Leads are crucial to every affiliate marketer’s success, therefore, having a process that generates leads regularly is of utmost importance if you would like to succeed in your business. It should be said, though, that not all leads (or lead generation processes) are equally beneficial and a low-quality lead could cost you more than it may appear at first impression.
Consider this – if the leads you are generating aren’t properly targeted during the process of your initial marketing strategy, you will have wasted time and money gathering a bunch of disinterested subscribers who will most likely never open your emails or take any kind of action. Your advertising dollars will have been wasted, you won’t be making any money, and these kinds of results lead to many aspiring affiliate marketers to throw in the towel.
As we’ve mentioned before, people who are most likely to patronize your business are those who know, like and trust you. Since affiliate marketers do not make sales out of a brick and mortar store but instead generate sales via online methods, there are different strategies to be used in their lead generation and marketing strategies.
Instead of a physical place of business, an affiliate marketer needs an online presence, preferably with a central hub, or website, where prospective clients, customers, and business partners can learn more about them at their leisure. Most successful affiliate marketers use a blog for this purpose and use additional avenues such as their social media presence and email list to interact with their leads and build relationships.
There is a good amount of time that goes into generating leads this way, though if you are able to invest in your business regularly you will see results much more quickly. You may also be able to outsource some of the more tedious tasks that need to be done every day or those that you might not have sufficient skill or knowledge about to complete yourself.
In order to generate leads online, there are several components of your business that you will need to have in place. You’ll need an autoresponder or other means in which you are able to contact your prospects on a regular basis. Some people rely solely on social media fan pages to do this, but there is a risk factor involved with that. Heaven forbid the site should go down, or you did not have access to your account for some reason. In that case, you would lose all contact with your leads. A much better solution would be to have people subscribe to your email list.
You will also need content. Whether you are posting on Twitter, your blog, or sending out regular emails, you’ll need plenty of written content to share. This is one of those tasks that will need to be done every day and one that is outsourced by those who do not have a natural knack for creating quality content that will encourage interaction and sales.
All of these will do you no good, though, if you are not targeting leads that are interested in what you have to offer. To do this, you’ll need to have a clear idea of who your ideal customer, client, or business partner is. This will help you to identify which social media channels to use, what kind of content to produce, and what types of lead generating freebies to offer.
Do not succumb to the pressure of quantity over quality and target everybody who has a pulse. Be specific when you create your customer profile. Get to know what their interests are, what problems they are facing, where they hang out, etc. and develop a strategy that puts you in front of them using the methods mentioned above. When you do so, all your hard work will not be done in vain and your chance for success will be greatly improved.
