Lead Generation Tools for Small Businesses

You must do everything possible to generate leads online as a business owner. Luckily, if you use the right lead generation tools for small businesses, this won't be as hard as you might expect. Here are thirteen tried and true digital marketing tips that can help you attract new customers.

1. Improve Your General and Local Search Rankings

Outranking your competitors in the search results can make it far easier to gather leads on the web. Not only will this ensure that thousands see your brand, but it can also attract potential customers in your local community. Here are a few tips that can dramatically improve the rankings of just about any brand:

Pick the Right Keywords

People will type your chosen keywords into a search engine to reach your website. Thus, choosing words and/or phrases directly relevant to your offer is essential. Additionally, you should ensure that some of them include the name of your city, county, or broader geographic region. That's because this will optimize your local search rankings.

Optimize Your Keyword Density

It's usually best to keep your keyword density between 1-3%. This will optimize your rankings, but the keyword density won't be high enough to get your site pulled from the search results. However, you'll still need to ensure that these words and phrases are worked into the content smoothly.

Ensure That Your Website is Mobile-Friendly

It's important to ensure that your content is optimized for devices that have small screens. In addition, an average smartphone typically won't be able to handle certain video scripts, such as JavaScript. So, it's best not to use these scripts on your website. Overall, the best way to determine whether or not your site is mobile-friendly or not is to take a look at it with a mobile device of your own.

Use Marketing Automation to Improve Your Rankings

Not only can marketing automation tools help you attract customers, but they can also improve your rankings. Here are a few automated lead generation tools for small businesses that want to improve their search rankings.

1. HubSpot
2. MailChimp
3. Campaigner
   

2. Pay Close Attention to Your Brand's Presence on Social Media

Social media marketing can be exceptionally effective for small business owners. However, it's important to pick the right ones for your brand. Here are a few tips that can help you choose the right social media sites for your small business:

1. Make sure that you respond to social media posts immediately. This will help to ensure that your target audience stays engaged, which will make it easier to attract potential customers.
2. Ensure that your posts are tailored to the unique needs of your audience.
3. Always post content that's actionable for your target audience. Make sure that people who visit your site will be able to learn something useful from every post.
   

3. Use the Right Email Marketing Strategies

While many business owners erroneously assume that email marketing is ineffective, this is not true. Cold emailing can help you attract customers, but sending out bulk emails can also improve brand loyalty. Here's how you can effectively make use of each of these strategies:

Cold Email Marketing

It's important to realize that you cannot send out bulk, unsolicited messages via email. This is considered a violation of the CAN-SPAM act, which can lead to significant fines. However, it is possible to send out cold emails individually, and this can be an effective B2B lead generation technique. Here are a few tips that can help you create the right cold emails for your unique brand:

1. You can help your sales team find the right people to reach out to by analyzing your brand's social media engagement.
2. Make sure that you keep a real-time log of all responses to emails that you receive.
3. Always include a call to action in your messages to potential customers.
   

Bulk Emails to Subscribers

Not only can bulk emails help you attract potential customers, but they also can improve brand loyalty and increase interest in new products. Many experts feel that email marketing is one of the best lead generation tools for small businesses. Here are a few tips that can help you create effective bulk emails:

1. A reputable CRM software provider can send out these promotional messages automatically.
2. Choose digital marketing software that makes it easy to find past promotional emails you sent. This will ensure that you can easily update your email marketing strategies.
3. Make sure that you read plenty of online reviews of any email marketing automation service that you're considering.
   

4. Use Automation Software

Automation software can allow you to streamline your digital marketing efforts. Here are a few examples of ways that you can utilize digital marketing automation as a small business owner:

1. Use automation programs to send out numerous SMS messages and emails to subscribers.
2. Use automated grammar checkers to ensure that all of the content your company posts is properly written.
   

5. Offer Convenient Customer Service

It's important to offer convenient online customer support consistently. Here are a few tips that can help you do this effectively:

1. Chat boxes can make it easy to offer effective customer support over the internet. Many software programs can make it possible to integrate this feature into your website, such as Live Agent, LiveZilla, Rocketbots, Crisp.Chat, and ZenDesk.
2. Sometimes, you might want to offer your customers an opportunity to talk to a representative via video chat.
3. Always respond to emails within 1-2 business days.
   

6. Pay Per Click (PPC) Advertising

Pay-per-click (PPC) advertising is a great way to attract many customers online quickly. In addition, you won't need to pay unless you've created effective sales pipelines for your brand. That's because you'll only be charged whenever someone clicks on one of your ads, and the advertisements can be placed above the search results or on the side of a webpage.

