Best practices for customer acquisition on social networks
Today, almost 55% of Internet users are on social networks.
They use it on a daily basis and contribute huge amounts of data to the platforms. This data is valuable for lead generation on social networks. Marketers can use it to directly target their audience.
In fact, there are several reasons for this:
✓ Search engine marketing is now difficult. It gets harder with each new update. Many websites that used to rank effortlessly now have a really hard time. These websites are looking for alternatives that can help them succeed in digital marketing.
✓ Even a new website requires a large amount of budget just to get it ranked for the keywords you want in a search engine.
✓ It’s expensive. A campaign that would cost $1 per conversion on social media costs $4 to $5 on search engines.
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Content
How to generate leads through social networks?
Most companies now use social media platforms for their campaigns. This is because they offer low-cost marketing to a targeted audience.
Social media campaigns have always been an important part of digital marketing. In the beginning, people used to think that social media was just another form of brand building medium.
Back then, small businesses promoted content on social media. This content ranged from cold calling to social spam. In short, it was a hit and miss scenario, where measuring return was a big problem.
Later, in 2010, Facebook introduced paid marketing. It allowed marketers to target social media users based on their interests. This opened a new chapter in digital marketing.
Following this, other social media platforms also launched their paid marketing channels. This gave social media marketers even more avenues to market.
Data on lead generation in social networks
Here are some facts about social media marketing that you should know in order to develop a results-oriented strategy for your company.
✓ Social media marketing has reduced costs for 45% of companies.
✓ Companies grew by 24% using social networks for lead generation.
✓ Nearly 68% of companies are using social media to generate leads in 2018.
✓ The biggest barrier to social media for 77% of companies is a limitation on lead improvement
✓ An average lead costs $2.50 on Google and $0.80 on Facebook. That’s a 32% cost efficiency across social media advertising.
Generación de prospectos en redes sociales frente a captación de clientes potenciales
Muchos profesionales del marketing no saben diferenciar entre los conceptos de lead generation y lead nurturing. He aquí una breve explicación de cada uno de ellos y de por qué son importantes.
Lead generation on social networks
A lead is simply an address, a phone number or an identity document that helps marketers to address their target audience. Typically, marketers ask for a name or email address for promotion to users.
Social media is a very important way to engage potential customers. Both organic and paid marketing can be done on a social media platform. Marketers can also promote content through groups/communities or through sponsored/native ads.
But leads alone don’t make a difference unless you nurture them. This is what lead nurturing is:
Loyalty of potential customers on social networks
A potential customer obtained through any medium is usually cold. They have to be warmed up before they can be marketed to. Therefore, most marketers nurture social media leads by taking them through a funnel. We have a full article on marketing automation and creating funnels. Read it to learn how to target the right type of audience with better marketing opportunities.
Speaking of targeting the right type of audience, you can also try targeting high-value customers, as they bring more revenue to the table. However, attracting important customers is another chapter.
If you are interested in why you should focus on important customers, you might be interested in reading our article.
Social media channels also allow you to nurture leads through smart remarketing strategies. Marketers can capture leads and then remarket to convert them into leads. They can use surveys, videos and forms directly on the platform to send personalized messages. This helps to better nurture leads.
Expert tips on social media lead generation:
Experts believe that marketers should try social media marketing with low budgets at first so as not to incur losses. They add that marketers should set a goal before they start marketing. This will help them measure the progress of their campaigns early on. Here’s a summary of what experts say about social media lead generation.
Brooke Harper of Tenfold states:
‘Lead generation is the main artery of the sales process. You need to focus on it to start increasing sales. Now, with the advancement of technology, there are many online lead generation techniques.
Arun Kumar Biswal, Business Development Director, PMSL Technology PVT LTD, states:
To generate leads on social media, the first thing is to know which platforms to use. To do this, create a target audience. Set the goals you want to achieve with social media marketing. Also, have a financial plan that lays out the strategy.
Rebekah Radice, author, speaker, says:
Before you convert social media fans into paying customers, know your sales process. Ask yourself: How do you nurture their relationships? How do you move them through the various stages of your marketing funnel?
