Inbound lead generation is a necessary part of successful sales and marketing, as it helps attract potential customers by raising brand awareness and creating tailored experiences for them.
In this guide, we’ll explore the 10 tested and tried inbound lead generation strategies to enable you to design your own approach based on your unique needs, goals, and target audience.
But first, let’s answer the essential question.
TL;DR
- Inbound lead generation is the process of attracting potential customers by using relevant resources and providing personalized experiences instead of pitching your sales offer directly.
- It’s more subtle than traditional and outbound marketing, focusing on long-term, sustainable results and targeting specific, qualified leads rather than a broad audience.
Several strategies are crucial for efficient inbound lead generation, such as:
- Content marketing
- SEO
- Social media marketing
- Email marketing
- Lead magnets
- Landing pages
- Affiliate marketing
- Content upgrades
- Chatbots
- Webinars and online events
Warmly can help you handle various segments of inbound lead generation, from identifying inbound website leads to nurturing them.
What is inbound lead generation?
Inbound lead generation is a strategy where businesses attract potential customers through valuable content and experiences rather than pushing their message out through traditional marketing methods.
The idea is to draw prospects in by providing helpful, relevant information that addresses their needs or interests instead of reaching out to them and pitching your offer point blank.
As such, inbound lead generation can include a range of techniques, such as:
🎯 Content marketing - Creating compelling content, such as blog posts, ebooks, whitepapers, videos, etc., that educates or entertains your target audience.
🎯 SEO - Optimizing your content and website to rank higher in search engine results, making it easier for people to find you when searching for related topics.
🎯 Social media marketing - Sharing content, participating in discussions, and building relationships on social media platforms where your target audience resides.
🎯 Lead magnets - Offering free resources or tools in exchange for contact information, such as downloadable guides, templates, or webinars.
🎯 Email marketing - Sending targeted, valuable content to leads who have shown interest in your offerings by subscribing to your newsletter, downloading a playbook, etc.
We’ll cover these and other techniques in more detail later on.
How is inbound lead generation different from traditional marketing?
The best way to understand the difference between lead generation and traditional marketing is to use the pull vs. push approach (and no, it has nothing to do with the gym).
Inbound lead generation aims to pull leads in by providing valuable content and experiences that resonate with their needs, interests, and pain points.
In this case, leads come to your business on their own accord, drawn in by the resources you provide because they find them useful, helpful, or intriguing.
Of course, this means that you’ll focus on leads who have already expressed an interest in your solution, i.e., who are aware of a need or problem that they need to address.
This interest is the very thing that pulls them to your brand.
Traditional marketing, on the other hand, actively pushes your offer and marketing messaging through various channels, aiming to persuade a broad audience to act immediately—buy your product, subscribe, etc.
This approach usually interrupts leads’ activities, hoping your message will catch their attention, regardless of whether they are actively looking for a similar solution.
Here’s a quick cheat sheet to help you differentiate the two:
Inbound lead generation:
- Attraction-based - Focuses on drawing prospects in by offering valuable content and experiences. The goal is to engage people who are already interested in or searching for solutions related to what you offer.
- Content-driven - Relies heavily on creating high-quality content such as blog posts, ebooks, and videos to attract and engage potential leads.
- Permission-based - Involves gaining permission from users to send them information, such as through email subscriptions or downloadable resources.
- Customer-centric - Tailors content and interactions to address the specific needs and pain points of potential customers.
- Long-term relationships - Aims to build trust and nurture relationships over time, leading to higher quality leads and more sustainable growth.
Traditional marketing:
- Outbound - Focuses on pushing messages out to a broad audience through channels like TV ads, radio, print media, and direct mail, often interrupting the recipient’s activities.
- Product-focused - This approach emphasizes promoting products or services directly, often using persuasive techniques to capture attention and drive immediate responses.
- Interruption-based - Often interrupts the target audience’s routine, hoping that the message will resonate and prompt action regardless of their current needs and interest level.
