimize site speed: Users, as well as search engines, increasingly value page loading speed. A Google survey shows that 53% of mobile visitors abandon a website when it takes more than 3 seconds to load. Constantly analyze your website and optimize its speed to ensure that no conversions are lost because of a slow website.

Leadster: Conversational Marketing Platform and Chatbot

Get to know Leadster, a complete conversational marketing platform to increase lead generation on your website. Visit our website and learn more!