If you are providing a product or service but failing to generate leads on a good scale, you are in the right place. There are a lot of B2B marketing channels for lead generation- but none is telling you the top genuine B2B lead generation channels that will really be effective.
Also, these channels are not absolute. They change with time, the effectibility fluctuates with time. Navigating the digital landscape needs savvy strategies in 2024.
So with a promise to elevate your business game with qualified leads, we are here with our 11 genuine lead generation B2B channels to focus on in 2024. Unlike many others, our effective tried-and-tested way to generate leads doesn’t only focus on lead scoring, you’ll get quality leads with a great conversation rate too.
Table of Contents
What is Lead Generation?
First things first! In case you don’t know or have very little knowledge about what B2B channel lead generation is, it’s like matchmaking for business to say simply.
Think of it as making new friends, but in the business world, it’s like connecting to people who could become your customers.
So lead generation is the process of finding potential customers who will be interested in the product or service that you offer.
If you are wondering what B2B lead generation is, then B2B stands for business to business. It’s a way to find out businesses that might be interested in your products or services.
There are two kinds of strategies for it – inbound and outbound. To say simply, the first one is that kind of marketing campaign where the audience will first know about your service and show interest in trying it out. In the second way, you’ll be the one to approach them first to try out your service even being a complete stranger.
Top 5 Strategies for Effective Lead Generation
The mistake at the very beginning is many people think more leads means more customers. That’s not true. Even if you use the best B2B lead generation tools to generate high-quality leads, good results may not be coming for your poor sales strategy.
However well the channels work, everything can go to dogs for the lack of lead nurturing. That’s why before getting into the lead generation channels, make your sales team learn the top 5 effective lead generation strategies.
1. Target Audience Understanding
Knowing who your potential business customers are is crucial in B2B marketing. Its influence greatly to various B2B lead generation campaigns at whatever strategy you apply. Unless you understand the needs of your targeted business class, you can’t tailor your approach to what matters most to them.
2. Effective Communication
How you communicate matters. Clear and effective communication is a must to convey your message to your potential business customers. Unless you can do effective communication, doesn’t matter what channel you are using to generate B2B leads, you’ll most probably fail to convert them into clients.
3. Trust and Credibility
Get into the shoes of the businesses you are targeting. You’ll prefer to work with someone who you can trust. Now you know what you have to do before trying out any of the lead generation channels. Build credibility first that’ll put you in a spot of trust before any B2B lead.
4. Adaptability and Innovation
The business landscape evolves. So a very important influencing factor for a useful B2B lead generation is being adaptable and innovative. So keep on trying out other strategies and adopt new ones if they work better. This will make sure that your lead generation strategies are relevant.
5. Timing and Persistence
One of the most important strategies of B2B business is knowing when a potential lead may need your service. The right thing at the wrong time doesn’t help in the conversion of your B2B leads. Another thing is you have to be persistent to turn the lead to your customer – not to the extent that they feel annoyed.
11 Genuine B2B Lead Generation Channels to Focus on in 2024
Do you want to turn strangers into prospects and prospects into happy clients? Here are the most effective B2B channels for lead generation in 2024.
1. Cold Email Marketing
I know what you are thinking – It doesn’t work! What if I tell you it does? Have you ever thought maybe it’s you who’s doing it wrong? Cold email marketing campaigns may take time to work but it eventually does if you have what it takes.
To write effective cold emails, you need to focus on personalization. The first step is to research that specific business and find out the points where you can offer improvement. Mistakes that others make are that they keep an email drafted and send the same email to every business. Never do this!
Start with an attractive subject line, personalize the greeting, and clearly state the purpose of your email. Then highlight what service you have to offer to them for their specific need via email. Show them you’re not just someone randomly trying their luck by emailing many people, but someone interested in giving them service specifically.
Though keep it brief, include a clear CTA or call to action. You can offer them a free trial as well. And no, you can’t be one and done. Always give follow-ups on your email marketing campaigns to be on their radar when they are thinking of taking the service from anyone.
2. Content Marketing
Content marketing has been an effective prospect for generating leads for a long time. After targeting a specific range of business audiences, write high-quality content in various forms such as blog posts, informative articles, etc addressing the specific needs and challenges faced by them.
Then Optimize those for keywords related to the search queries the businesses do when they look for that service. SEO will help you to improve your search engine visibility and once you get yourself into #1 on SERP results, Your brand will position as a brand authority in that field.
Like this, with proper content distribution your product or service will be promoted to a wider audience without you even approaching them – thanks to SEO. Those leads will discover your service and approach you for your service. The conversation rate is very high in this lead generation channel once you get yourself high on SERP results.
3. Video Marketing
Look around you – everyone is making videos. And why not? Videos are the most consumed thing right now. Smart brands and people are making videos about the things they are experts in.
So to have effective leads that convert into customers, list out the needs and pain points of your targeted businesses. Then make comprehensive videos on those topics showcasing your expertise and providing value to your potential business customers.
Optimize the video titles, descriptions, and relevant keywords. Always remember you are targeting B2B audiences who don’t have a lot of time to watch a long video. So for effective B2B lead generation, try to make it quick and input as much as information you can.
4. Website
The website is a professional platform to showcase your expertise. You can talk about all your skills there, how you work, how you make sure your clients get the best results, client testimonials, work details, and many other proofs of your work. So having a well-built website or landing page is a must to have a good impression on B2B leads.
And who knew a website could work like lead magnets? You can offer resources like whitepapers, ebooks, webinars, etc in exchange for your potential lead’s name and email addresses and phone numbers using lead capture forms or lead gen forms.
