How to Use Inbound Marketing for Lead Generation

If you want to generate quality leads, you should be using inbound marketing. Inbound marketing is a subtler approach that puts the decision in the hands of the consumer. It allows you to generate high-quality web traffic that has the potential to convert into leads for your business.  

Inbound marketing for lead generation involves:

  • Using content and SEO to increase website traffic
  • Providing a positive website experience
  • Offering value to consumers
  • Using CTAs, sales funnels, and forms to get leads

By using inbound marketing to optimize each of these areas, you will be able to generate more leads for your business. Keep reading to learn how you can begin implementing inbound marketing for lead generation today.

How Does Inbound Marketing Work for Lead Generation?

Inbound marketing aims to maximize three key areas that are beneficial for driving traffic to your website. These key areas are:

  • Content
  • SEO
  • Social media

By optimizing your marketing strategies in these areas, you can organically generate more website traffic that has the potential to convert into leads.

Content

Inbound marketing uses content strategies that bring in new website visitors who align with your target market. Inbound content strategies aim to provide quality content that consumers will find useful during the buying process. By providing useful content, you will gain brand awareness and consumers will begin to see your brand as a knowledgeable resource in your field.

Through informative blog posts and other valuable web content, you can ultimately gain consumer trust and generate interest in your products or services. Once you develop interest, it creates a natural sales funnel that helps you convert web traffic into leads.   

SEO

Search engine optimization (SEO) strategies can be leveraged as part of your inbound marketing efforts. SEO will help you target keywords that are relevant to your target audience and rank high in search results.

By targeting the right keywords, you can create highly relevant blog content and web pages based on consumer needs. This increases the likelihood that your target customers will find your website when they are searching for information related to products or services your company offers.  

When someone finds your website through search, it’s important to provide a positive experience that offers value. Viewers who find your website through search and have a good experience will be much more likely to convert into leads.

Social Media

Social media can also be used as part of your inbound marketing strategy. Consumers who discover your brand through social media may become interested in the products or services you offer and want to know more. This is how social media can help you generate leads and turn followers into paying customers.

When optimizing your social media, it’s important to project the right image and target an audience that will be interested in your products or services. By providing the right image along with high quality social media content, you will have a higher chance of consumers discovering your social media accounts and going to your website to learn more.

Benefits of Inbound Marketing for Lead Generation

If you choose to optimize your inbound marketing strategies for lead generation, you will see many benefits.

A Cost-Effective Marketing Strategy

Inbound marketing is a cost-effective strategy. The Content Marketing Institute states that inbound marketing is 62% cheaper and generates three times as many leads compared to outbound marketing. This shows that inbound marketing strategies are very effective for lead generation, and you will get additional return on investment compared to other strategies.

High-Quality Leads for Your Business

Inbound marketing is an organic web traffic approach that puts the decision in the consumer’s hands. By doing this, the leads you generate through inbound marketing will have a higher potential to convert into paying customers.

Increased Brand Awareness

Inbound marketing will help increase your website traffic which will improve overall brand awareness. If you provide useful information to consumers, they will be much more likely to remember your brand. Even if someone comes across your content and doesn’t convert, they are still likely to remember your brand name and there is a much higher chance they become a paying customer in the future.

Maximized Sales Funnels

Inbound marketing will maximize the sales funnels used on your website. Sales funnels are useful during the buyer’s journey to help them through each step as they make a purchasing decision.

Through inbound marketing you can create targeted content that helps the customer at every stage of the decision-making process. By doing this, you become a reliable source of information for consumers. Once you have consumers on your website, you can use well-timed calls to action to generate leads and paying customers.

Nurturing Leads

Inbound marketing helps with nurturing leads. Nurturing leads involves purposefully engaging your target audience, offering useful information, making the buying process a positive experience, and being there to offer support along the way.

Studies have shown that nurtured leads are more likely to convert. According to Marketo, nurtured leads result in 50% more sales and cost 33% less than leads that aren’t nurtured.

Creating purposeful content, a positive website experience, and being a reliable source during the buyer’s journey can all be ways you can nurture leads through inbound marketing. This creates high-quality leads that will be more likely to purchase from your company.

How to Convert Inbound Traffic into Leads

Once you begin to drive inbound traffic to your website, it’s important to know how to turn these new website visitors into leads. To maximize your lead generation strategy, you must:

  • Gain attention
  • Optimize landing pages
  • Provide well-timed calls to action
  • Use forms

By improving each of these areas, you will be able to generate traffic that turns into high-quality leads.

