4 Ways to Get Cheaper Leads
Generating leads is a crucial part of running a business. Because, hey, without any leads, there aren’t any customers.
But generating leads costs money, and even though the cost of lead gen is a necessary business expense, you want to keep it low, right?
So how are you supposed to do that? Especially when you consider the fact that cheap lead gen options usually lead to cheap leads — who don’t often turn into customers.
On the other hand, investing a little bit of money into a good lead gen effort might result in some higher-spending customers.
Here are four ways to reduce lead gen cost.
Before You Start…
Here’s a question you should ask yourself when you’re working on your next lead gen campaign: Are you going to collect information through your website, or are you going to collect it directly through Facebook? There are pros and cons to each method.
The first method entails directing all traffic to your website, where your leads can fill out a form to receive your offer. The second option is to have them fill out a form directly on Facebook.
As you can probably guess, the second option tends to get more leads because it’s an easier, more straightforward experience. But just because you get a lot of leads doesn’t mean those leads are going to go anywhere. In fact, the easier it is to take advantage of your lead gen offer, the more not-so-serious leads you’re going to get.
On the other hand, a lead is probably much more serious if they take the time to click through to your site, wait for the page to load, navigate their way to your form, and fill out their information. Somebody jumping through those hoops is much more likely to be genuinely interested in what you do — and more likely to become a customer.
But Facebook wants to send you good leads. So as a way of improving the way it does things, Facebook introduced conversion leads, where traffic still goes to a form on Facebook, but you then send data from your sales funnel back to Facebook. This lets Facebook understand the quality of its leads and target the right people. Facebook now understands which of its users are likely to click an email, watch a video, attend an event, or take advantage of some other kind of offer.
So, with this understanding of your options when it comes to capturing leads, let’s take a look at four ways you can get the most out of your lead gen efforts.
1. Be open to trying any kind of lead gen offer.
This might seem obvious, but give it a try. You’d be surprised by what kind of offer attracts the most leads, or which offer converts the most leads to customers.
A brand with smart marketing will always have multiple lead gen offers so it can compare the effectiveness of one to the others.
Put together a quiz, webinar, PDF, videos, or even an application to a phone call. Don’t just focus on the lead gens that have the lowest cost — remember to focus on the ones that offer the greatest ROI.
2. Be direct about what you’re selling.
If you think being vague will get the curiosity of a wide range of people, you’re going to run into problems. There’s too much competition online, and people want to know exactly what they’re getting into.
Trim any fluffy language or digressions, and instead get straight to the point: What is your product or service going to do for them?
Remember to focus on the end result rather than the process. For example, if you’re selling a weight-loss methodology, you know that people want to hear they’re going to be in shape in time for summer (end result) rather than hearing they are going to lose weight (process).
3. Focus on the lifetime value of each customer.
Remember that the best customers are customers for life — the ones you can keep selling to over and over again.
So, it can sometimes be hard to judge a lead gen’s success based on a customer’s first purchase. You’d rather have somebody who consistently returns to you than somebody who spends a moderate amount of money and moves on, right?
Focus on how you can extend special offers beyond the lead generation stage. If you’re a wedding photographer, you know your relationship with your customer doesn’t end after you shoot their wedding. You could follow up with offers of prints or albums to increase your sales. You also might score gigs with this couple later when they need family portraits done every year.
4. Don’t forget about PR.
Lead gen campaigns give your target audience a reason to connect with you, but these campaigns can’t do all the work themselves. A strong PR strategy will ensure your brand has the visibility, recognizability, and reputation it needs to win people over when they are exposed to your lead gen.
Think about it this way: You see an offer from a brand you’ve never heard of before and a brand you recognize instantly. If the offers are equal, which one are you going to go for?
People will always choose the brand that’s more reputable!
Lead gen is all about strategy, and it’s easy to overthink it (or maybe even underthink it) when it’s your business and you’re so close to what you do. Our team of marketing experts is here waiting to help — and we want you to maximize every advertising dollar you spend. Reach out to us today to book a free discovery call.
