Outbound Lead generation is something that every company looks for these days for the growth of their business and hence it has become so crucial.
There are 2 types of lead generation strategies in the B2B sales environment.
- Inbound Lead generation
- Outbound lead generation
These 2 methods of lead generation are equally important for any startup and established business.
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Inbound lead generation is a process where we get leads from our past efforts like SEO, Organic Social, and so on, but outbound lead generation is something different.
What is Outbound Lead Generation?
Outbound lead generation is a strategic approach to proactively engage with potential customers who might not be conscious of your product or service.
This method involves sales folks initiating communication through various channels such as cold calling, cold emailing, social media outreach, and paid advertising to generate interest and establish a sales pipeline.
The primary goal of outbound lead generation is to nurture leads and gently nudge them through the sales funnel, ultimately transforming them into paying customers.
In simple words, inbound lead generation attracts leads into our basket, and outbound lead generation will look outside to bring in the leads into our basket.
Inbound Lead generation vs outbound lead generation
Inbound lead generation requires a long-term consistent effort to build as a brand in the market to get marketing-qualified leads into your sales pipeline.
Inbound vs Outbound – What’s better? The answer is, it depends.
Also Read: Top 10 B2B Lead Generation Tools for 2021
Marketers have long debated what methods are best for generating business leads, with some favoring inbound methods, while others prefer outbound. But, the truth is, with the right strategy in place, any marketing method can be effective.
The goal of most marketing strategies is to attract high-quality leads, but there are different types of leads, each with its unique characteristics. A common mistake marketers make is using the same techniques to generate all types of leads. That is why it’s important to understand that there are two main approaches to lead generation: inbound and outbound.
Inbound Lead Generation is a technique in which you draw in target prospects through either your website, blog, content or social media. This technique is also referred to as ‘bottom-up’ or ‘inbound marketing.
Outbound Lead Generation Strategies and Techniques
Outbound lead generation is taking another step concerning bringing in qualified leads into our basket.
Over time, WhatsApp for Business, so-called SMS marketing has transformed into WhatsApp marketing is giving a good mileage but that’s for sure a good go for B2C and not for B2B. Don’t take me wrong, it can be effective, but for B2B lead gen, it was not a game-changer for us.
Next Comes cold calling which is an evergreen method or approach for B2B lead generation that needs highly targeted and updated Data (So-called phone numbers) to opt for this method.
So, I spoke a little less about the above ways of B2B marketing and the reason being I did not see great growth or success with the above 2 approaches, especially in 2023-24 years.
Email marketing has consistently delivered results, and its effectiveness is evident in the statistics. For instance, 54% of brands opt to send emails 2-4 times per month, with 32% sending emails once a month. This frequency is crucial in maintaining a consistent connection with potential customers without overwhelming them.
Source: https://www.sender.net/blog/email-marketing-statistics/
Now I would like to speak more on Email Marketing which can be often conveyed as Cold Email Marketing which worked like a miracle for us.
Here is a Step by Step process which we did in our outbound outreach campaign
Gathering the Database
The primary thing that we need to initiate the email marketing campaigns is Data, to be very precise not just an email id but the related data associated with it and the platform that we used was Apollo.io.
We have considered these parameters in fetching the data
- First Name
- Last Name
- Company Name
- Industry
- Job Title
- Most Importantly Email status (Verified and Likely to Engage)
Now, we will have 2 options can save this to our list and export them with paid option or you can work around with some chrome extensions to import the data (which is not an ethical practice but if you have limited budget to perform this give a try)
Here is the video explaining how it works.
Tools and Setup for Your Emailing
Our primary tools for this Email Campaign include Amazon SES and MailBluster, both of which were used extensively in this campaign.
We tried different tools and really don’t want to name them but somehow we got this effective combination of Amazon SES and Mailbluster that worked like a magic.
