There are quite a few lead generation strategies I’ve tried back in the day. So, I would say your choice should be based on your industry, business type, and audience you are targeting.
https://www.a2cdigital.com/post/2021-new-lead-generation-strategy-3-0For example, if you are working in SaaS sales, there are some must-try lead generation strategies for you – 5 Lead Generation Techniques For SaaS Businesses
As for me, there’s one tactic that has worked especially well. In a nutshell, it works like this:
- Target
To start with, you will need a buyer persona (unless you already have it). Although be careful – there are certain mistakes most sales reps make when identifying their buyer personas (read more about it here – Creating Buyer Personas: The Biggest Mistakes)
Once you know who you should target, look up the accounts that meet your requirements. I used to rely mostly on LinkedIn or business listings like CrunchBase/AngelList, but you can pick any other platform that you see fit, e.g. Owler or Yelp.
- Research
To make sure the prospects actually fit in with your buyer persona, do your research. To start with, you can simply google the person or browse through their social media profiles. Any information you can find, from the content they share to their background or interests, can come in handy.
Based on the data you collect, you can further segment the prospects into smaller, targeted groups and tailor your message accordingly for better performance.
Also, you should try to find the prospects’ contact data, including emails and phone numbers. Tools like
“Name2email” or “Reply chrome extension” can help you do that.
- Contact
Next, go ahead and contact the prospects. You can do so via social media, email, or even make a call right away. I personally prefer starting a conversation via email and there are several reasons for that:
- It is a non-intrusive method (unlike voice calls)
- It is considered a go-to medium for business communication
- It is easy to use at scale while keeping the communication personal
- It can be automated
If you are struggling to write a good cold email, I’ve shared some best practices (as well as proven templates) in my previous answers:
Pro tip: Before you reach out to a person try to build awareness first – comment or like the content they’ve shared on social media, get active in a group you both are members of, etc. The goal is to catch the prospect’s eye – if they remember you, they will be more likely to respond to your messages.
- Follow up
As mentioned above, you can and should use different channels when trying to connect with the prospect. However, you shouldn’t bombard the prospect with emails, LinkedIn messages and phone calls all at the same time. A much better strategy is to include all of these channels as the steps of the same outreach sequence.
For example, here’s an example of a multichannel sequence we’ve been using at Reply lately:
As you can see, it includes an initial cold email as well as a number of follow-ups across different channels (completely automated using Reply platform).
- Analyze and improve
Another benefit of using outreach automation software for lead generation is that it gives you tons of data so you can clearly see if your strategy is working or not and how to make it even better.
For example, if you analyze the bounce, open, and response rates for each of your emails within the sequence, you can easily pinpoint the problems with your campaign and make the corresponding changes.
Plus, it is also very easy to segment your audience and A/B test different templates or, for example, personalization options to see what works best for each prospect group.
That’s pretty much it.
Of course, there are certain best practices you should follow (as well as some pitfalls to avoid) if you want this strategy to work out as well as it did for me. You can learn more about the common mistakes of cold outreach here
BTW, I am regularly sharing my first-hand experience and pro tips on B2B sales and cold outreach – you are welcome to check out my previous answers (or follow me to get notified about future updates)!
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