Many companies start marketing on social media without a clearly defined goal. If you want to convert the right leads on social media, you need to be clear about your sales process.
Top tips for generating leads on social networks
Now that we know the right time to start the social media lead generation process. Here are some tips you should know before starting the process.
1. Share links to closed content
Everyone likes valuable content. If you have valuable information about your product, you can put it behind a door. Share this piece of gated content on social media and get relevant leads on social media.
This is what gated content looks like:
2. Organize contests on social networks
One way to promote your product on social networks is to organize a contest. It can be said that this is a widely used method. And it’s true. But it still works.
There are two reasons why companies organize contests. First, they get a lot of leads that can benefit the business. Second, the participants of each contest can share it with more people. This further increases the reach of the publication.
The only downside of social contests is that the leads you get this way are not always relevant.
Therefore, it is essential to filter relevant leads through lead nurturing.
3. Social media advertising
Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn now offer “lead generation” ads. They allow marketers to capture leads directly on the platform through targeted marketing campaigns to social media users.
They don’t have to click on those ads and go to a landing page to fill out a form. The process is simple. Users click on the form and fill it out. In response, they will receive an e-book or gated content for free.
Watch a user add their name and email address to a Facebook ad form. The process took less than 30 seconds. This saves time for both the marketer and the user.
4. Hangouts, webinars and live videos.
Another social media strategy to generate leads is to use hangouts, live videos and webinars. Most companies organize webinars on a specific topic with pre-registration. The idea is to capture as many leads as possible. Since the registration is upfront, most people won’t even attend the webinar. But it will help the company get relevant leads.
Hangouts include a few people interested in a topic. An example is ‘Google hangouts‘. The person who starts the hangouts can invite other people to join them. A maximum of 150 people can join the hangouts at a time.
Live videos are not gated content. Companies make live videos when they have to make an announcement, when they are present at an event or when they want to quickly answer some questions from users.
For live videos, companies can opt for in-video promotion or gated content. They can also direct the viewer to contests and landing pages of their choice. There are many options available for live videos. Facebook and YouTube offer live videos. You can even add links to your webinar or forms/surveys to convert viewers into leads.
5. Use geolocated searches
Social media platforms also offer the option of location targeting. This allows marketers to send promotions to a targeted audience. They can send gated content to users and target them with lead nurturing ads or surveys to get their feedback.
6. Click on a landing page
A landing page is developed to convert leads into customers. For example, if you are selling cloud hosting, you should have a landing page for WordPress Cloud Hosting, Magento Cloud Hosting, etc.
Developing a landing page is also a good idea if you don’t have gated content to share on social networks.
Note: Social media users don’t like abrupt promotions and, unfortunately, sharing landing pages falls into that realm.
Therefore, when sharing your landing pages, focus on paid/sponsored promotions.
7. Create engaging social media questionnaires
Content marketers are increasingly striving to generate social media content that is engaging and capable of generating more leads. But not all content works as intended.
Engaging social media contests can increase conversions 70% of the time, and the fact that 50% of contest participants subscribe to an email list is a compelling enough reason.
Social media contests are arguably the most competitive forms of content out there that many marketers overlook as a viable strategy. But when implemented into your brand’s marketing strategy, they can generate leads and increase engagement and provide value to your audience.
Personality quizzes are the most popular form of quizzes that people love to take and share with others.
All you need to do is to use a good online quiz maker to create engaging quizzes. You also need to provide some value to the audience, if you expect them to share their personal information with you. This value can be anything: a discount code, a free entry into a sweepstakes, a valuable e-book, etc. Once you’ve collected the data, you can retarget your audience with personalized content that they like, provide them with product recommendations that perfectly match their needs, analyze the data for market research, and much more.
The best social media platforms for lead generation
This is a list of the best social media platforms for generating leads and selling products directly to social media users.
Lead generation on Facebook
Facebook is the most widely used social media platform for lead generation. It has about two billion active users. Marketers can market to anyone in any industry with the click of a button. CPC rates are also one of the lowest on Facebook and many dropshippers are using it to market their products.
With Facebook, you have three ways to get leads.