This way you’ll get information about which B2B lead have visited your website and showed interest in your service or product. One of the most useful channels for lead generation at this time.
5. LinkedIn Ads
Many people will tell you social media ads are one of the best lead generation processes. Well, they are. But as we are not just talking about any lead generation channel, but the most effective ones for lead generation B2B, among all other social media ads, my favorite is LinkedIn ads.
Why? Because LinkedIn ads are the best for target audience precision. You know LinkedIn is an active hub of top people in businesses. In LinkedIn ads, you can define your target precisely using LinkedIn’s targeting options.
You can specify company size, industry, job titles, and other relevant criteria. This made LinkedIn ads a better B2B lead generation way than all other social media channels.
6. Influencer Marketing
Have you noticed something lately? Look up and down, right and left, influencers are everywhere. So right now, influencer marketing has become a new yet very impactful marketing way among digital channels.
So they are heavily getting used for lead generation. To enhance your brand visibility and credibility, you can choose some influencers whose expertise aligns with your B2B content. Then you can strategically design a marketing campaign with them to attract some quality leads.
7. Referral Marketing
Referral is an underestimated primary lead generation tool. In the world of effective lead generation, trust and relationship plays a huge role. So if you have some existing networks, why not tap them to get some more leads?
Sometimes many customers may refer your service to their known businesses out of love and respect. But to scale it up, you can offer them a percentage of each lead they bring to become a new customer. This kind of referral marketing makes sure of a continuous flow of new automated leads by your own customers.
8. Affiliate Marketing
All B2B marketers know how effective affiliate marketing is in generating high-quality leads. It’s a collaborative approach between business owners and affiliates who promote their products or services to others.
It’s a great B2B marketing channel because you don’t have to pay those affiliates anything from your pocket. You’ll instead offer a specific percentage of each lead they can get down the sales funnel.
9. Brand Partnership
Generate high-quality B2B leads by brand partnership with companies that have similar audiences. To give an example, let’s say you bought a domain from Namecheap. As you bought a domain, you are clearly going to use it on a new website. So you’ll already see an option to open WordPress inside the hosting company Namecheap to start building the website.
It’s because the two different companies have brand partnerships together. It’s a great lead-generation strategy. So to maximize your leads, you can partner up with similar companies and nurture them to get a high conversion rate.
10. PPC Marketing
PPC or pay-per-click is one of the best channels to track the people who may be interested in what service you offer. PPC allows businesses to target specific audiences with precision through various platforms.
You can target specific demographics now and your sales and marketing team can make sure your ads reach exactly to the decision makers.
11. Facebook Ads
With a conversion rate of almost 10%, Facebook lead ads are one of the favorite platforms for B2B Marketers for its unique feature. Unlike every other platform out there for ads, Facebook has a diverse ad format. With 12+ position to show ads of various designs, channels like Facebook is the best for digital marketers.
Compared to LinkedIn, the cost per lead on Facebook is also cheap. So investing the same money on Facebook ads compared to various B2B marketing platforms will get you more leads. Facebook ads also are one of the best B2B marketing channels to convert leads into customers.
Which Lead Generation B2B Channel Should You Choose?
This is the most repetitive question – which B2B digital channel for generating leads to choose? Every channel mentioned above is the most effective one this year – the best way to convert into customers. But which one should you try? I advise you to think about who your current audience and targeted business are.
Who are they? Do they watch videos? Or spend time on LinkedIn? Or search for finding any service in Google? All these factors matter the most in choosing the right B2B lead generation channel.
If you don’t have a huge budget for lead generation, it’s impossible to invest in every B2B lead generation strategy. So you need to do some market research and test out a few lead generation channels that best suit your targeted businesses. Another important thing is, however good a lead generation channel is, all of them need persistence to be effective.
In case you personally don’t have that much patience or time to spend hours to generate leads, no worries! There are a lot of B2B lead generation agencies at your service ready to pour their experience and knowledge into bringing you potential customers.
FAQ:
Should I Prioritize Inbound or Outbound Strategies for B2B Lead Generation?
A: Both lead generation efforts have their own merits but personally, I like inbound ones only for the fact that the conversion rate in this marketing strategy is greater than the other one. But to get the best result, a balanced approach is the best way to go.
Is Cold Email Still Relevant in B2B Lead Generation?
A: A strategy like cold B2B email still can work using the proper strategy. The key is to do research, personalized messages, and follow up for more effectiveness. Don’t use automated emails.
Should I Invest in Paid Advertising for Lead Generation?
A: If you are thinking of paid advertising, target Google and LinkedIn. They are one of the best ways to get a lot of leads that will have a good conversion rate.
Final Words
For sustained business growth, leveraging genuine B2B lead generation channels is very important. The 11 channels discussed – content marketing, email marketing, video Marketing, affiliate marketing, influencers marketing, referral marketing, website marketing, LinkedIn marketing, Facebook marketing, PPC marketing, and brand partnership – all are the most effective lead generation strategies of this year with the highest conversion in B2B marketing.
The secret sauce is to understand your audience properly and one of the most effective things for all B2B companies is to use a strategic mix of various marketing channels that align with your business objectives.
Remember – at the end of the day, it doesn’t matter how many leads you have. The equation always gets to the conversion of those leads to customers. So focus on lead generation channels that bring quality B2B leads that bring some results to your lead generation campaign.
Mousumi Karim
Mousumi Karim is an undergraduate in Physics who now works as a "Content Wizard" at Adigic Digital. She prepares engaging contents for multiple local and international brands. Her unique mix of science and creativity is shaping her success in the digital content world.