“With more small businesses going digital in the past year than ever before, it is extremely important to learn to implement and improve your marketing strategies for your business. Making these improvements has become extremely necessary in order to succeed online, and ultimately “survive” as a small business.”

So what is the most crucial marketing goal that small businesses should focus on? That is the golden question which we will be answering in this article.

Small Business Top Marketing Priorities

Service Direct performed a survey on 250 local service businesses in 2020 to identify their marketing goals. The results demonstrated that 48% of local service businesses stated that increasing lead volume is a top priority marketing goal and 42% stated that improving lead quality was a top priority marketing goal.

There is very good reasoning behind these businesses’ responses and this is because the more leads a business gets, the better chance they will have of scheduling jobs and driving revenue. However, companies typically see a higher return on investments with a lower amount of high-quality leads instead of a surplus of bad leads. To better understand this, let’s dive deeper into how lead generation actually works. 

What is the Lead Generation Process?

Lead generation is crucial to the survival of any business. Leads can range from the people who come into your store, to those who visit your website to check if your business can serve their needs. The majority of users search the web for local services and products before ever making a purchase decision.

The main difference between leads and website traffic is that leads mean more business through the door. Whereas with website traffic, the more traffic you receive, means more exposure for your website and business. Because of this, optimizing your website for more leads requires a lot of trial and error testing to find out what draws in conversions. This doesn’t mean you have to completely redo your website if you aren’t generating a ton of leads. There are plenty of ways you can leverage your website to bring in more leads and sales.

Quality Leads over Quantity of Leads

There are several ways for you to start generating leads for your website and this all boils down to good marketing efforts. You have to know what types of messaging and marketing will make your audience connect in the best way. Lead Generation is not just collecting a bunch of email addresses for email marketing messages. If you truly want to generate leads and drive profits, you must build a funnel that brings in high-quality leads to keep a business successful. Although email marketing can be a part of that lead funnel, it is not the only step. 

So, how is a “high-quality lead” defined?

High-quality leads refer to those leads that have a greater likelihood of converting into a paying customer. The higher the quality of a lead, the higher chance they have of purchasing your product or service. This classification is established by using lead scoring techniques that systematically attribute values to your leads based on principles such as lead behavior, lead source, product fit, and persona match. Typically, high-quality leads have a strong product fit, which in turn, increases their retention and lifetime value. 

Businesses want to get more leads in order to get more customers like this. However, the majority of those new leads are price shoppers, spam calls, or individuals who are not currently seeking the company’s services. 

This leads us to why the phrase “quality over quantity” in the world of lead generation is so very important. While most companies think they need to bring in as many leads as possible, research shows that companies have more success when the quality of leads is the top priority.

Tips to Increase Leads Quality

Moving from focusing on lead volume to focusing on lead quality can be a difficult and frustrating step for many local service businesses to take because it doesn’t seem practical. However, there are many actions that local service businesses can take to begin bringing in high-quality leads quickly, that will make a much greater difference for their businesses success.

Make Sure your Site is Optimized for Potential Conversions

By ensuring that your website has the best user experience possible, your content and design will do their part to guide your site visitors through the sales funnel. By optimizing your website for conversion as soon as possible, the quicker you’ll see the desired results. At this point, you must create a user-friendly page that includes engaging content and direct messages to attract leads at each stage of the process.

A successful way to do this is by providing valuable guides, checklists, or downloadable e-books that will assist you in gaining detailed information from your audience. Additionally, you can add CTA buttons such as “Estimate the Cost”, “Contact Us”, and others to determine which users are ready to convert.

Score Your Leads to Understand Successes and Shortcomings

Lead scoring is a key part of lead generation, particularly when it comes to the quality of leads. By developing and implementing an effective lead scoring system, you are able to better understand the value of your leads and where you are lacking that value. Not to mention, with an effective lead scoring system, you will be more likely to capture those quality leads that may have otherwise slipped away.

Use Remarketing to Increase Conversions

Remarketing can be an excellent way to obtain higher-quality leads because it allows businesses to connect with individuals who have considered their services in the past. By taking the time to utilize remarketing tactics such as social media ads, arranging your CTA based on customer demand, and segmenting your remarketing campaigns by service offerings, you will start to witness an increase in lead quality.

SEO User Intent

User Intent, also known as search intent, is the primary goal that users try to achieve when searching for a query. User intent can be categorized in three different ways: go, do, and know. This helps align the objectives of your business with those of your customers. You can attract people who are ready to buy from you by giving them what they want, instead of what you think they want. User satisfaction, quality content, and target audience focusing are ways that SEO User Intent generates higher quality leads.

How to Implement Local Lead Generation Strategies

Localized Lead Magnets

You can use localized lead magnets to ensure you are gathering emails only from the local area. Since this is one of the most effective ways to get all of the necessary details from your potential leads, the following is recommended: creating a guide for buying a house in a specific city, e-books, email-gated videos, and other types of calculators to assist users in estimating property sale price or getting advice on something. 

This doesn’t mean forget about your leads. These lead magnets are not just about gathering emails, but also serve as a way to keep in touch with leads to convert them into clients. Be weary not to become pushier in your tactics with communication, this will only push your messages right into spam folders. Instead, you can utilize a situation when users would need to download a guide from your page, to then have a follow-up email sent afterwards asking whether they found it helpful. Additionally, you can also automate sequences to ask your users for feedback or include a suggestion to check out related content.

Optimize your Page for Local Search

By adding local keyword modifiers, you can give yourself a huge advantage in easily ranking for your target keywords. For example, instead of setting the keyword “best lawyer” to get placed on the first page, you should instead shift to using keywords such as ”best lawyer near me” or “best lawyer in Florida”.

Google provides searchers with auto-complete suggestions when typing in terms or questions into the search bar, and you can use these words and phrases to craft the keywords for your business. This is to help your business or services show up in the SERP (Search Engine Results Page), when a person searches for these common phrases. Now, all there is to do is to use a special tool to track your rankings and get alerted when changes arise. 

Include your Business in Local Listings

When someone searches for something near them on Google, the map pack works to push organic results right underneath the search bar. This makes it possible for local businesses in the area to stand out when a user is looking for a related product or service on the web. In order to show up in this designated area, you must add your page to Google My Business to improve your visibility and grow your website’s SEO opportunities.

One you have set up your Google My Business, it is time to look at the potential listings you can place your business into. This process is not time consuming, but will provide great results for your business, promote your page, and potentially increase leads to your page. This is because users who search for services in listings have a high conversion rate. Once these individuals have a need to put their money into a local product or service, they just need your listing to point them in the right direction.

Lead Generation for Your Small Business

Digital marketing is continuously developing, so you’ll frequently hear about all the new tactics to generate leads for your business. Sometimes sticking to the old traditional methods works best, but relying on creative innovation can have a huge impact on your success. Since our world is constantly evolving and moving more online, your business needs to be prepared for that.

What works for one local business may not work as well for others. Online marketing is an ongoing test to try and determine which strategies and techniques work best for you to reach your goals. Make certain that you discover your niche, fine tune your strategy, and have a fully prepared lead generation strategy to grow your business.