To initiate this, what we tried is, we had created a new domain for our emailing process which is another domain extension for our brand name and to authenticate it; we redirected it to our mail domain.
Example: If our main domain is www.brand.com , we have multiple versions of it like www.brandusa.com , www.brand.co, www.brand.today and www.brand.net.
In the above process, we have taken this approach to make sure our emails properly get delivered into their inbox which is very crucial for outbound marketing.
When we send out 5 or 6 follow-up emails to our prospects, there are high chances that we may get reported spam which will ultimately put us in the blacklist.
So, to avoid this, we used one domain each for one quarter and kept the other domains for the Email Warm-up process by subscribing to newsletters of our industry.
In the above scenario, we have 99% delivery rate with 46.81 open rate and 2.51% click rate. We also ensured that we won’t send any links in the emails in our first email and 2 follow-up emails.
Email Subject Lines, Body and Personalization
I have used Copilot in Microsoft Edge which used GPT 4 free of cost and hence the output was great.
As you see, the above draft is very simple and straight to the point asking for time.
The crucial aspect of email marketing is its ability to be concise and direct. The trend in 2024 is to keep emails short and to the point, respecting the recipient’s time and intelligence. This approach ensures that the message is easily digestible and doesn’t get lost in the noise.
Also, you should never copy and paste this script into the email tool as there will be a hidden script in the email that will create unnecessary spaces in between the text, resulting in the email ending up in the spam folder.
Use MS Word’s default paste option to remove the script and make any changes or customizations necessary.
According to statistics, emails with personalized subject lines see a 20.66% open rate compared to 19.57% for non-personalized ones. This level of customization helps in crafting messages that resonate with specific pain points or needs of the target audience.
Source: https://www.sender.net/blog/email-marketing-statistics/
Email Warm-up
Once when we are done with the usage of a domain for 3 months, by analyzing the delivery rate, and bounces, we switch to the new domain which is already in a warm-up process.
Also, Ensure that you change the domain once in a quarter and it should be in a circular format.
Quarter1: www.brandusa.com
Quarter2: www.brand.co
Quarter3: www.brand.today
Quarter 4: www.brand.net
Again back to the same loop next year.
Common Mistakes to Avoid in Outbound Lead Generation
Lack of Personalization: Failing to personalize your outreach efforts can lead to low engagement rates and a poor return on investment. We have used detailed mapping on what communication should go to which industry and which job title. This helped us in getting good hot responses.
Insufficient Research: Failing to research your target audience and their needs can result in ineffective messaging and low conversion rates. In the beginning, we never had a strategy to filter our prospects but we used to reach just based on Job titles which we rectified in later stages.
Overreliance on a Single Platform: Relying on a single platform to pull marketing-qualified leads is an outdated strategy. Using multiple channels can increase the effectiveness of your outbound lead generation process. As said, we had sent more than 50K emails by just relying on one email deliverability report but in later stages, we used multiple platforms for our emails and also its intelligence.
Poor Timing: Failing to consider the timing of your outreach efforts can result in low engagement rates and a poor return on investment. Our best time for sending emails was 10 Am which is a very good time in the USA to have some good time for research.
Many studies recommend sending emails during the morning hours, particularly between 9:00 a.m. and 11:00 a.m. This is when professionals are likely to be checking their emails after the morning rush and before the day becomes too busy
Source: https://optinmonster.com/the-best-time-to-send-emails-heres-what-studies-show/
Inadequate Follow-Up: Failing to follow up with leads can result in lost opportunities and a poor return on investment. As said, we received great responses and calls got scheduled from our 4th follow up email.
Final Thoughts
Outbound lead generation is an influential method to boost your sales. By developing an approach that outlines crucial facts for each stage of the funnel, using numerous channels, and personalizing your outreach efforts, you can increase the effectiveness of your outbound lead generation process.
Remember to avoid common errors such as lack of personalization, insufficient research, and overreliance on a single platform, poor timing, and inadequate follow-up.
