No-one can deny that to grow your business you need to consider how you attract new potential customers (or leads). It’s how you generate these leads that is important. Use the Lead Generation STEP as your easy to remember system:
Strategy
Target
Efficiency
Process
Strategy = your bigger picture plan. What are your long term goals for your business? Do you actually need many new clients or are you better off to sell more services to your existing clients? Are there better ways you can grow your business without chasing new customers? Document these goals in an annual plan that you update quarterly and refer to monthly.
Target = your target market or your ideal client. Your client selection criteria should not be that they need to have a heartbeat and a wallet. Who do you want to work with and what specific services do you want to offer them? Where do these future clients hang out in the greatest numbers?
Efficiency = how much does it cost you to generate a new enquiry or lead? For example, if you spend $500 on a radio campaign and get 2 leads, then your cost of each lead is $250. Or, if you spend $5,000 on advertising and marketing per annum and generate 100 new leads per year then each lead has cost you $50 (plus the time taken to generate these leads which is often much greater). There are bound to be much cheaper (and many free) ways to generate new leads – read on to get those ideas.
Process = the system and software you use to track the effectiveness of your marketing and sales activity. Having an up to date database is essential as is being able to get messages out to your target market in the most cost effective way. Your process should be used consistently across your team, should link with your website and give you easy to produce reports to help you track your efficiency and results.
Here are 10 ideas to generate new leads for free (or close to free):
Ask your existing clients for referrals
Have a referral reward system
Write newsletters / blogs / ebooks
Put content on your website that prospective clients can download for free (in return for giving you their contact details)
Be active on social media (with a focus on education not selling)
Create an on-line forum
Identify strategic partners that you can refer work to (they will want to return the favour by referring clients to you)
Speak at networking events
Ask customers to complete Google / Social media reviews
Book a complimentary meeting with us to share more ideas
So, if generating new leads is what you have in mind, use this Lead Generation STEP to make sure you get the best return on investment.