- Less personalization - Tends to be more generic, aiming to reach as broad an audience as possible without considering their specific interests that much.
- Short-term results: Often focuses on generating quick sales or leads, with less emphasis on building long-term relationships with prospects.
What are the best inbound lead generation tactics?
And now, without further ado, let’s break down the 10 best inbound lead generation strategies you should deploy to attract more quality leads across channels.
Pro tip: You can use as many tactics as you want, as they’re not mutually exclusive. When deciding, just keep in mind who your target audience is and where they are most likely to be found, what goals you want to achieve, and how much time and money you’re willing to spend.
1. Content marketing
As mentioned above, content marketing is one of inbound lead generation’s crucial components, as it’s one sure way of attracting potential customers and positioning your brand as a source of truth.
Namely, leads who are looking for information or solutions for their pain points will be drawn to your brand if you provide them with the answers they need.
As a result, you’ll build trust and authority, encouraging leads to opt for your solution when they decide to buy.
Here’s a helpful example of how you can use well-crafted and optimized BOFU content to monetize on leads who are still in the consideration stage and push them further down the sales funnel.
You can create various content types, depending on your objectives, including:
- Blogs - Regularly publishing informative, educational, and relevant posts that address your target audience’s pain points can help you gain significant traction in your industry. Don’t forget to update posts to ensure they’ll be fresh and relevant year-round.
- Ebooks and whitepapers - These are more in-depth resources that offer even more value than blogs, as they tend to break down crucial questions in more detail. As such, they’re usually used as lead magnets, where visitors provide their contact information to access them.
- Case studies—These allow you to incorporate social proof into your content strategy by showcasing real-life examples of how your product or service has solved problems for other customers.
- Podcasts and videos - Video content can be highly engaging. Just make sure to cover interesting topics, host industry experts, etc.
Pro tip: Creating quality content can help not only with attracting leads but also with getting backlinks. If your content is good enough, other sites - including those with higher domain rankings - will be more likely to link back to your website.
2. SEO and organic traffic
SEO (Search Engine Optimization) boosts your brand visibility by helping you to rank higher on SERPs. In turn, you’ll be able to drive more organic traffic.
Namely, having good SERP positioning increases the likelihood that web surfers looking for relevant information or solutions will click through to your website instead of turning to your competitors.
Remember, regardless of how good your product actually is, it won’t mean much if you can’t get people to look at it.
To ensure a steady stream of organic traffic, there are several SEO aspects to focus on, including:
- Keyword research and optimization - Use industry and topic-relevant keywords in your content and website to improve search engine rankings and to attract the right kind of audience. After all, you can’t expect to draw in quality leads if you don’t use targeted keywords bound to spark their interest. Invest in keyword research tools such as Ahrefs to identify the right keywords.
- On-page SEO - Optimize crucial elements of your web pages and content, such as meta tags, headings, and images. Publishing content and web copy following SEO guidelines will help search engines understand and rank your content and enhance reader experience and readability.
- Link building - Getting backlinks from reputable sites improves your domain rating and visibility. You can achieve this by leveraging guest blogging, link exchange, or by creating high-value content others will want to refer to (think of content that features things like industry benchmarks, trends and statistics, etc.).
3. Social media marketing
Since the whole point of lead generation is to entice prospects to come to you, social media is one of the first places to focus on, as nowadays, everyone is online.
Of course, you don’t have to disperse your efforts across all platforms. The right social media platform for your business depends on two main factors:
- Whether you’re a B2B or a B2C company and your vertical - Some platforms are designed for professionals alone (e.g., LinkedIn), while others include more versatile demographics. For instance, focusing on Instagram won't be the ideal choice if you target businesses in a highly specific vertical, such as the banking sector. Conversely, if you’re in B2C e-commerce, LinkedIn alone won’t help you generate as many leads as some other social media.
