Free website traffic and leads generation tools are the most powerful strategies to generate quality traffic and qualified leads for any kind of business and website. Lead generation is essential for every single business. Lead generations are easy to target prospects that are interested in buying your service or product.
Generating leads for your business is one of the most important aspects of your marketing plan. When you are generating leads from multiple sources, you experience a high-quality option, which allows you to increase revenue and efficiency of your business. In other words, it is the capital investment that pays off big in both the short term and the long term. Generating leads involves a fair bit of work in setting up and carrying out a lead generation plan. There is no easy way, but it is worthwhile if indeed you do work hard for it. In this article, we will discuss about free tools for lead generation as well as give an insight on how to generate leads effectively.
Lead Generation is the process of attracting and converting strangers and prospects into someone who has indicated interest in your company’s product or service. The goal of lead generation is to attract as many new leads as possible, then pass them to the sales team for further nurturing.
The internet is filled with opportunities and one of them is the possibility to generate good quantity of qualified leads, like-minded people, who are interested in what you offer. The challenge is to use the most suitable tools possible to achieve your lead generation goals. If you are looking for free tools for lead generation, or ones that are affordable enough for a startup company, then this article has something for you. I will discuss about free tools for lead generation in another article.
What is a lead generation system?
Lead generation software is a time-saving marketing and sales app that lets you automatically generate more leads and route them to the proper team. It helps you increase brand awareness, attract more qualified leads, and close more sales deals.
Lead generation focuses on the top of the sales funnel, typically pulling leads from online channels like email, social media, and landing pages. From these channels, it collects contact information from people who have expressed interest in your product or service.
So you can market to them with better insight. More targeted marketing tactics mean more qualified leads, which ultimately translates to more profitable deals.
Is lead generation a marketing tool or a sales tool?
In some ways, it’s both. It’s the marketing department’s job to create materials that target your ideal customer and attract leads. From there, sales takes over to nurture the lead until the deal is closed. Lead generation programs refine the lead-finding process with both sales and marketing in mind. Often, a lead generation system is a feature of a larger platform, like a CRM. That gives both teams even more useful tools for streamlining productivity and boosting profits.
Why do you need lead generation software?
Competing for consumer attention requires constant effort. But even the most dedicated teams can find it tough to identify and engage with the right customers. Every day, businesses change addresses and phone numbers, contacts leave organizations, and new companies are started.
Lead gen software helps minimize the time your company spends tracking down leads. All by automatically updating contact information. That means you won’t find yourself working with outdated data.
A lead generation system not only helps you find customers, it gives you the tools to find the right ones. The highest value customers are ones who:
- Are genuinely interested in your product or service
- Have the money to invest in your product or service
- Have a problem that you can solve
Lead generation software is highly advantageous because it attracts leads who generate the most profit while requiring you to expend minimal effort. It narrows your sales team’s focus to the customers who are most likely to buy your product or service. That minimizes time wasted on cold leads, and helps you develop a stronger customer base.
How does a lead generation platform work?
Lead generation isn’t a one-size-fits all approach. Depending on if you’re a B2B or B2C business, you’ll use lead generation programs differently. Some lead generation tools are meant to increase customer engagement, while others help you streamline the sales call process.
But no matter which approach is best for your business, the idea is the same. Get your name out to customer leads, and attract them to your door before they go to the competition.
Lead generation can include a lot of different tools, but here are some of the most popular ones:
- Content creation tools: Some lead generation platforms offer templates for creating content like blogs, white papers, infographics, and e-books. Sharing this kind of content on your website and across social media channels boosts engagement. And it establishes you as a knowledgeable source in your industry. You can also require viewers to submit contact information before accessing long form content like e-books or instructional videos.
- Lead nurturing tools: Once someone enters your pipeline, it’s vital to keep the engagement going to turn them into a marketing qualified lead. Lead generation lets you gather enough information to target your contacts with personalized messaging via email campaigns or phone calls.
- How to score leads: Lead generation systems can calculate and assign a numerical value to your contacts. The higher the score, the more likely that contact is to make a purchase. Leads are scored based on several variables, including industry, website activity, and company size. Trying to manually score your leads would be an exhaustive task, which makes it one of lead generation’s most powerful and time-saving tools.