On-page promotion
Facebook allows businesses to create their own pages. This way they can get leads from people who have already liked their page.
Often promote products on social media pages. Only those who like your page can see these posts.
Note: On average, the reach of a page is about five percent of the total number of “likes” it has.
Why is organic promotion important on social networks? Organic reach is free. This means that if a page has more than 100,000 likes. You can easily market your content to around 5,000 people for free.
Now think. If you were to reach 5,000 people with paid marketing, the total amount would be between $3 and $8.
On Facebook, businesses can market gated content, landing pages and even routine posts on their page.
Off-page promotion
Off-page means promoting lead-generating content in communities, groups and other Facebook pages.
Try to do precise off-page marketing so it doesn’t look like spam.
This is an example of a Facebook social networking group.
Therefore, users who are part of the page will be able to see this group in their feed. Similarly, businesses can create their own pages and groups, both at the same time, to increase their organic reach.
Paid Promotion
Most companies prefer paid marketing promotions because they bring instant results. Paid promotion strategies work in the same way as social promotions. Facebook offers a variety of social ads, each with a specific purpose.
Below is a screenshot of the main types of ads available on Facebook.
After selecting the lead generation ad, you will have more options to provide a form and links to gated content such as e-books, demos, quizzes and checklists. Add these to the ad to start the promotion.
You can use lead generation or conversion ads to capture leads.
Twitter lead generation
Twitter is another great social media platform for lead generation. There are two ways to promote your lead capture piece on Twitter.
Tweets/Retweets
Businesses that have a Twitter account can run sweepstakes or contests to get leads. Those who enter these sweepstakes can share them with other users, further increasing reach.
Similarly, businesses can post their free content on Twitter and increase their social media reach. Organic reach increases further when someone likes or retweets the post.
The image above shows a tweet with two comments, 11 retweets and 20 likes.
Paid promotion
As a user, you can use paid promotion cards on Twitter to collect leads. You can promote landing page posts for the same because Twitter cards offer you to collect leads on-site and then upload them into CRM.
This is a website click-through ad on Twitter. First, marketers will add a code on the website. Then they will use it to get people to perform a certain action on their website or e-commerce store. The platform will only charge per conversion.
Lead Generation on LinkedIn
LinkedIn is for professional use only. Its users do not share gifs, but resumes, career-oriented stories and experiences. This provides LinkedIn with accurate data about their interests and activities. They can use these to help recruiters target selected audiences with relevant search queries.
Paid lead generation on LinkedIn
LinkedIn also offers forms that users can fill out manually. This saves time and simplifies the entire process.
Like other social media platforms, LinkedIn also offers paid ads for lead generation. You will first need to create a paid account on LinkedIn. Once you’ve done that, you can choose from three different types of ads: text ads, sponsored content and Inmail ads. If you’re a beginner, try different types of ads to see which one offers the highest ROI. Once you’ve done that, start using that ad type for your subsequent projects.
Lead generation on Instagram
Instagram is another good platform for social media lead generation. It has over a billion users and a highly engaged community. The main promotional channel on Instagram is hashtags. Users can add relevant hashtags to their posts and they will appear in searches. But Instagram does not allow URLs. This means that all content has to be in text, photos or hashtags.
For lead-based content promotion, you need to add relevant hashtags to your posts.
But since URLs are not supported, users can add the link in an Instagram photo or add it to the profile URL. So, those who want to click on it will be able to do so from the profile link.
You can write “Link in bio” so visitors can land on the corresponding landing page.
Lead Ads on Instagram
The second option is to get lead ads from Instagram. Lead ads offer a clickable link within the sponsored post on Instagram, allowing viewers to land on the relevant page.
Instagram offers several types of ads for marketers to promote their products. Whether they want audiences to install an app, visit a website, generate leads, or purchase a product, they can do so with Instagram product ads.
Conclusion
Generating leads on social networks takes time. It’s not a one-day process. Even savvy marketers get confused when they can’t generate relevant leads from social media following lead generation best practices.
Therefore, it’s best to keep trying. Experiment. Try new forms of promotion and explore new social media marketing channels to set yourself up for success.
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