You should always focus on the imagery in your brand's PPC ads. That's because these advertisements are fairly small; you won't be able to write much text. Luckily, these three simple tips can help you pick the right images for your brand's PPC ads:

1. Try to include eye-catching imagery of products that you sell.
2. Post images of your employees performing services that your company offers.
3. Ensure that the images you include in your PPC ads feature vibrant colors that attract the attention of potential customers.
4. If possible, use video marketing to improve the effectiveness of your pay-per-click ads. These videos should help people better understand what your products offer.
   

7. Improve Your Backlink Strategy

An effective backlink strategy can increase interest in your products, and it can even improve your search rankings. As a result, these links could dramatically improve the effectiveness of your company's site. Here are five ways that you can improve your brand's backlink strategy.

1. Try to post your backlinks on high-traffic websites. This will significantly improve their effectiveness.
2. You might want to consider posting backlinks along with promotional YouTube videos. This could direct thousands of potential customers to your website.
3. If your competitors have a more effective backlink gathering strategy than your business, you might want to adopt some of the same strategies they use.
   

8. Create Effective Blog and Forum Posts

Blog and forum posts can allow you to reach out to many people online. However, it's essential to ensure that the messages you post are relevant to what your brand offers. In addition, you should always include contact information in promotional blogs and forum posts. Here are a few tips that can help you qualify leads on forums and blogs:

1. Use a Chrome Extension to check the grammar of your posts. This will help to ensure that they're properly written.
2. Create a sales funnel by creating a series of blog posts and/or forums.
3. Try to tell an engaging story with some of your brand's posts on blogs, forums, and social media outlets. For instance, describing how the products or services you offer helped an individual customer could be an effective way to reach out to your target audience.
4. It's important to make sure that you take steps to ensure that your business does not face some of the most common problems with blogging, such as lack of knowledge or a small target audience.
   

9. Harness the Power of Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing can be an effective advertising tool for any brand, which is certainly true in 2022. Here are a few tips that can optimize the effectiveness of your company's affiliate marketing strategy:

1. Realize that you get what you pay for when it comes to affiliate marketing services. So, paying a higher commission could be well worth it.
2. Amazon and many other e-commerce sites offer affiliate marketing services for sellers. So, you might want to consider listing products on these platforms.
3. Compare the fees of different affiliate marketing services. In most cases, the commission you'll pay will be between 5 and 10%. However, this varies significantly from one affiliate marketing service to another.
   

10. Use a Refer-a-Friend Program to Grow Your Brand

Not only can refer-a-friend programs increase website visitors for your brand, but they can also increase the number of customers you get. Here are a few tips to help you create an effective referral program:

1. Ensure that the referral bonus you offer is proportional to the cost of your products or services. Sometimes, it's better to offer a referral bonus as a percentage of purchases instead of a specific monetary amount. This is typically a better strategy for business owners who sell high-value products.
2. Make sure that you track the results of your affiliate marketing program. Luckily, numerous digital marketing software programs can make this much easier.
   

11. Use Influencer Marketing to Grow Your Business

Influencer marketing is a great way to reach out to your target audience. You can use this strategy on social media, YouTube, other video streaming platforms, forums, blogs, and digital marketing channels. These five simple tips can improve the effectiveness of almost any influencer marketing strategy:

1. Find influencers that are well-known in your geographical region. This can sometimes be a more effective way of reaching out to your target audience than choosing famous influencers throughout the country.
2. If possible, try to find popular influencers among your unique audience.
   

12. Make Use of Lead Generation Apps for Small Business Owners

Luckily, there are many lead generation apps on the market that are designed to help small business owners grow their brands. These apps are designed for Android, iPhone, Windows, and other operating systems. Here are a few of the best ones on the market today:

1. Boomerang: If you're looking for a lead generation app to help you send promotional emails, Boomerang is one of the best options on the market. In addition, it offers affordable prices, which makes it attractive for small business owners.
2. Find That Lead: Find That Lead can help you find contact information for employees of a certain company. This makes it a highly effective tool for business owners focusing on B2B marketing.
3. HubSpot: This app is a well-rounded digital marketing service designed for business owners of all types. In addition, it's affordably priced, reputable, and highly effective.
   

13. Reach Out to People in Your Community

Reaching out to people in your community can attract interest from potential customers. Here are a few tips that can help you effectively reach out to people in your area online:

1. You can reach out to people in your community on social media groups. This is a very effective way to attract potential customers from your area.
2. Download a neighborhood app to reach individuals in the same region as your business.
   

E-Marketing Associates Can Help You Grow Your Business Online

As a business owner, you must do everything possible to promote your brand online. Many of your customers will find your business through a Google search, on social media, or from posts on social media sites, which makes digital marketing one of the most important advertising channels in the modern era.

Luckily, E-Marketing Associates can help you promote just about any product or service on the web. This can lead to a dramatic increase in sales, which will, in turn, create more profits for your business. You can start by improving visitors' brand experience with professional small business website design, which will help your search rankings. Not sure how your business is performing online? Get a free business report that shows how your business stacks up against the competition.