content marketing for lead generation

Content Marketing for Lead Generation: Creating Lead Magnets

A stream of leads is like the lifeblood of a business.

When a company’s generating leads, this business is also likely to be making sales and revenue. That’s why many companies spend fortunes on lead generation methods. Unfortunately, certain lead generation methods work better than others.

If you want to turn your business into a lead magnet, it might be missing out on a great lead generation method: content marketing.

In this post, you’ll learn about content marketing for lead generation purposes. We’ll also show you how you can create content that generates leads on autopilot!

Why use content marketing for lead generation?

lead gen

First things first, is it beneficial to generate leads with content marketing? Yes, here are the main benefits of using content in your company’s lead-generation efforts.

It’s cost-effective

Content marketing definitely isn’t the only way to gain qualified leads. But it might be one of the cheapest. According to WebFX, content marketing costs 67% less than most traditional marketing methods.

If you’re comfortable with finding a few keywords and writing long-form content, content marketing for lead generation purposes can be nearly free for your business. That’s if you have the time and effort to devote to creating content.

But that doesn’t have to be your only option.

Even outsourcing content creation to another business can cost far less than paying for ads, commercials, or online video spots.

As someone who’s been writing content for over a decade, we can tell you that a few hundred or thousand bucks can go incredibly far regarding content marketing for lead generation.

Forms relationships

There are two main ways to treat qualified leads. You can get them in and out, or you can build long-term relationships with them. Sure, getting leads to your website and making sales is great.

But what happens when the leads you rushed in and out don’t come back to make repeat purchases? This leaves your business in a rushed state where it must always gain new leads to survive. Eventually, that pool is going to shrink.

That’s why we like using content to form real relationships. These relationships lead readers to keep coming back to check out your content. And it can also lead them to become repeat customers.

Example: You can buy new clothes from Store A or Store B.

The staff at Store A gives you a friendly greeting, let you know about current promotions, and help you choose clothes that look great.

Store B’s staff takes no time to greet you and provides you with no suggestions.

Which company are you going to buy clothes from? Most people will prefer the customer experience offered by Store A.

In the online world, your content is your brand’s main way to make and grow connections with real people.

Content builds up over time

Valuable content can withstand the test of time. In other words, well-written and helpful content sticks around on search engine results for a long while.

Your business can start making a few pieces of lead magnet content over time. Repeat this content marketing for lead generation strategy for a few months or years, and your company could have hundreds of lead magnets getting clicks around the web.

Creating content made for generating leads

creating lead gen content

It’s now time for you to learn how to create lead-generation content like an expert. Follow these tips, and your content should generate leads right away.

Know who makes up your audience

Before you get too far into content marketing for lead generation, it’s important to know your audience. Your audience will be the people making a choice to click on your articles. For that to happen, you need to come up with topics that interest your audience.

Without an interested audience, articles don’t receive clicks. And when articles aren’t getting clicks, that means no one is reading them. By knowing your audience and their interests, you can avoid this major problem.

Create a few guest posts

If you’re reaching enough people through your current website, it’s time to consider the power of the guest post. Guest blogging involves one website writing content for another website. So, a guest post puts your content in front of a completely new audience.

These types of posts are also great forms of content syndication. As you continue creating guest content for other websites, you could find yourself building up a sizeable audience.

Use professionally designed landing pages

Sometimes, companies write content that ticks all the boxes for their audiences. Unfortunately, great content won’t make up for a poorly designed landing page. The landing page is a crucial part of your conversion funnel.

If you’re getting a low amount of leads or none at all, take a closer look at your landing page. We also recommend using a tool like HotJar (free version available). This tool records a video of your web pages, so you can see what users see in real-time. It may help you uncover what’s going wrong or right with your content marketing for lead generation efforts.

Include a few strong CTAs in your articles

It’s great to have people visiting your company on its website or a social media platform. But it’s even more important to have your readers take a certain action. The action your readers take depends on the goals of your content marketing strategy.

Typically, a company wants one or all of the following things to happen:

  • Increasing online traffic (search engines, social media, etc.)
  • Gaining more leads
  • Making more revenue
  • Getting better placements in search engines

Fortunately, working on one of these goals tends to help you achieve the other goals.

The way to get your audience members to become leads is with a CTA (call to action).

You have the freedom to choose any CTA you want. However, we recommend keeping your CTA at two to four words max. A great CTA is a short, motivating command. Here are examples of some of the most common CTAs:

  • Call now
  • Sign up now
  • Register now
  • Find out more

Share, share, share

If you spend the time and energy to create a piece of quality, share it like your life depends on it. That last sentence might sound a little extreme, but I recommend devoting as much time to sharing content as you do creating it.

When it comes to sharing content, you want to stick with popular and relevant platforms. Popular platforms are great because they have a lot of traffic. Relevant platforms are also excellent because readers are more likely to have an interest in your content.

Ramp up the effectiveness of your content marketing for lead generation efforts by sharing content at some (or all) of the following websites:

  • Social media platforms (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, TikTok, etc.)
  • Medium
  • Slideshare
  • Email lists

Tip: Don’t expect your first pieces of shared content to go viral overnight. Most popular accounts on social media and content-sharing websites repeatedly share what they create. Think about sharing content as a long-term strategy rather than something that is done once and forgotten about.