- Your target audience - Different audience types reside in different social media. For instance, Gen Z is most likely to be found on TikTok, decision-makers on LinkedIn, gamers on Discord and Reddit, etc. Define your target audience and determine where they live online before designing a social media lead generation strategy.
To engage with leads online, you should focus on:
- Sharing engaging content as frequently as possible - Being regular and persistent is key in social media marketing, so just make sure to post intriguing content as often as possible.
- Creating compelling content - Posts that include visuals, such as infographics or videos typically perform better and can increase engagement. Content like listicles, short how-to guides, etc., can also resonate well with your audience - just make sure they’re relevant for your ICPs.
Whether for yourself 👇
Or your brand👇
- Interacting with your followers - Engagement is a two-way street, meaning you must give some to get some. You can’t afford to ghost your followers, so you should dedicate time to answering questions and comments, participating in discussions, and creating interactive content (e.g., polls, quizzes, etc.) to drive engagement and build rapport.
4. Email marketing
Email marketing might initially sound like an outbound lead generation technique, given that you send emails to potential leads.
However, inbound email campaigns differ from cold email campaigns in one key aspect - you reach out to people who’ve already shown a certain interest in your solution, e.g., downloaded an ebook, subscribed to your newsletter, etc.
So, to create efficient email marketing campaigns, you first need to build and segment email lists based on leads’ interests, behavior, and previous interactions with your marketing efforts.
For instance, leads who have expressed interest in a particular product can receive emails with detailed information, case studies, or special offers related to that product.
Conversely, those who have engaged with educational content such as ebooks might receive emails featuring new blog posts or upcoming webinars.
Another key point in email campaigns is personalization. Ensure that each email is tailored to the specific audience segment and individual lead, as that’s your best shot that your emails will have high open and click-through rates.
💡 Pro tip: Instead of dealing with all this manually, you can use marketing automation tools. These can help you cover all aspects of inbound email lead generation, from list building and segmentation to crafting and sending personalized emails.
For example, Warmly can add website visitors who match certain criteria (e.g., match your ICP, show high intent, etc.) to automated email and LinkedIn sequences.
Each lead will receive a contextual email or LinkedIn DM based on their interests, interaction with your website, demographics, etc.
5. Lead magnets
Lead magnets are another way of monetizing your most valuable content, such as ebooks, guides, detailed reports, etc.
Namely, gatekeeping your best resources will incentivize leads to provide their contact information in return for access to them.
However, keep in mind that people value their privacy more than anything, especially given the sheer number of spammy emails an average person receives daily.
This means you’ll have to ensure that the content you’re offering is really valuable enough for leads to be ready to give their contact in return. This content typically includes:
- Ebooks and guides - In-depth resources that provide a more detailed view of topics and issues relevant to your audience.
- Reports and whitepapers - Detailed documents on industry trends, benchmarks, research findings, etc.
- Templates and checklists - Ready-to-use tools, such as marketing plans, budget templates, lead generation checklists, etc.
- Quizzes and assessments - Interactive content that gamifies lead engagement by providing personalized results based on users’ unique inputs.
6. Landing pages
Creating dedicated landing pages for specific content, offers, or campaigns is another crucial part of inbound lead generation campaigns.
For optimal results, design landing pages that are:
- Simple, concise, and to-the-point - Most leads will just skim over it, so save your writing skills for other content types.
- Include compelling offers and CTAs leads will find difficult to resist - Feature strong value propositions relevant to the source that brought leads to that specific page. For instance, if they clicked through your newsletter that addresses LinkedIn prospecting best practices, the offer and CTA could include actions like “Download Free Ebook,” “Try For Free,” etc.
💡 Pro tip: To determine how a landing page performs, use a website traffic tracking tool like Warmly. That way, you’ll be able to monitor who lands on your web pages, how they interact with them, and more.
Find out how to identify companies and individuals visiting your website here.
7. Influencer marketing
Partnering up with key influencers in your industry is another great way to capture the attention of your ideal audience.
