Accelerating growth – how b2b companies can generate more quality leads (for real!)

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We all know how important lead generation is to help B2B sales teams achieve their goals.

The topic, however, is one of the subjects that generates the most heated discussions in marketing and sales teams.

But, whatever the position of each professional, the conclusion is the same:

IF THERE ARE NO LEADS, THERE ARE NO SALES.
And similarly, if the quality of the leads is questionable, the conversion rate will be terrible.

Good news: things don't have to be this way! (and they shouldn't be)

B2B marketers can start creating moves that increase student database the quality of these new leads, as well as their volume.

And in this article I will show you how you can attract qualified leads , build an environment of trust around them and ensure that your brand with a B2B focus, whether selling products or services, can have a solid sales funnel .

This way, you'll never have to lose sleep wondering how sales volume will upset you at the next company meeting, and you'll have a good predictable revenue stream .

These are some of the best ways B2B companies can generate leads and a surefire way to ensure that by the end of the quarter, both the marketing and sales teams can pop bottles of champagne together.

So without further ado, let’s move on….

Start by understanding your audience and their habits
Don't roll your eyes!

I know that planning is indeed a pain for most companies, and when you read a title like this you might think “here comes theory”. Calm down.

One of the first things any great B2B marketer does before launching any campaign is identify their target audience and learn everything they can about that group.

Identifying an audience in B2B is a little more difficult than working in situations aimed at the B2C segment.

Take a look:

When it comes to a B2C business, the purchasing decision is typically a much faster process, as a single person makes the decision.

For this reason, it is possible to understand the pain of this single person and focus the strategy on them.

Unfortunately, things aren’t that simple when we start thinking about a B2B audience.

For most customers in this segment, we won't be talking about a $30 or $40 t-shirt or a $10 phone case (unless we're talking about wholesale sales).

Most B2B transactions occur with larger average tickets and can be considered large sales.

The B2B footprint works like this:

In many cases, these purchases require buy-in from multiple hierarchical levels within a company.

Not only does a senior marketing professional need to sign off on a project, but their department, a VP of Purchasing, and a CTO all have input into the transaction.

So, in this case, determining EXACTLY who your audience is can be a challenge !

For this reason, account-based selling has become very popular among B2B companies, marketers, and sales professionals.

Account-based selling occurs when, instead of trying to sell to one individual within an organization, you deploy sales and marketing efforts across multiple touchpoints, multiple distinct channels, and coordinate it all through the use of data and technology.

For example, instead of focusing only on the CEO of a potential client, you also focus your efforts on the CMO, CFO and other professionals with decision-making powers in the company.

This way you are able to create a sales perspective from different points of the company .

That's why it's so important to keep track of these different points, understand how they work, and use the data to better understand what kind of content these people want, how they want to receive it, and to what extent they are or are not prepared for an approach.

This is the role of strategic internal information.

And this strategic data will help you better understand who you should focus on first.

First, you should look for who your best customers are:

Which customers see the most value in your products and services?
Which clients do you value most? (who pays well!)
Which customers does your team enjoy serving the most? (read the book The Ultimate Sales Machine !)
Which customers will close quickly and give you less work using your product and/or service?
Read also: Solopreneurs: Definition, Business Ideas and Action Plan
Create a list.

And after that, take this list and start looking for companies that are similar in these segments with similar size and practically the same problems.

It is through this data that you will be able to find your target audience and, once you do, it will be time to turn them into customers.

I sincerely believe in the equation:

CONTENT INTELLIGENCE + CONTENT PRODUCTION SKILLS = CONTENT EXCELLENCE

Most people don't take the time to understand what kind of content their audience really wants.

Few people spend enough time talking to their customers and understanding their pain points.

But it is in this exercise of intelligence that companies and marketing professionals can discover extremely valuable insights.

How to make B2B events count on content marketing
Most industries have a series of conferences and events that are packed with a specific target audience at the same place and time.

