For the longest time, lead generation on social media was a secondary goal when it came to businesses and their use of the medium.
Instead, social media was all about awareness, community, interaction, and building a fanbase.
While these goals certainly offer value and shouldn’t be discounted, they don’t pay the bills – something businesses of all shapes and sizes have come to realise over the last few years.
Now that we have access to ever-increasing data points that can identify sales opportunities, as well as what marketing message can move a customer from a prospect into a lead, the days of social media simply acting as an awareness channel is no longer the only option.
At SoAmpli, we see this all the time when working with salespeople looking to use social media better through our content curation platform. Indeed, in our own analysis of the kind of content that is shared most by salespeople, we’ve found there are definitive types that are more successful when it comes to social media being used for lead generation.
Company News and PR Coverage
Perhaps not surprisingly, this was the top content shared by salespeople on social media, accounting for 31.8% of all content.
Positive news about sales; new appointments of senior, influential executives; feel-good stories that show the company is involved in the local and global community.
When businesses are being hailed for their success in both sales and their culture, it makes them an attractive proposition for talent, sales partners, customers, and more.
Think of what success story your business can share, and tailor it for the audience you’re trying to reach – a feel-good story will relate more to customers who like to support social causes, for example.
Creating short, punchy videos that accentuate these stories make them easier to share, while offering a rich and powerful call-to-action to initiate a lead or inquiry.
Curated Third-Party Content on Industry Trends
The second most popular was curated content, especially when it came to industry trends, accounting for 22.7% of all content.
Successful salespeople and marketers need to stay up-to-date with what’s happening in their industry, and what’s coming down the line.
Knowing the trends that are shaping the industry can help position your business at the forefront of these trends, and keep you front of mind with your customers. Creating a white paper about these trends, or a downloadable PDF, offer you warm leads to follow up on earlier in the sales cycle.
Helpful Content Created for a Specific Audience
Accounting for 18.2% of the most popular content, helpful content that targeted a specific audience was the third most shared by salespeople.
Again, perhaps this isn’t too surprising – much like any good salesperson will understand a lead’s pain point or need-to-have before a meeting, content based on audience ensures only the most relevant information is shared.
By looking at the analytics around the usage of your software, or the kind of searches bringing traffic from Google, you can tailor specific content based on the audience you’re trying to reach.
- For mobile visitors looking to find out more about your company, a short responsive video can highlight featured services, with an option to add push notifications for the latest news.
- For web visitors that are looking to compare your service or product with a competitor, a dedicated landing page that is triggered by keyword searches can offer that comparison with a special, time-sensitive offer to buy now.
Understanding the audience’s needs will help you identify what, and when, to provide, turning interested parties into warm leads, or even conversions.
Topical Content Based on Cultural Celebration
The fourth most popular type of content for lead generation on social media was topical content, especially when it comes to cultural events around specific days of celebration, accounting for 14.5%.
No longer restricted to seasonal holidays or Mother’s Day / Father’s Day, the most successful businesses are tapping into customers looking to do something special at certain times of the year.
- Webinars that show how to use a CRM to build better leads through cultural interests;
- Offering software or platform upgrades based on a special event (“this Thanksgiving, you’re going to thank us for the extra power we’re about to give you”);
- Offering lessons on how best to celebrate a cultural event;
- How your company celebrates with its employees on special days of the year.
These ideas, and others like them, promote your business as one that embraces the importance of these holidays, and why customers should buy from you as opposed to your competitors.
Content that resonates with the target audience – a sentimental video for a family reconnection, or an infographic on the history of a specific celebration – increases the likelihood of being shared, and forming leads from those who react the strongest.
Promotion of Company-Related Events
With 12.8% of the audience, the fifth most popular topic shared on social media is that of company-related events and the promotion of them.
Ranging from open houses to job fairs, community events to sponsoring local businesses and partnering with social causes, these events can offer multiple leads for salespeople.
- Showcasing the latest product brings potential customers into direct contact with you;
- Sponsoring local businesses connects you with their suppliers and customers;
- Supporting social causes connects you with customers that prefer doing business with conscientious companies.
Creating content that can take advantage of these events is key to generating a lead while the event is still fresh on their minds.
Having visitors to the event utilising a hashtag, and then using a social CRM platform like Nimble to connect the dots on that person, their business, their interests, etc., helps to build a powerful profile of who you’re trying to sell to, and what encourages them to move from lead to sale.
As data continues to provide more tools to understand who the audience is, what motivates them, and how to present your message at the optimum time, sales and marketing teams have never been better informed.
With sales and marketing working together, creating the kind of content that is shared frequently and repeatedly, businesses are discovering lead generation on social media isn’t just a luxury – it’s an essential part of the revenue-generating toolkit.