Industry influencers already have a large following, many of which are businesses and/or individuals who match your ICP, so there’s no reason to let that go to waste.
Offer incentives to influencers - the most common way is to give them commission rates for each sale, lead, or click-through - in return for them to subtly promote your brand to their followers.
This can be done in various ways, including:
- Guest blogging.
- Giveaways and contests.
- Product reviews and demonstrations.
Source
8. Content upgrades
This is a more advanced inbound lead generation technique, as it involves offering additional value or content related to the content your audience is already consuming.
For example, you could offer downloadable cold email templates to readers of a blog that breaks down cold email outreach.
This enables you to make the most of the leads who have already shown interest in your content and solution, which makes them much more likely to provide their contact info in exchange for access to content upgrades.
In addition to templates and checklists, typical content upgrades include resources similar to basic lead magnets, such as:
- Ebooks.
- Exclusive interviews.
- Playbooks and worksheets.
- Benchmark reports.
- Bonus content.
Source
9. Chatbots
Chatbots are another excellent way to engage and qualify specific inbound leads - website visitors.
If an individual or a stakeholder lands on your website, that’s typically a sign that they’re interested in what you have to offer. Therefore, you should pounce on them as soon as possible to capitalize on their interest.
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Smart chatbots, like Warmly’s AI Chat, can help with that, as they can:
- Engage website visitors in conversation by sending contextual messages and offering valuable resources (e.g., product tours, case studies, etc.).
- Answer visitors’ questions.
- Qualify and score them by asking qualification questions (e.g., “What brings you here?”).
- Schedule meetings.
- Route leads to adequate human reps.
10. Webinars and online events
Webinars and online events can boost lead generation across levels by:
- Positioning you as a thought leader in a specific vertical.
- Increasing your visibility.
- Capturing leads’ contact information when they register for these events.
- Helping you expand your network and build a strong community of potential leads and partners.
Source
To attract the right audience and compel them enough to sign up for it, ensure that your webinars delve into relevant and valuable topics for your potential leads.
Inbound Lead Generation vs. Outbound: What are the Differences?
Although there’s a high chance that you already know what makes inbound lead generation different than outbound, it can’t hurt to include a quick refresher.
As mentioned above, inbound lead generation focuses on attracting potential customers by creating valuable content and experiences tailored to their needs and interests. This is done by leveraging personalized content and educational resources and providing tailored experiences.
In contrast, outbound lead generation involves proactively reaching out to potential customers through direct methods, such as cold calling and emails, advertising, etc.
Several additional differences stem from this key one, including:
1. Engagement
Inbound lead generation attracts and engages prospects by providing value and addressing their needs, compelling them to come to your brand in a non-intrusive and subtle way.
On the other hand, outbound lead generation relies on direct and to-the-point outreach, often interrupting prospects’ current activities to capture their attention.
Of course, outbound lead generation also targets a specific audience based on attributes and characteristics relevant to your product’s ICPs, although a much broader one than inbound.
2. Cost efficiency and ROI
The great thing about content is that it can be repurposed and updated over time, keeping it fresh and relevant.
As a result, the content you publish once can continue to generate leads long after it’s been created, making inbound lead generation very cost-effective.
However, inbound lead generation takes time, as building trust and authority among potential leads cannot happen over time. This means that you’ll have to be patient to start getting ROI.
Outbound lead generation, on the other hand, requires more up-front costs related to advertising, email campaigns, and other direct outreach methods.
On the bright side, outbound typically yields results faster, making it a good choice if you’re in a hurry to get an ROI.
3. Lead quality
Inbound lead generation is focused on higher-quality leads from the get-go:
- Leads who are already interested in your content and solution.
- Leads who are actively looking for information regarding their needs and pain points.
- Leads who are engaging with your content.
This means that these leads are more likely to convert soon.
At the same time, outbound results in a higher volume of leads, but they are usually less qualified and require more time and effort to convert.
