6 Social Media Lead Generation Strategies You Should Watch Out For
Speak to almost any marketer, and they’ll tell you that social media is a great place to generate high-quality leads for most businesses.
However, the effectiveness of using social media networks for lead generation usually comes down to the techniques you adopt. That’s why two businesses from the same niche may experience vastly different results from their social media lead generation efforts.
In this article, we’ll share some of the best social media lead generation ideas and strategies that produce incredible results. We’ll tell you how to implement these strategies and show you some of the brands that are already taking advantage of the techniques.
Let’s get started.
1. Use Lead Generation Quizzes
A lead generation quiz is content designed to engage with your audience by asking questions. Lead quizzes are interactive tools with predetermined answers that guide participants to a specific outcome.
You can use personalized quizzes to generate qualified leads from your site visitors. Personalized questions will also allow you to determine attributes that will help you segment your email list so you can send relevant content.
If possible, use these questions to address conversations that are useful to your ideal customer.
In the example below, the B2B talent acquisition company Jobvite uses lead generation quizzes to gather leads for its email marketing activities.
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It’s more beneficial if you connect your quiz to something related to your products or services, for instance, you could create a product recommendation quiz tailored to their preferences. Also, remember to prompt users to enter their email addresses before viewing the quiz results.
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Like Jobvite, you should create awareness on social media channels like Facebook or Twitter so active users can engage with your quiz.
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Quiz generation tools like SurveyMonkey, Opinion Stage, Typeform, or others, have templates that you can use for engagement-encouraging content. Your lead generation quiz should be visually appealing because this can also improve the engagement rate of your quiz.
2. Use Targeted Ads with Special Offers
Statista reports that 37.9% of people purchase after viewing an online ad. Therefore, targeted ads can be effective social media lead generation tools for your business.
Use social marketing ads with special offers like discount codes, free deliveries, and giveaway deals to grow your online consumer base. Because social media users are very selective about the type of ads they click, you should have exciting offers that appeal to your ideal customer. See how Dropbox does this by offering a free 30-day trial.
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You should also create a landing page that captures your potential customers' email addresses. For a more effective social media ad, include a clear call to action like the above example. Another thing to pay attention to is the targeting options on various social platforms. Additionally, exploring strategies to reach Instagram growth can provide valuable insights for expanding your audience and optimizing engagement on this popular platform.
Facebook and Instagram allow you to target a specific audience based on demographics, interests, events, and devices they use. LinkedIn provides advanced targeting options like company size, revenue, name, and type. Twitter allows you to target based on conversations, keywords, events, and interests. With advertising on TikTok, you can target users through location, interests, and behavior.
The advanced targeting options vary across social channels, so the best thing is to use options that will help you reach your ideal customer.
3. Conduct Virtual Events
Virtual events will help nurture your audience through insightful content and conversations that benefit them. Holding events on social media is a strategic approach to brand building. It helps to expand your reach, establish your social media presence, and grow authority in your industry. Even better, they are effective for reaching potential leads.
When you want to hold a virtual event, the first thing you’ll do is to make your audience expectant. To achieve this, inform your social media community about the upcoming event—tell them what to expect and when it will happen. You can also send bulk emails to existing customers promoting the event.
For example, Apptentive uses LinkedIn to inform its social followers about an upcoming event in the image below.
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After building anticipation, you’ll want to ensure that potential attendees register for the event—this is where the initial lead generation happens. You could tell them to provide their email address so they’ll receive more information and get reminders about the event. Use a series of social posts to create buzz before the big day.
Make your virtual event appealing by inviting industry experts your audience would want to meet. You can use learnings from a previous event to create quality content that builds interest in the upcoming one.
You can also use brand collaborations to take your virtual events to the next level. The idea here is to identify another brand or a thought leader whose products complement yours. With the help of email look up tools, you can get their contact information and reach out to them for a potential collaboration. This is a great way to tap into other established audiences that mirror your ideal target customers.
4. Leverage Social Proof
Social proof is the backup you need to ensure your lead generation efforts get more conversion rates. Wyzowl reveals that reviews contribute to the buying decisions customers make.
Social proof works when:
- Users are uncertain about a product or service.
- They see recommendations from people similar to them.
- Experts give an opinion about your product or service.
- Many people like or share your content online.
Use your social media profile to share how consumers are benefiting from your products. You can adopt user-generated content like customer reviews, stories, and feedback. This builds your brand credibility and helps you bring leads even closer to a conversion.
Here’s an example from Airtable using customer stories and feedback to build credibility for their product.
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Apart from customer reviews, there are other ways you can build social proof around your brand with social content. Get recommendations from industry experts and leverage social media partnerships with relevant professionals. Reach out for celebrity shout-outs and collaborate with social media influencers to create a positive image for your brand.
If you run a business in the blockchain or crypto niche, it might be challenging to find the right influencers on your own. Make sure to work with a reliable nft influencer marketing agency that can find relevant influencers with engaged audiences.
5. Make Use of Sequential Retargeting
Use sequential retargeting to remarket your product or services through ads that focus on specific actions or user behaviors from the past. These ads can target people who engaged with a previous ad, bought a particular product, or interacted in other ways with the brand. As a result, you can get leads from various levels of your sales funnel through ads on social networks.
Also, Facebook allows you to set up targeted ads in a sequence. Here’s how it works: you can set up a series of ads so that people within your target audience see the ads in a specific order.
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In the above example, Airtable uses the Facebook ad sequence to promote an ad series tagged “This is how” that shows how the brand helps teams work better. It’s a creative way to share an engaging story that will capture qualified leads.
Facebook recommends using sequence ads for storytelling campaigns. That’s because the setup does not let you determine if users engage with the first ad before seeing the next one. But don’t worry. You can still attract potential customers by telling a compelling story and presenting valuable content.
6. Launch Referral-Based Campaigns
Organizing referral campaigns is a great marketing strategy for rewarding loyal customers. The program encourages your customers to say nice things about your brand and get rewards for their loyalty. They’ll tell friends and followers about your brand, which will help you acquire new customers. Typically, these customers use referral codes or links, so you can easily track the sales process.
Referral marketing campaigns work because they thrive on the trust generated by peer-to-peer recommendations. A study by Nielsen Global shows that 9 out of 10 customers trust recommendations from their peers. So, there’s an opportunity here for your brand.
You can use social media posts to promote your referral campaign. See how the B2B cloud accounting software FreeAgent makes this work.
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When you run a referral program, encourage your customers to post their referral links or codes with others. It’s always a good idea to add an incentive, so your customers are motivated to participate.
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FreeAgent offers a 10% discount for every referral that continues using the platform and a Free subscription if the customers refer ten people. Now that’s an exciting incentive.
Conclusion
Social platforms offer opportunities for building genuine relationships and more personal interactions with potential customers. You can and should use this to grow your customer base with relevant leads.
We’ve seen how lead generation quizzes, targeted ads, virtual events, social proof, retargeting, and referral social media campaigns can improve your social media lead generation. With these strategies, you could get better returns from your social media marketing efforts.
Add these lead generation tips to your social media content strategy and observe the growth that follows.
About the Author: Owen Baker is a content marketer for Voila Norbert, an online email verification tool. He has spent most of the last decade working online for a range of marketing companies. When he’s not busy writing, you can find him in the kitchen mastering new dishes.
