Leads, leads, leads- the only tune on the tip of every marketer’s tongue. Once the referrals and the circle of family-friends aren’t enough to keep your firm growing, it’s all about the leads. However, when it comes to B2B lead generation, it’s very easy to slow down or even halt any campaign progress by making a few tiny mistakes. The result: Anything from just slightly worse metrics to a completely ruined campaign.
But consider being forewarned as being forearmed. So, beware of these 5 fatal lead generation mistakes that can ruin a campaign or heavily cost your business:
Mistake #1:
Focussing On A Single Lead Gen Source
Every beginner marketer or inexperienced salespeople and SDRs tend to confine themselves to only one channel or source of lead generation. For instance- many start generating leads from social networks like Facebook or LinkedIn as their only source.
While all these may seem like good lead sources, especially if they offer enough leads in your particular niche, having a diversified source of lead generation channels can help you discover which ones bring you leads of the best (or worst) quality. Try generating leads from social networks, websites and 3rd party databases all at once, and compare which works best for you.
Mistake #2:
Skipping Lead Verification Processes
In today’s push for personalization, one simply can’t afford bad data on B2B leads. Sadly, B2B data changes like the weather- companies, phone numbers, email addresses, needs, jobs and there’s a good chance that almost half of the data in your system is incorrect.
In most cases you’ll find that 30% of your leads are invalid, and filtering them out will save you money that would otherwise be spent on delivering the messages that would never be read. Remember that, it costs less to verify 10,000 leads than to deliver your message to 2,000 invalid, abandoned or non-existing email addresses lurking on your list.
Mistake #3:
Failing to Enrich B2B Leads
This is a mistake that would plunge your open rates, click-through rates and conversion rates down to the rocks. It happens when the generated leads are used right away, without enriching them by extracting additional data from various sources.
Additional data for enrichment can include:
- Secondary contact methods (e.g. phone number, or social media profile for messaging)
- Company name (for personalization)
- Company size (for segmentation)
- Title, position and more (for more hyper-personalization)
An account-based marketing company can extract this data separately and personalize subject lines, email copies, segment lists, contact leads using multiple channels, and more.
Mistake #4:
Not Opting for Lead Segmentation
With the necessity for laser-focussed marketing, every message, every campaign, every ad needs to be tailored to a specific customer or account. Market segmentation is a form of personalisation that divides leads up into different groups based on similar demographics, needs, priorities, common interests, pain points etc.
Marketing communications that lack personalisation are ignored by leads. As a result, lead segmentation is pivotal. To segment them, your list needs to be enriched first. Once you are familiar with basic segmenting you can create deeper and more sophisticated segments that work best for your business. Moreover, you can always outsource these services to external agencies that offer professional account-based marketing services.
Mistake #5:
Using Enriched Leads Only Once
This is one of the most common lead gen mistakes that marketers make. You have generated leads, launched your campaign, got your good/bad results, and then moved on from those leads to start generating new ones for your future campaigns.
You’re missing out on a great deal of conversions if you never use your leads again. Follow-up your enriched leads through phone in addition to email campaigns, or create multiple segments and launch bigger drip campaigns with multiple steps and better offers.
In-conclusion:
The competition is fierce in digital channels. It’s now tougher than ever to cut through the noise and convert traffic into sales-qualified leads (SQLs). Knowing your mistakes before you make them will help you get the most out of your leads and save valuable company resources. Alternatively, you can also outsource the process to a marketing automation agency for the best results.