4. Customer experience
Inbound strategies are focused on creating and nurturing meaningful, lasting relationships.
As a result, they’re intent on providing each lead with a tailored experience that resonates with their needs, interests, behavior, etc.
In turn, this approach encourages leads to convert sooner and become long-term customers.
Outbound lead generation is more aggressive and intrusive than inbound due to its focus on immediate results.
Consequently, the general lead experience might not be as positive as it is with inbound leads, who are more likely to feel valued, appreciated, and listened to.
5. Long-term impact
Since inbound lead generation tends to build long-term relationships and trust, it’s more likely to result in higher retention rates.
Namely, if leads create a positive association with your brand thanks to all the valuable resources and experiences you provided, they’ll be readier to stick with your brand through thick and thin later on.
Outbound lead generation is intent on selling as quickly as possible, meaning it focuses less on building lasting relationships and more on selling right now.
However, regardless of its success and initial ROI, outbound isn’t capable of establishing brand loyalty among leads and existing customers, as they won’t have that many reasons to be loyal to begin with.
If all you’re looking for is a quick sale and are treating customers as numbers, you can’t really expect to get much more in return.
How does inbound lead generation work?
Finally, let’s explain how inbound lead generation works by dissecting the stages of the inbound marketing funnel and breaking down how they work together to deliver results:
Awareness stage
The main objective in the awareness stage is to attract potential leads and raise brand awareness by addressing their needs and pain points in your content.
In this stage, you should develop high-quality, informative content that deals with specific challenges, questions, and interests of your target audience, helping them understand:
- How to handle their problems and requirements.
- Why your solution is the best for their specific needs.
This content could include anything from blog posts, articles, and social media content to infographics, videos, and more.
SEO and social media marketing are also crucial at the awareness stage, as they:
- Make your content easily discoverable by your target audience by providing higher SERP rankings.
- Increase brand visibility and engagement through posts that resonate with your audience, replying to their comments, etc.
Consideration stage
The main objective at this stage is to engage leads further by providing more detailed information and solutions to help them assess their options and, ideally, conclude that yours is the best.
To achieve this, you should:
- Offer more advanced resources that delve deeper into key topics, such as ebooks, whitepapers, case studies, and detailed guides.
- Host webinars and online workshops that provide valuable insights and drive direct interaction with your audience.
- Leverage email marketing using segmented email lists to send personalized content recommendations, follow-up messages to leads who have downloaded a resource, etc.
Decision stage
This is the final stage that leads to conversion.
In it, you should focus on converting leads into customers by presenting compelling offers and CTAs that encourage them to make the final leap and become paying customers.
Several tactics work the best here, including:
- Providing irresistible offers that incentivize leads to buy, such as free trials, demos, discounts, or limited-time offers.
- Highlighting success stories and testimonials from satisfied customers to build trust and credibility.
- Use strong, clear CTAs that guide leads to take the desired action, whether it’s signing up for a service or contacting your sales team.
- Having your sales team follow up with leads who have shown strong interest or engaged with your offers via personalized messaging based on leads’ interactions and behaviors.
Once you combine all these actions into a holistic strategy, you’ll get a well-oiled lead generation machine that constantly brings new leads to your pipeline.
Convert more leads with Warmly
Handling lead generation manually is no easy task in today’s competitive market.
Besides, some lead generation metrics vital for success can’t be tracked without help from tools designed to monitor specific lead generation channels and capture relevant data - such as Warmly.
Warmly is a revenue orchestration platform that lets you harness your website’s full conversion potential by:
- Tracking and identifying website visitors - both companies and individual stakeholders.
- Enabling email campaign attribution by letting you track visitors who come through specific campaigns.
- Revealing B2B and intent data on each identified lead, enabling you to score and qualify them.
- Providing automated and human-handled options for engaging leads on your website while they’re still hot.
Sign up for Warmly’s free forever plan and discover how it can help you generate and convert more leads today.
Or book a live demo to see it in action first.