Every business, big or small, is guided by the ultimate premise of sales and revenue generation. These cannot be attained unless marketers ensure a steady inflow of qualified leads through the sales funnel. A lead is a prospect showing interest in the business’s offerings directly or indirectly. Since leads are familiar with the business, marketers find it far easier to connect, engage, and strike a rapport. The higher the number of qualified leads a business generates, the higher the sales and marketing ROI will be.
Digital Lead Generation for Service-Based Businesses
Digital lead generation is far more challenging and crucial for service-based business. They are not selling tangible products with specific dimensions, colours, or other predefined characteristics. So buyers cannot research and examine them before purchasing. Providing and availing services (B2B or B2C) is a highly subjective and experiential realm. Therefore, service-centric businesses need to foster exceptional brand recognition and credibility. Only by displaying trustworthiness and industry insight can they convince customers to try and avail of their services. An outstanding online presence and flawless reputation across digital platforms are necessary to solicit contact details, and garner high-value leads.
Strategy 1: Providing Free Service Previews
- Unlike products, it is not possible to check services before the purchase. It becomes a challenge to promote them and urge clients to give them a try for lesser-known and upcoming brands.
- The only viable solution to this problem is to provide free consultation sessions to qualified prospects. A preview of the service can be rendered in this session to showcase the efficiency and commitment levels of the business.
- Businesses must ensure that they define their ICP beforehand. Only prospects that strictly match all ICP traits should be provided with these free consultations for maximum ROI. It also helps in compiling a contacts database of qualified leads.
- It enables businesses to showcase their mettle and build trust, thus gaining client confidence. The crux is to provide a free solution to a minor problem. It will convince prospects that the team is well-equipped to provide apt solutions for bigger pain points.
Strategy 2: Hosting Online Events
- The first strategy of one-to-one free consultation sessions can be quite effective for highly selective targeting and account-based marketing. However, to reach out to a wider target audience, an alternative strategy is necessary.
- Regularly hosting conventional corporate events (seminars, exhibitions, and conferences) is highly expensive and difficult for most businesses. However, hosting online events on digital platforms today incurs negligible costs. When promoted well, these digital events can bring voluminous leads and help build the brand.
- A simple PowerPoint presentation on well-researched industry content can engage the target audience and amplify organic queries. Decent internet connectivity and a free live-streaming platform are all it requires.
- Start-ups can collaborate with industry influencers or established businesses that are not competitors to amplify the reach of these events.
Strategy 3: Crafting Lead Magnets on Common Queries
- Marketers can directly interact with their target audience by conducting personalised sessions and digital events and digital events. They get to know about the most common queries and concerns of prospects.
- A standard practice in digital lead generation is providing visitors with free resources in exchange for contact details. These freebies are known as lead magnets. These include e-books, online tools, whitepapers, market research reports, etc.
- Service-based business must emphasise tailoring these lead magnets to address the most common FAQs of prospects directly. Providing practical solutions for the most pressing problems of potential clients will win their trust. They will look up to the brand, and their probability of opting for paid services will exponentially increase.
- The biggest advantage of using lead magnets is the low cost and convenience. Once uploaded to the relevant landing pages, contact details get collected automatically.
Conclusion
The biggest challenge faced by marketers in the service industry is to ensure substantial lead generation. Hosting engaging/informative online events, providing free trials, and uploading the right lead magnets are effective solutions. Building a highly positive and noteworthy online presence is equally important. Businesses can always avail the professional assistance of digital marketing agencies and b2b data providers for quick lead generation.
Apart from this, if you want to know about Lead Generation Using AI: The Future of Marketing then please visit our Business category
