Generating Lower Cost Leads With Social Media

Transcription

1 Generating Lower Cost Leads With Social Media Kipp Bodnar Hubspot Christine Whittemore Simple Marketing Now MarketingProfs B2B Forum Boston Introductions Christine (CB) Whittemore Chief Simplifier, Simple Marketing Now cbwhittemore@simplemarketingnow.com Blog: SimpleMarketingBlog.com Kipp Bodnar Inbound Marketer, Hubspot kbodnar@hubspot.com Blog: Blog.HubSpot.com 1

2 Does This Sound Familiar? My local reputation keeps my door swinging. I am totally clueless how to attract new biz and am afraid to spend money on traditional media b/c I cannot afford not to have an ROI. Social media makes sense to me but I cannot find the time to do it well. Anonymous 2

3 And This? Lead generation is difficult to track. Often customers don't remember how they originally came across your company and often [what they] cite is not correct. Bill Buyok Owner, Avente Tile How About This? The challenge, especially for smaller companies, is measuring the results from social media activities. For example, if an individual clicks through to our website from a tweet and buys something, that s easy to measure. But in most B2B situations, differentiation on features, complex sales cycles, multiple decision-makers, significant service component means this typically doesn t apply. In B2B outreach, if John Doe is influenced to buy from us based on a blog post or a tweet but completes the purchase through another unrelated channel there s no easy way to assign the value of that sale to our social media outreach. Valerie Fritz VP Marketing RTLS Division TeleTracking 3

4 How Do You Generate Leads? Most Effective Lead Sources Referrals Organic Search Trade Shows Networking Events Advertising Demonstration Paid Search Direct Mail Free Trial ebook Download Live Webinar Social Media For Lead Generation Most Effective Facebook LinkedIn Blogs Twitter YouTube Flickr Social Bookmarking Lead Source 4

5 The 5 Steps of Social Media Lead Generation Step 1: Get The Basics Right Step 2: Maximize Content Discovery Step 3: Create Conversion Ubiquity Step 4: Test and Fail Fast Step 5: Optimize For Maximum Lead Flow 5

6 Case Study Content Marketing Institute 6

7 CMI s Goal Get an address to start the relationship! Image source: 7

8 A CMI Case Study A CMI Offer 8

9 CMI Landing Page CMI s Lead Generation Flow Become Readers of CMI content At least 6 months Subscribe to other content products 3 or more Easy conversion Contact form, , Twitter 9

10 Calls To Action From CMI Recent Post 10

11 Maximize Reach, Discovery Twitter Facebook LinkedIn Contact Us Daily 11

12 Weekly CMI Results Traffic: 40,000+ visits/month Leads: 30 to 50 signups per day Revenue: 2011: up 300%+ 12

13 CMI s Advice For Generating Leads Find a niche where you can be the leading expert in the world, and then think of yourself like the trade magazine for that niche and cover the market. Pam Kozelka Content Marketing Institute Social Media Advertising Advice LinkedIn & Facebook ads: Strong calls to action Personalize AMAP: by region or job title specifically Fresh, simple, social 13

14 Case Study 14

15 Lead Generation Flow Daily blog content Pushed out through social media Higher value content How-to articles Case studies behind lead-generation forms Confirmation Lead nurturing series Paid sources 5 part series Don t annoy! 15

16 Content Reach & Discovery Free Whitepapers 16

17 Measure, Adjust, Prioritize Leads flow automatically into CRM Number of leads captured Ratio of leads to sales Average value of sales Average return-on-investment Source: MarketingSherpa - Content Marketing: Inbound strategy pulls in 25% more revenue, 70% more leads Results Since Early 2010 Higher quality leads vs. paid sources Increased sales 25-40% increase in revenue per quarter ~ 2x average annual revenue per account 70% increase in inbound leads 20% increase in website traffic Source: MarketingSherpa - Content Marketing: Inbound strategy pulls in 25% more revenue, 70% more leads 17

18 How To Implement 5 Steps of Social Media Lead Generation 18

19 The Magalog Guy 19

20 People Learn in Different Ways Variety of content formats available Magalog Blog Sample Magalogs Book download Podcasts Free resources Content confirms expertise Blog builds traffic Two Extreme Lead Paths Immediate need Referral or WOM Longer term Build trust Express personality Critical to have good fit with lead Phone consultation 20

