For any business to succeed, your target audience must know about your business.
It’s not enough to have a foolproof business plan or the best product, you are headed for failure if you cannot make sales.
In the United States, about 20% of businesses fail within the first year, only about 30% of businesses make it to their tenth year. A similar situation can be found in the United Kingdom where 60% of businesses fail within the first five years. That’s how it’s obtainable in Australia, New Zealand, and the rest of Europe.
The NUMBER ONE reason for the failure of these businesses is the inability to make sales.
Those who are able to make sales are afloat and winning.
To avoid being part of these numbers, you have to be able to generate leads online for free. Why “online” and why “free”?
Regardless of the type of business, a majority of your target audience is present on the internet where they spend three hours daily. Due to the limited marketing budget at your disposal, generating leads online for FREE will enable you to make money online for your business.
That settled, what are the practical but smart ways to generate leads online for free;
1. Answer Questions on Quora
Quora is often underrated by businesses in need of leads. What many are unaware of is that it’s an untapped goldmine.
What you have to do is get noticed. You can only get noticed on Quora if you answer numerous questions of users expertly. When you are noticed, your website will be checked out through your profile.
There are different segments on Quora, answer questions that are related to your business. This will establish you as an authority and many will find it worthwhile to want to know more about your business.
2. Start a YouTube Channel
With a worldwide userbase of over 2 billion, YouTube offers businesses the opportunity to generate leads online free.
While it’s a video hosting service, YouTube is also a massive search engine that competes excellently with social media platforms. If you want to play a long game with your leads, starting a YouTube channel should be on your lists.
People are always looking for tutorials, reviews, and other information on YouTube. Provide them with these resources on your channel and they will come back for more.
3. Optimize Social Media Profiles To Attract Leads
As a business in need of a means to generate leads online free, your social media is a great place to start.
You have to do all you can to keep your social media accounts updated and fresh at all times. There’s no social media account that cannot help in generating leads online free, it’s a matter of how you are going about it.
Let’s assume you run a B2B business, you should sit on LinkedIn where you must have a stellar headline and descriptive summary. That’s all you need to close the deals.
4. Ask For Referrals From Your Current Customers
What you are actually looking for is more customers in order to stay profitable, You need to reach out to current clients, thank them for the business and ask for their help in generating more leads.
You should be 100% certain that the customer you are asking for a referral is happy with your service. Ask for a 10-minute conversation with the client and don’t forget to thank them for their time.
Go on to ask if there are any of their companies, contacts, and associates that would be interested in your service.
That’s one simple way to generate leads online free.
5. Work Out an Email Sequence
In order to generate leads online for free, you will have to come up with a creative email sequence that grabs all the attention.
To be able to implement an email sequence, that means you must have been building an email list long before. Forge a 6 step sequence with each having a purpose;
- Email 1: Identify Pain points
- Email 2: Explain Value Created
- Email 3: Subtle Mention of a Big Client
- Email 4: Roll Out Your Strength
- Email 5: Introduce Your Product/Service
- Email 6: Reach Out Again with a Summary
6. Host a Webinar or Workshop
If generating leads online for free is what you have on your mind, then you will have to do it at the expense of sharing your expertise.
People are only going to buy what you are selling if you are able to establish your expertise as an individual. This is why it’s not enough to publish blog posts and articles, you will have to host webinars and workshop online. Making money online is quite easy if you can generate leads online for free; enough leads to help your business stay profitable and relevant.
