Use Lead Magnets to Grow Your Pipeline

One of the best ways to generate leads is “lead magnets,” content so valuable to your prospects they will give you their contact information to get it. Once you establish that relationship, you can then use email and other cost-effective methods to nurture those leads.

The most common lead magnets are ebooks, white papers, webinars, and podcasts, but short videos are rapidly gaining in popularity. Your magnet can be anything your prospects think is valuable enough that they will provide contact information.

Learn more about lead generation

EBooks

An ebook is one of the most cost-effective content types because it can generate leads for years. It can be about any topic of continuing interest but usually takes the form of a “how-to” guide or best practices.

An e-book is not heavy reading. Instead, it should be easily scannable, with attention-getting graphics and charts. It will usually be a few pages but could be much longer, like this example of a research report.

I work with graphic designers to help you make your e-books engaging, useful, and evergreen. I can work with your designer, or I can team up with one of my design resources.

White Papers

There are three types of white papers, according to my mentor, Gordon Graham, That Whitepaper Guy. They are like ice cream, like this example.

  • The Backgrounder: the features and benefits of your product or service, predictable as vanilla ice cream, like this example.
  • The Numbered List: a series of tips, questions and answers, tips, or things to do. A quick read, light and flavorful, like strawberry ice cream.
  • The Problem/Solution: dissects a problem common to your industry and shows why your solution is the best. “Rich and satisfying.”

A white paper establishes you as an authority in your industry niche. Like e-books, they can be effective at capturing leads for a very long time.

Webinars

I can’t make you a great webinar presenter, but I can help you build a great presentation slide deck. I’ve been creating slide presentations for executives for over 30 years, and the one most important thing I can tell you is that expectations have changed.

Today, the focus is on the expertise and presentation skills of the presenter. If you present a webinar by talking through bullet points in a slide deck, your audience will bail out of your webinar and forget about you.

Your slide deck needs to impact, but it needs only enough text to keep the audience on track. Most of the slides in my presentations have little more than a title and a chart or diagram. I put the details in the notes, so, when your prospects download the slide deck to share with their colleagues, they will have all the information they need to share your ideas.

Few people will sit through a live webinar. Instead, they will want to watch a recording so they can schedule it when it is convenient.

Podcasts

Recorded audio presentations are growing rapidly in popularity. They are usually brief presentations on a topic of interest to people in your target audience. Podcasters often have guests who are knowledgeable in the industry. If you are a new podcaster, I can write scripts that will help you get your feet on the ground.

Save Time and Money by Repurposing Your Lead Magnet

Once you have developed successful content, you can use it in many ways repeatedly. For example, an ebook can become a webinar. A webinar can be adapted to a white paper. A white paper can make a great topic for a podcast.

It can save you a lot of time and effort.

Marketing Collateral for Lead Magnets

The best content in the world will do nothing for you unless your prospects are aware of it and know it has value to them. So, when I write “gated” content, I also help you market it. Normally, that may include the following items:

  • Insert ads for blog articles and emails.
  • Social media posts.
  • One or more blog articles on the topic, or a series of articles.
  • A landing page to capture registration information.
  • A “thank you” page with the download link or a calendar meeting.
  • For a scheduled webinar or podcast, I also write follow-up reminders.

This combination of evergreen content and attention-getting marketing collateral will produce leads for a very long time.

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