Lead generation is one of the hottest topics in the B2B world. Some claim to have the perfect solution. But first of all, there’s no magic wand (as you’ll see later). Something you heard somewhere could be helpful, and you can maybe use that knowledge to generate quality leads for your business…
But as our good friends, Ancient Romans used to say – cum grano salis.
In other words, don’t believe everything you hear or see. Why?
Because:
- not every market is the same
- not every offer is the same
- every lead is different (if you do your job well)
That means you can’t copy/paste a lead generation strategy from a random company in your industry and expect the same results. We understand that all those easy ways to get leads sound tempting. But many companies wander around the clientless abyss because they think the next thing they try will change everything. We’ll return to the shiny object syndrome (and those who spread it).
However, now it’s time to mention our other ancient friends.
Lack Of Strategy or Having a Wrong Strategy
There once was a woman whose husband got a gift. But every good gift has rules (you know, like Gremlins). However, the thing from this ancient story had only 1 – leave it alone.
Yet we all know people are curious and can’t resist the urge to get closure on every story. So the woman decided that she needed to see what was hidden in the box.
(Thank God that happened in Ancient Greek because there’d probably be an unboxing video if it happened today).
The woman, Pandora, opened the box, hoping to find hundreds of high-quality B2B leads inside. But sadly, she found only inactive email addresses and 404 links. And something that many companies use as a business strategy to this day…
We don’t have to tell you that Pandora’s startup went out of business before the next Olympic games. She was so frustrated yet had no choice but to get back to her 9-5 job at the stables.
Why?
Because hope is not a strategy!
Hope is fine, but a blind chicken can hope to catch a worm. However, a chicken that can see and knows where to look – gets the worm. Simple.
So not having a (lead generation) strategy is easily one of the foundational business scaling mistakes. If you can’t get more leads, you can’t get more clients. If you can’t get more clients, you can’t scale.
So before wasting any resources on lead generation, sit with your team (or someone more experienced in the field). Lay down everything you know about your business, market, and competitors. Then come up with a strategy that doesn’t rely on hope to bring results.
Of course, you can never be sure of anything in B2B. But when you have the right direction and all the details about getting to your goal – chances for success grow exponentially.
“Yeah, that’s cool and all, but we don’t have any strategy, and we’re doing fine.”
We hope that the upper statement didn’t just cross your mind. Sooner than later, businesses targeting other businesses realize that…
Spray And Pray (Shotgun Approach) Doesn’t Pay Off
One of the business aspects where many digital agencies and other expertise-based businesses often fail is having only the first layer of strategy. They imagine their dream clients and put them on pedestals. So they do everything with only one purpose – catching those dream clients.
But…
Imagine your dream client as the brightest star in the night sky. You know that you need to follow it if you want to achieve your business goals. However, you can’t forget that you aren’t flying. You’re walking. And you need to watch your steps.
Those who don’t go deeper than determining their ideal clients stumble and fall. They get lost and desperate if stars don’t fall right into their laps. And desperation never rides alone. With it comes something equally smelly and dangerous.
Panic!
The shotgun approach is a waste of resources. It relies on quantity instead of quality. Or in other words, it’s based on hope instead of data. That’s why most businesses with poor strategies never get their ideal clients.
If you’re a serious business, someone who replies to anything similar to the cold email template below isn’t your ideal client:
“Hi,
I’m X from Z. We help you achieve Y.
Wanna jump on a call?”
Why? Because whatever someone behind that email sells is nothing more than a commodity. And thousands, if not millions, do that but for a lower price. That’s fine if you want to compete based on price… Yet you don’t. No one wants to race to the bottom. Such companies don’t know how to switch to value-based pricing.
However, Spray and Pray usually lead to settling down for toxic clients (if they manage to get any clients). The road to closing those non-ideal clients is full of weak leads. Filtering through weak leads takes more time than nourishing good leads. Also, as Gio said in the latest episode of the Maoio Podcast, that hurts branding.
If you’re constantly pitching to the wrong companies and working with the wrong clients, you can’t expect to build a brand that’d attract your ideal clients. That means companies take themselves further away from ever accomplishing their big goals simply because they lack a lead-generation strategy. Without it, they must act opportunistically and eat whatever they can find. Something like hyenas.
But wouldn’t you prefer to be a lion and eat what you want instead? Everyone would. Which lures companies into another B2B lead-generating mistake.
Expecting Immediate Results
Being excited about your business is the foundation of success in B2B. If you don’t care about your company, no one else will. However, being overly excited is the first thing you need to avoid. That makes teams expect results immediately.
