Inbound Marketing Blog

3 Ways To Help Small Business Get Leads From Social Media

If you’re wondering what the business value of social media is for small business or B2B – you're not alone, I hear this all the time from business owners.  The purpose of this blog article is to show you that social media is working and growing as a lead generation source and provide insight into how it fits into the overall lead-customer sales cycle.

Reviewing my analytics recently I noticed a consistent growth in traffic and leads from social media. Leads generated for my business represent 30% of my total leads.  After looking at  one of my client's analytics I noticed 70+% of their leads come from social media - they are B2B.  One of the reasons this client is doing so well, compared to others, is that they make the effort.  They follow the recommendations and best practices – are actively involved in groups, post regular updates and answer questions.

#marketingtakeaway – small business gets leads from social media.

And I'm sure you’re wondering...

• how do you generate leads from social media?
• are they quality leads?
• or how do you convert them into a customer?

First, let’s look at how to generate leads from social media.

1. Don’t use social media as a sales channel use it to build reach with your target audience, connect, engage and share. Share not only your own content but other people's valuable content too.
2. Create content that is of value to your target audience and share it via your blog, website and social media updates. Create lots of valuable information and share it for free before you ask for their personal contact details in return. This will help establish trust and credibility so that when you do promote something like an ebook or webinar your audience is more likely to convert.
3. Give your audience a compelling reason to give you their lead information, create a self help guide, this can be as simple as a two page pdf document, or more involved like an ebook or webinar.

This is a win/win situation for all. Your prospects (now leads) are happy because you helped them out with some valuable content and you’re happy because you now have their email address and can email them to sell your services – right? No! And this where many people get social media wrong – social media is not a sales platform.

Think about where this new lead is in the buying cycle. They’ve indicated a need and expressed some interest in your company and information. But chances are they don’t know enough about your company to take your sales call or hand over their credit card.   This is where you need to know the length of your sales cycle and what information a lead needs before they’re ready to buy.  What are the typical questions you, or your sales team get asked by prospects, what reservations do they have? Its important you address all this ‘important’ information through a series touch points (email, blog, social media) before getting them on the phone.  

Now you have your leads, you want to get them sales ready – to make sure you don’t miss out on next weeks blog – 5 ways to help small business nurture leads and get them sales ready. - subscribe via email or RSS – links are at the top. 

What do you think? Do you agree or disagee? Have you been successful on social media or not? Please share your thoughts and comments below.

Other articles you may also be interested in:

 

9 Tips To Increasing Leads From Your Landing Pages

Improve Lead Generation: How To Understand Your Prospects' Needs

Inbound Marketing For Lead Generation: Why, How and What To do