21 Calls To Action Blog or podcast subscription Free marketing resources Free 130 page book: lead gen form Free phone consultation 21

22 Social Media To show personality Blog & podcasts Facebook LinkedIn Q&A - RSS feed Twitter Promote articles Benefit from search Monitor keywords Magalog Guy s Advice: The tempting siren song with social media is that you can reach everyone. But we know "everyone" should never be your target market. You need to be clear about your ideal prospects, then keep pushing out a message that resonates with them with the intent on having a two-way conversation. Non-business people on social media find each other when they're interested in a similar topic Yet in business, we sometimes fail to carry that over into our connections with prospects. It becomes a one-way conversation instead of the natural progression of friends who came together over a similar interest and then build on that interest over time... 22

23 Avente Tile Online tile retailer B2B, B2C Social tools Be human Build trust Add context to products 23

24 Avente Tile s Offers Subscribe to enewsletter Subscribe to Blog Call or Contact 24

25 Lead Generation Process Targeted keyword-specific blog content Promoted via social media Twitter Facebook Contact Lead form Phone call Twitter DM Twitter Chats to Connect with Designers Search Terms B2B Leads Guest posts 25

26 Referrals To Website Avente Tile Talk Blog: 32% visits, pages/visit, 36.43% bounce Because of the Blog: This Old House: 7% visits, pages/visit, 30.71% bounce Houzz.com: 4% visits, pages/visit, 26.21% bounce Hootsuite: 3% visits, pages/visit, 23.21% bounce KitchenAndResidentialDesign.com: 1% visits, pages/visit, 18.18% bounce 26

27 Detailing Website Events Detailing Blog Events 27

28 Blog Social Sources 35% referrals from Google Images Check your <alt> tags! 28

29 Awarepoint Healthcare IT company Enterprise awareness solutions for hospitals Long lead times Complex sale Launched Awarepoint Blog February 2010 Establish thought-leadership Broaden awareness Awarepoint Lead Generation In-person sales team Demonstrations Trade shows Traditional marketing tools White papers Case studies Brochures Presentations at conferences Repurpose Place into greater healthcare context Promote via Social channels 29

30 Calls To Action Free case studies Learn more: blog posts Subscribe to blog Demonstration Lead form Impact Analysis Meeting Lead form 30

31 Results: Influence the Influencers Raise awareness Beyond healthcare IT stakeholders Part of solution for better healthcare Participate in greater industry discussions Lean healthcare Prevent MRCA New source of traffic 9k visits, 56% new, 1/3 from search 31

32 Social Sources of Blog Traffic Facebook 12% visits, 1.56 pages/visit, 76.19% bounce LinkedIn 7% visits, 1.66 pages/visit, 72.04% bounce Twitter 3% visits, 1.62 pages/visit, 65.38% bounce 2/27/10-2/27/11 Social Visibility RightHealth.com 1.29 pages/visit, 71.43% bounce rate TheRTLSBlog.com 1.54 pages/visit, 53.85% bounce RFIDSolutionsOnline.com 1.88 pages/visit, 62.50% bounce FierceHealthcare.com 1.33 pages/visit, 33.33% bounce 32

33 The Healthcare Community The competition! As of 3/10/11 33

34 Final Thoughts * Tools You Need! A blog for great content Think like a publisher Social networks to share content Analytics to monitor performance Goals, custom URLs Alerts to monitor conversations Landing Pages to capture lead information CRM to track leads SalesForce.com, SugarCRM for lead nurturing Emma, ChimpMail, 34

35 Tools To Track Results What Makes Calls To Action Effective? Meaningful to prospects Top of Funnel Middle of Funnel Bottom of Funnel Image source: 35

36 What About Testing? Resources Mashable: HOW TO: Use Social Media for Lead Generation Social Media Examiner: Startup Company Eliminates the Cold Call with Twitter Kipp Bodnar: 7 Steps to Building A B2B Social Media Lead Generation Pipeline Slideshare/Hubspot: How to Use Social Media for Lead Generation 36

37 Contact Us! Christine (CB) Whittemore Chief Simplifier, Simple Marketing Now Blog: SimpleMarketingBlog.com Kipp Bodnar Inbound Marketer, Hubspot Blog: Blog.HubSpot.com 37