Many aspects and jargon used in today’s fast-paced business may be too alien for some. This is especially true for those who are too focused in running their business to the best they know how to learn new or faster ways to expand.
Take “lead magnet” for example. Even if you’re not exactly sure what it is, there is a good chance that you are familiar or implementing it in some form or another.
One perfect example we can cite is going to the grocery store. How many times have you seen sales representatives wanting you to try that slice of cheese, or a taste of a new brand of soda, or a sample of coffee? How about spritzers, wanting you to sample that new scent on your wrist?
What is a Lead Magnet?
In digital marketing, a similar concept, cited in the last paragraph above, is implemented. At its centre, you offer something of value in exchange for a prospect’s contact information. What you exchange for that information is a lead magnet.
Lead magnets compel site visitors to exchange information, such as their email address, for access. This can be a piece of content such as, white papers, newsletters, or eBooks, among many.
Other lead magnets you can exchange for customer information is a free product sample, a product demo, a trial subscription, or any other product or service-related incentive.
The challenge is, no one gives their email address or any contact information that easily. Lead magnets need to offer something of value in exchange for their opting in to receive messages from your brand in the future.
Why Lead Magnets are Important for Business Growth
The goal is not to trick or force a prospect into handing over their email. Your lead generator is the first step in establishing and building a relationship based on trust and respect, for an equitable exchange of value.
Think of your lead magnet as your number one salesperson every time a visitor comes to your site. This is an opportunity to provide something of value to someone who’s already on your website. So why not give them something that they can use and act on right there that might help them with that they are looking for – without talking to anyone or without any type of commitment to buy.
Why are lead magnets important? If you want to grow your business or expand your email list, then creating lead magnets helps a lot. Lead magnets are purposeful forms of content that show potential customers that you are knowledgeable, if not an expert, about your industry, and you have the solutions to their problems.
Lead magnets are crucial to building a targeted email list. It also gives potential customers a peek on what your business can deliver, and how it can help them.
What To Do Once You Have Leads?
Once you have leads, nurturing them by continuously delivering relevant content builds their relationship with your brand. Nurturing includes accessible, useful information relevant to your audience’s needs and interests. Understanding buyer profiles helps you better understand which types of relevant content that will fit your buyer personas.
By nurturing your leads, you establish trustworthiness with potential customers, which will reward you with more customer insights and conversion paths. By providing trustworthy information, it provides your nurtured brand relationship a highly competitive edge.
One thing you must understand is that most people don’t buy on the first opportunity. Business relationships are just as crucial as any human interaction. For this reason, it is highly uncomfortable to ask for someone’s contact information when you first get in touch with them, this is heightened if you don’t have anything of value to offer in return.
Therefore, it is crucial that you offer a low-commitment resource to enhance that relationship with a prospect. With a lead magnet, it will encourage visitors to give you their contact information and begin a relationship with your business.
Lead magnets can also become a crucial step in your marketing and sales process. If you have online courses to promote, you can use a webinar to sell it.
How Lead Magnets Can be Used in Service-Based Businesses
The first thing to consider before creating a lead magnet for a service-based business is to identify your target market’s most significant pain points, their wants, fears, or objections are when it comes to your type of services you offer.
You can then use these elements to create lead magnets that will resonate and stand out with your ideal clients. Service-based businesses offers intangible services to another company in the form of skills, amenities, and expertise.
Once you determine these elements, you can then move forward to designing a lead magnet that will work best for your type of service-based business.
It is a bit trickier for certain service-based industries to offer an effective lead magnet. For example: the clients of a lawyer or a law firm wouldn’t want tips on how to practice law. The clients of accountants wouldn’t want to learn how to do double-entry bookkeeping. It would be easier and efficient just to hire someone to do that for them.
Another example we can cite is if you are a business coach, consultant, or one that offer some type of specialist advice or training. Then a “checklist” would be a perfect lead magnet for your type of business.
There are ways to create a checklist that would lead your client to ask to learn more, such as, focusing only on what your client needs to do. You don’t need to deep-dive into details on how to do each step. That is what your services are there for.
Determine what’s keeping your client stuck, or what processes they do not know how to do or are time-consuming to do in-house. Providing a lead magnet, that could help them get unstuck, would be of great value to them.
Clients may know they have a pain point, but are not sure what that is specifically, then you can use an “assessment” or “consultation” as an attractive lead magnet. This type of lead magnet is effective for counselling, health, wellness, technical, accounting, or financial services. These are areas where you can sell your expertise through your lead magnet.
When clients have a lot of negative perceptions around your type of service-based industry, providing a “guide” lead magnet would work well. It works for clients who may not have much information about the type of services you provide or are fearful of hiring the wrong person or agency.
The guide you provide would be invaluable since you are giving them information that they need to know before deciding to engage your services. Visitors will not take much interest in your lead magnet if you fail to convince them that you are authentic and interested in sharing your expertise.
By adding real life examples such as, photos, videos, and testimonials can be highly effective in this case.
How Lead Magnets Can be Used in Product Based Businesses
The purpose of a lead magnet is to obtain contact information in exchange for something of value to the client. Additionally, it offers brands to intentionally build an email list of potential clients who are interested in your company and products.
Product-based brands know that in the chaotic world of online commerce, it is crucial to stand out and be intentional in their marketing efforts. This applies to their email marketing and list-building.
Like service-based businesses, there are a lot of lead magnet examples out there, but not all may be right for your business. Do consider your audience, but also consider the industry you operate in when selecting your lead magnets.
A way to position your product as a solution to a specific problem in your niche is to offer information. For example, if you are selling beauty products, highlighting a few fast facts about the benefits of using your products every day will do more to convert leads.
Regardless of the type of product-based business you are in, that is struggling to develop a content-rich lead magnet but does not want to rely on giving discounts, offering free shipping is a great option.
Not only does free shipping easy to provide, but it often does also not cost your company all that much. But for consumers, free shipping feels like a tremendous value. Online shoppers are four to five times more likely to buy if free shipping is offered. Like giving discounts or a free product giveaway, free shipping is a no-brainer to say yes to.
Get Started
There are a lot of lead magnets to choose from that would cater to both service and product-based businesses. The goal is to maximise the number of leads you get, for you to have more opportunities to connect with people interested in what you offer.
The best way to get started is to select lead magnets that would match your needs and goals and test its effect on your lead generation efforts. Adjust your offers until you find a version that generates for you the most leads.
The goal to increasing revenue is being able to nurture your leads so that you can effectively entice them to buy something or engage your services. You can also alternate between lead magnets if more than one works well.
We at The Growth Manager can be of service to you by helping you develop new ideas, strategies, and tactics with our 6-Session Business Development Program. We can work with you, not only with your lead generation efforts, but also to create strategies for increasing your annual revenue. Join us and let’s get started.
