Most B2C companies have been long immersed in digital marketing, and many of them are now gaining a good number of new business leads and growing at a rapid rate.
Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for B2B companies, particularly those in the manufacturing industry, who seem to be under the impression that content marketing could not possibly have the same effect on businesses as it does on consumers.
For this reason, they remain advertising in trade publications and attending trade shows, expecting these techniques will bring them new business leads just as they used to.
Although outbound marketing may indeed help improve brand image, it often has only the smallest impact on new business leads.
Luckily, there are plenty of options available to increase your number of new business leads. Better still, the likelihood is that your competitors are not taking full advantage of these tactics, which gives you the opportunity to establish your company as a leading force in your manufacturing sector.
1. Embrace Inbound Marketing
Obviously, outbound marketing is effective, but inbound marketing (content marketing, social media, and SEO) tends to be much more effective and costs around 62 percent less per lead, reports Voltier Digital.
Create high-quality content that will be useful to prospects who may be looking to purchase your products. Once you have grabbed their attention, invite them to take a simple action such as providing you with their contact details to receive in-depth information targeted toward their needs.
2. Utilize Your Company Website
The best place to begin your inbound marketing efforts is at your website, which has the power to provide you with a constant flow of new business leads. Make sure that you frequently post either straight to your site or to a connected blog.
A note on blogs: Just because you are in the manufacturing industry does not mean a company blog is any less important in efforts toward gaining new business leads than it is for a B2C company.
A blog is one of the easiest ways to direct traffic to your website and is a much better strategy than simply relying on the pages of your main site, which can come across as a little boring or confusing to early stage prospects who do not yet have great interest in your company.
Interested in how a blog can get more people to your website? I might suggest our article on the 14 reasons you should consider a business blog.
3. Use Pay-Per-Click (PPC) Ads
PPC ads can be effective for increasing new business leads in all types of companies, but they are especially beneficial for manufacturing companies who are trying to reach a specific audience.
Ads on Google, Bing, and social media (particularly LinkedIn for B2B companies) enable you to accurately target your advertising, control your budget, and track prospect activity to help you gain new business leads faster than you would through organic search alone.
4. Design a Great Landing Page
If your prospects are going to give you their contact information, you must make your offering of a white paper or guide sound worthwhile. It all starts with a great landing page, one of the most important pages on your website.
Your landing page is the place prospects end up when they click on a PPC ad or a call-to-action on a web page.
- Keep the language short and sweet, focusing on the benefits to the reader.
- Keep the design simple but enticing — experiment through A/B testing to find out what works best.
- Above all, it must be clear what you are offering prospects and how the content will help them.
As you can see, there are numerous possibilities for increasing new business leads from your website. Experiment with as many as possible to find out what works best for your company.
How important is finding new business to your manufacturing company? What struggles does your sales team face landing new business? How's your close rate?