We’re all used to getting whatever we want quickly. And there are so many examples of quick wins that a person can’t be satisfied with regular results anymore. However, those are counterproductive.
The modern world makes us impatient, but the lack of patience in the whole society doesn’t change the fact that everything good takes time.
Let’s get back to the cold email B2B template. You can send tens of thousands of emails. And even if you get a 50% reply rate (which you won’t), you still need to invest your resources into determining which leads are solid and converting them.
So even if you get 100 leads the first day you start lead generation, that wouldn’t be an immediate result. It would if your goal was to get leads… Yet your goal is to convert leads. That’s what counts.
Don’t get us wrong, we aren’t against cold outreach, but in B2B, it’s much better to focus on quality than quantity. In the long run, it saves a lot of resources. Your team won’t burn out every 3 months. You won’t hurt your branding. You won’t become a company that slides in DMs like LinkedIn is Tinder.
The Secret of B2B Lead Generation Revealed?
If you want to take one gem from this blog, it should be this…
Learn how to network efficiently to create a lead-generation Perpetuum mobile.
Yes. That’s the big secret (at least half of it – the rest comes later). It takes more time than sending 123232 emails per day at first. You might not get many clients, maybe any, for months. But once you do, the snowball effect will carry you.
Solve a problem for one company, they’ll recommend you to another. Give advice to someone, be kind, help…
People remember that. And companies are people, not offices. So we could say that B2B doesn’t exist because you aren’t selling to a logo, website, or whatever. You’re selling to people. And nothing comes close to networking when it comes to lead generation.
Positivity spreads quickly.
But don’t be impatient. Stick to your strategy (if it makes sense). We’ve seen many times that teams give up because they burned through the marketing budget without getting much back, so they give up because they want to try something else while they still have time.
But that’s wrong. Slight changes in the strategy could bring the desired outcome. Often the problem hides in the budget (not what you have, but how you use it).
So instead of chasing shiny objects, think about taking a step back and looking at your budget. Then adjust your lead generation strategy according to new data. Since that’s easier said than done, we can teach you how to define your marketing budget according to your specific needs.
Believing in a Magic Wand (Sorry, But You Aren’t Harry Potter)
Now you know that lack of consistency, poor networking, and branding makes it difficult to have a long-term B2B lead generation strategy. But we still need to address those who spread false hope.
Everyone nowadays is a victim of shiny object syndrome in one way or another. However, we’ll focus on silly offers that promise everything immediately. Even if you know those are fake, you can’t avoid thinking about what if it really works. Hopefully, you look at such offers only from the marketer’s POV, not the buyer’s.
But some business owners get hooked and set their hopes too high. Only to get shattered once they realize that was another wrong investment. Don’t fall for anything that sounds too good to be true. Would you believe a guy who says that he can build your entire house in one day alone? We hope not.
So why would you believe a company that promises an abundance of B2B leads every day without knowing anything about your business? No reason at all. Plug-and-play magic solutions don’t exist.
You need people, budget, skills, time, process, and a way to network. There’s no magic. It might feel like that to people outside, but everyone experienced knows that magic is hard (smart) work.
Before we reveal the rest of the big secret of B2B lead generation, we’ll share another tip… That one is perfect for you if you prefer to work smart instead of hard.
Always productize your services because it lets you keep track of results, wins, and failures (among other things). The more data you have, the better strategy you can make.
Or you can’t…
But even if you don’t know anything but how to do your job, you can get high-quality leads because…
The Secret of B2B Lead Generation Revealed!
Imagine you’re a penguin. You’re stuck in some cold place, and the winds are killing you. But all of your friends stand close together to endure the blizzard. Yet, you, the stubborn bird who knows and wants to do everything alone, insist that hiding behind this snowman is better than hugging.
Yeah, but that snowman turns out to be a snow troll looking for the next snack. So you manage to hide from the blizzard. Yet your sanctuary becomes the belly of the beast.
Just because you insisted on doing everything your way.
Don’t be that kind of penguin.
Have the right people by your side. You have your skills; they have theirs. What you don’t know, you don’t know. It’s easier to pay someone to solve a problem you have than to learn everything by yourself.
Filip Zolota, a seasoned consultant and business owner, always says:
“Do what you do best. Pay for the rest.”
That’s the second part of the big secret.
Let’s recap…
To ensure you never feel the draught of B2B leads, you must:
- build a strong network
- do what you do best; pay for the rest
And if you want to get both parts of the B2B lead-generating (client-producing) secret, check out this growth mastermind for service-based businesses.
