If you had to make a sale today, where would you start?

The number of online marketing tactics to generate leads can be overwhelming. Do you buy an Email list and blast a campaign? Do you set up a Google AdWords account and begin advertising for relevant search terms? Do you direct message every connection you never knew you had on LinkedIn?

Lead generation can be confusing for marketers. Who do you trust? How do you do it? What returns can be expected? By answering these questions, you can start to identify the best B2B Lead Generation Tactics for your business.

First, Who Are Your Customers?

Marketers need be to crystal clear on who the customer is before beginning to execute any lead generation tactics. The more information you know about your target customer – age, gender, income, interests, location and motivation — the better.

Conduct a customer analysis to determine who your customers are and where your customers came from. For example, if you find one-third of all your customers have come from a referral, you’ll want to focus on lead generation tactics like a customer referral program. Alternatively, if you find that none of your customers have come through email marketing, perhaps it would be wise to focus your efforts on a different tactic.

Once you know who to target, dive into tactics.

1. Email Campaigns

Sending an email campaign may be the quickest and most inexpensive way to drive leads. Whether you have a neglected email list, just put together a list of contacts from Outlook or LinkedIn or purchased a list, an email campaign can quickly generate interest in your services.

An initial email campaign should succinctly capture the main point of your service, list a few details and have a clear call to action. After sending the campaign, monitor the reports of who opens and clicks the campaign. These recipients were interested enough to learn more, but not quite interested enough to submit their information. Consider following up with these recipients directly.

If you do send out an email campaign to recipients who have not opted in, make sure that you are CAN-SPAM compliant and use an email verification service prior to uploading and sending out your campaign.

2. Customer Matches Through Social Media Advertising

Upload an email list directly into Facebook or Twitter, match the emails up with users and advertise to a custom audience. The customer targeting of this tactic is reliable and effective.

You can also create a “lookalike audience” from a customer email list. Lookalike audiences enable marketers to reach people who are likely to be interested in your services because they’re similar to your current customers. Take a list of a few thousand customers and reach a few hundred thousand prospects who match your demographic data.

If you do not have an email list to upload, these social media ad platforms have demographic data that can be used to accurately advertise to your target customer. Always test and then invest where you are seeing the most return.

3. Hand-To-Hand Combat Through LinkedIn

LinkedIn is a goldmine of leads. If you know who you’re targeting, LinkedIn provides the tools and opportunity to reach out directly to your prospects.

The process for generating leads through LinkedIn is simple. Make a connection request. Develop a relationship after an accepted connection request. Then, after trust has been established, make an “ask” to set an appointment or demo.

The approach is simple, but the process is time intensive. It requires dedicated follow-up and tracking of which connection requests were made and who has received follow up messages. If you can manage the process, there is a lot of immediate gratification and positive return to be had through LinkedIn.

Article From :www.forbes.com