Split-test your content

As you continue with your content marketing for lead generation strategies, you’re going to have times when it’s difficult to choose between a line, image, or other pieces of your content. Fortunately, you can have the best of both worlds with split testing.

Split testing is a powerful tool in your content marketing for lead generation arsenal. You can split test ads, blog posts, and much more. A split test lets you show different versions of your content to an audience.

After enough time passes, you can check data (clicks, conversions, etc.) to see what page performs best. Then, you can make sure your audience only sees the page that has the best chance of leading to conversions.

Update older articles

You’re going to have some articles or posts that perform better than others. With that in mind, check over your content (especially blog posts) that aren’t generating leads. This could be because your website has older articles that haven’t received updates in a while.

If you have high-quality content that’s over eight months old and not ranking well, it’s time to update these articles.

Create content in various formats

Another way to utilize content marketing for lead generation is by mixing things up. Let’s say that you enjoy creating a blog post every few days. You could mix up your content by pausing the blog posts for a few weeks and creating interactive content like quizzes or informative content like a how-to video.

Creating relevant content in various formats helps your audience avoid burnout. Plus, expanding your content strategy in this way could also uncover massive new sources of traffic.

Don’t ask for too much information

With stories of data breaches and information leaks, it’s understandable that most people are weary of sharing their personal information online. As you create your opt-in form, keep the previous fact in mind.

Plug-ins and programs give website owners various fields to put in their lead generation forms. But we recommend only asking for information you absolutely need, such as an email address and a first name.

Short forms also help you generate high-quality leads. Keeping your forms short helps you attract leads who don’t have time to fill in longer forms.

Excellent types of content marketing for lead generation

examples of lead generation

If you want to gain leads with content marketing, it’s always helpful to have examples to check out. With that in mind, use the following examples as great ways to use content as lead magnets.

White paper

An aspect of good content marketing is taking complex topics and breaking them down into something that’s easy for anyone to understand. One way to achieve that goal is by creating white papers.

A white paper is typically distributed on paper and condenses complex topics into something that’s easy to get. If you need more leads, white papers can be valuable parts of your content marketing for lead generation strategies.

Companies often use this format as a lead magnet. You can have someone give you an email address to receive the white papers you create. If the white paper’s subject is enticing enough, they can work well at driving leads.

Interactive tools

We won’t lie – this topic might be a little too complex for some people. I can tell you I’m no expert at creating interactive tools. But your company could be sitting on tools created by engineers or programmers that could work wonders for your company’s lead-generation efforts.

In this instance, we’re talking about virtual tools. An example of this kind of tool could be an online calculator or something similar.

Webinars

If you need a way to branch away from the blog post, consider recording a webinar. Webinars are videos ranging anywhere from 30 minutes to a few hours. You can record a webinar and then distribute it to your audience. Some companies host live webinars where members of their target audiences attend and can sometimes ask questions.

With an attractive landing page leading to your webinar, your business can have a powerful content marketing for lead generation tool.

Original research

You can also lure leads into becoming potential customers with well-written research. With that said, the success rate of this method depends on what industry and space your company operate in.

If your target audience is shoppers in the retail niche, most of them won’t care about reading research. But for a B2B company, releasing cutting-edge research can be a great part of its content strategy.

Roundups

Another smart way to take part in content marketing for lead generation is to have other people provide the content for you. That’s the beauty of roundups, content involving collected opinions of other experts.

Now, we’ll be honest — roundups take time to create. That’s because you’re waiting for other people’s opinions. And most people lead busy lives. So, it’s best to write other pieces as you wait for people to answer your roundup questions.

We recommend asking people for a few sentences you can use for your website. If they go over that limit, that’s great. You just don’t want to ask someone to provide too long of an answer, which could affect how many responses you receive.

Quizzes

Your business can also use a time-tested content marketing for lead generation strategy by creating an interactive quiz. Trust me, creating quizzes is much easier than it sounds. Services like Typeform and QuizGecko let you easily create quizzes to get and hold your audience’s attention.

All you need is to research a bit of information. These tools can take your input and turn it into a multiple-choice quiz that’s great for engagement.

You can have your quality leads either submit their information before taking a quiz or at the results screen. We recommend waiting until the reader is at the results screen to include your lead form.

Infographics

A great example of content marketing for lead generation involves an infographic. An infographic can grow leads because it contains valuable information. Plus, the visual format of an infographic makes it something that people enjoy looking at.

Keep in mind that infographics, while containing interesting information, are visual-based. If you’re not comfortable with graphic design, you might want to hire someone to put one of these together for you.

Videos

One of the most popular forms of content marketing for lead generation is online video. Whether you upload long or medium-length videos to YouTube or short-form videos on TikTok, this format is fast becoming a must-have in content marketing campaigns.

For instance, according to HubSpot, 88% of marketers use videos as one of their preferred lead-generating methods. Let’s be honest – not everyone wants to read new blog posts. For these people, video is the perfect format.

Creating videos is also great for organic search results. Many keywords, especially those explaining how to do things, feature videos in their search listings.

Content marketing generates lots of leads when done well. By reading the previously mentioned information, you’re ready to create content that generates leads around the clock. Including this type of content in your marketing funnel often leads to amazing results for your business.

Need a content upgrade but don’t have the time or the budget to hire a content team? Content Marketing Life is here to help. We offer lead-generating content that your target audience can’t resist.

Content Marketing Life