Gain Attention

The first step is getting the attention of your target audience. This is where you will utilize web content, SEO, and social media content to generate website traffic. By providing relevant content that captures attention, you will get more website visitors that will want to learn more about your brand.

Optimize Landing Pages

A well-designed landing page will generate more leads. Consumers make up their mind about a website very quickly. This means your website must be both visually appealing and user friendly from the moment someone reaches a landing page. If your web pages don’t load fast enough or don’t provide the information that viewers are looking for, they will leave.

Provide Well-Timed Calls to Action

When you are trying to generate more leads, a well-timed call to action (CTA) is critical. You must provide a CTA to inform website visitors of an action you would like them to take. You can maximize your CTAs by offering something that is useful to the consumer or beneficial to the buyer’s journey. If you make a compelling offer, web visitors will be much more likely to use signup forms or take a specific action.  

Use Forms

Providing forms on landing pages is a good idea to get viewers to sign up for email lists, special offers, or to get in touch for more information. Aim to make your forms as user-friendly as possible while still providing any necessary information. By optimizing forms, you will be much more likely to convert web page viewers into leads.

Best Practices for Inbound Marketing Lead Generation

To enhance your inbound marketing strategies for lead generation, you can use the following best practices.

Avoid Annoying Pop-Ups on Web Pages

Nobody likes it when you click on a website and the first thing that happens is an ad pops up that asks you to sign up to receive emails or take some sort of action before ever seeing the website content. In fact, according to HubSpot, 81% of people will often leave a website that uses pop-up ads.

Pop-up ads feel spammy and can detract from your brand image. If you want to generate leads from inbound marketing, you should aim to avoid advertising tactics that will cause people to have a bad experience or leave your website.

Consider the End Goal

You must consider the end goal first before creating content. If your main goal is to generate leads, you should focus on content strategies that will help you achieve that objective.

By focusing your content on generating leads you will be able to create more effective content for that purpose. The right content will create consumer interest and a natural sales funnel that leads website viewers to taking a targeted action.  

Create a Connection

When using inbound marketing strategies for lead generation, it’s important to create a connection. By posting relevant content that is beneficial to consumers, you will already be on the right track to creating better relationships with potential customers. Other ways you can create a connection include:

  • Address questions/concerns: If you notice questions or concerns arising that are related to your business, you should do your best to address this. By addressing questions or concerns you will be able to show your company cares.
  • Put passion into your content: When you’re passionate about the content you create, that will shine through to those who view it. Putting your passion into content will help you create content that is compelling and connects with others.
  • Share your values/mission statement: Sharing your mission statement and the values that your company holds can be a good way to connect with consumers. Those who believe in your brand’s mission will be much more likely to turn into leads and paying customers.
  • Speak to your audience: When you are creating content, it’s important that it feels like you are speaking directly to your audience. This will help those who read it feel more engaged with what you’re saying.

By creating a connection, you will be able to get the most out of your inbound lead generation strategy.

Know Your Audience

When you create content, it’s important to know your audience. Think about the common questions or problems that your target audience may have and create content that covers these topics. By understanding your audience, you can create content that speaks to them and is beneficial for their needs.

Offer Value First

When using inbound traffic for lead generation, it’s important to offer value first before trying to get people to use your signup forms or take a specific action. Think of it like offering someone a drink when they enter your home. You should offer viewers something of value when they enter your website. Once you provide value, your CTA to use your form or take an action will be much more effective.

Provide What Was Promised

When someone goes to your website, you must provide the content, information, or offer that was promised. Consumers who don’t find your content useful based on what they were searching for will exit your website, creating a high bounce rate. A high bounce rate can lead to ranking lower on search results, and it often means you aren’t targeting content correctly or your website viewers are having a poor experience.

Quality Customer Service

Offering quality customer service is an essential business practice no matter what your goals are. If you want to generate leads that convert into loyal paying customers, you must provide customer service.

Make sure your website visitors know how to get in touch or where they can find customer service resources. When questions or concerns come up, be there to help your customers every step of the way. By providing excellent service, you will be able to increase satisfaction with your brand that results in positive word of mouth advertising.

Word of mouth advertising alone can go a long way to getting more website traffic and generating more leads. Those who hear positive things about your brand will be much more likely to convert into paying customers themselves.

Conclusion

Inbound marketing is a subtler approach to lead generation. By focusing on inbound traffic, it allows your target audience to find your website on their own. By implementing these tips, you can successfully begin using inbound marketing for lead generation.

Pierce Reiten
Pierce Reiten

Helping businesses increase sales and build a reputable brand image through SEO, quality website content, and creating a powerful content strategy. Contact me to learn more about how I can help you!

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