Common sense is that promotion at these events, by a brand, can only occur in four ways:

Speaking at conferences;
Sponsoring these events;
Placing booths, stands and the like at events;
Networking during these occasions.
Don't get me wrong:

All of these approaches can work.

In fact, I believe that public speaking is perhaps one of the most underrated ways to generate leads for B2B companies.

But I’m here today to tell you that these aren’t the only approaches. The best marketers understand that generating leads at conferences requires creativity and strategy. Here are a few simple ideas that can help you reach your audience at your next event without any of the above approaches.

Join Facebook groups created for these events

If you're going to an event with over a thousand people and are looking to generate leads, creating or joining a Facebook group can be a great way to connect with the right people.

You can use these groups to answer questions, share content, build relationships, and even schedule meetings and get-togethers, just like you do with your friends.

When searching for these groups, simply type the name of the event in question into the Facebook search bar and evaluate the results:

In the above search, we looked for Facebook groups related to a particular event. A quick search showed us both the “official” group for the event and communities created for previous versions of it.

When I joined the group, I discovered that there were already over a thousand people registered there. This group provides an opportunity to network and capitalize on existing contacts (even before the event itself). Here is a good example of an opportunity:

These groups allow contacts to be made prior to the event or even for other related events to be suggested.

Geolocation advertising
You know very well that the people you’re trying to reach out to will be attending a certain event, so why not try to pinpoint their location? Let’s say you have a bunch of potential B2B leads who are going to a conference near downtown Goiânia.

First, try searching on Google for the exact address of the conference or where it will take place.

Once you have determined the “pin” on the map, set a distance of a few kilometers from the point, in order to better reach your audience.

How to Make Geo-Targeted Ads Killer
Nobody likes to spend money just for the sake of it!

Therefore, it is recommended that you try to ensure that an ad will be as relevant as possible.

You know that a certain audience will attend an event, so instead of promoting your content in a vague and generic way, be specific.

By doing things this way, you can increase the odds that your ad will actually be clicked on by people who will be at that event, and one way to reinforce this even further is by referencing the event in the ad text itself.

You can, for example, use a template like this:



Are you going to attend [EVENT NAME]?

Our team will be there too! And we will give all participants a FREE version of our report on [TOPIC]!



This approach allows people who see the ad but don’t attend the conference to refrain from clicking “just for the sake of it” unless it’s really of interest.

Read also: Sales Techniques: Boosting Your Business Success
Create content focused on the B2B event
If you have thousands of people coming to a conference that is completely unknown to them, one of the easiest ways to create awareness is by generating quality content about the event and its venue.

Some of the best examples of content in this sense can be found today in the USA, and not by chance.

Various infographics, personalized videos, ping-pong interviews and other materials can sometimes create a larger audience for companies participating in the event than for the conference itself.

One of my favorite tactics is to create huge blog posts detailing all the speakers and presenters at a conference. Mind map infographics also work exceptionally well, like this example from my Mind Map for Creating Killer Ads .

In this case, the creators of the post started with a huge Excel list with names, titles and quotes from all the speakers at the event.

With the list developed, they began contacting the people on the list who they already knew, reaching out to others through introductions or mutual acquaintances.

Here is the email used by one of the creators when contacting speakers:

After this initial contact, he compiled responses and created the content for the previous link, which generated a huge response from the event's speakers and participants.

Drive social media engagement during B2B events
Most conferences these days have an associated hashtag that attendees use to engage. If you’re looking for ways to generate leads at events, take some time to engage with people through these hashtags.

The more you engage on social media, the more people will be willing to visit your profile to learn more about you and your business. A great way to capitalize on this is to use Twitter’s “pin” feature to point to downloadable content on your profile. To do this, when you create a new tweet, click on the arrow in the top right corner and click on the “pin” option on your profile.

When people start visiting your profile through other tweets, they will always come across this message at the top of your page.

An interesting tool for this type of tactic is Narrow.io. When you submit a conference hashtag to this tool, it will automatically “like” all tweets being shared that include that same hashtag.