- Lead distribution: Once your program has identified a high-value lead, their information is automatically passed along. Right to the appropriate sales representative to follow up and continue building the relationship.
- Sales analytics and reporting: The simple act of using lead generation isn’t automatically going to boost profits. You’ll need to look at your analytics and reporting to see what’s working and what isn’t. Putting the effort into checking your analytics and making adjustments to your process may take some time, but it’s a necessary step in ensuring your lead gen software is working for you.
FindThatLead
Quickly find important emails of any company by just entering their domain name.
LinkedIn Sales Navigator
Use the free chrome extension version of LinkedIn Sales navigator to get insights on people you are communicating with on emails.
Leadfeeder
Pricing: 14-day free trial, paid plans start at $79/month
Rating: 4.3 stars on G2 (Based on 483 reviews)
Leadfeeder tells you what companies visit your website, even if they never fill out a form or contact you.
Leadfeeder also finds contact information for employees at the company using Leadfeeder Discover. This allows you to follow up with visitors who never inquired about your product or time your outreach to potential leads in your sales pipeline.
To try out Leadeeder, all you need to do is install the Leadfeeder Tracker (it takes less than 5 minutes!).
A 14-day free trial is available with paid plans starting at $63/month.
To sign up for Leadfeeder, follow these steps. We can start sending you leads in minutes.
Prospect.io
Pricing: Paid plans start at $74/month (annually) or $89/month (monthly)
Rating: 4.2 stars out of 5 via Capterra
Prospecti.io is a modern-day sales automation platform that’s fully integrated with Salesforce, Pipedrive, Close.io, and HubSpot. The Prospect.io Chrome extension helps you find prospects in one click and launch cold email campaigns straight from your browser in mere seconds.
Looking for new leads takes time and effort. With Prospect.io, you can focus on what really matters: selling to decision-makers.
Their essential plan starts at $78 per month (if paid annually), while their business plan starts at $129 per month (if paid annually), and prices go up from there based on how many credits you’ll need.
Hoovers
Pricing: Contact for pricing, they offer a free trial
Rating: 3.9/5 stars on G2, based on 380 reviews
Hoovers is a sales acceleration tool that helps businesses leverage data and analytics so you can build your lists and connect with prospects faster. Features include informed conversations, automated workflow software, real-time notifications, and personalized buyer intent data.
Hunter.io
Pricing: Free to find up to 25 requests/mo; plans start at $49/month with a free option
Rating: 4.3 out of 5 stars via G2
Hunter helps you find emails by typing in the person’s name and their company. You can also browse for all emails at a specific company. You can use the tool for free for up to 25 email searches and 50 email verifications per month. From there, paid plans start at $49/month for 500 searches and 1000 verifications.
Boomerang
Best for: When you want to set and forget the direct emails you write.
Boomerang is a super-simple Gmail add-on (that you don’t need to be a Chrome user for — great news for us Safari devotees) that lets you write emails and then schedule them to send later. If some or all of your lead generation is homegrown — i.e., not fully-automated through something like MailChimp — this is a great tool for going on a writing-emails sprint all at once and then having them send whenever you schedule them to. You can also set reminders, which means Boomerang will tell you when you haven’t heard back from a contact. From there, you can decide if you want to reach out again.
You can use Boomerang for free with limitations, but for $4.99 per month for the Personal plan, even the most budget-conscious user can afford to upgrade. You won’t have a limit on message credits, and you can add notes to your messages so that you understand the context even if it’s scheduled to return to your inbox three months from now. (Another feature of Boomerang is that you can schedule emails to clear out now and come back later.) If you end up using Boomerang a lot, there are two more paid plans that come with even more features, like scheduling recurring messages.
Now, it’s important to note that Boomerang probably isn’t a good fit for big businesses that have to juggle hundreds or thousands of contacts. But if you run a small business and like to provide a lot of personalized, one-on-one service, Boomerang balances direct contact with useful automation.
Hello Bar
Best for: Brands that want a bold way for visitors to convert.
We love how Hello Bar’s homepage pop-up shows instead of just tells. Without even having to click or scroll, you see an example of what Hello Bar can do for your business. And if you want a bolder, more in-your-face way of getting visitors to take the next step, you’ll think, “How can I get that on my website right now?”
The good news is that it’s a cinch to get on your site – you don’t need any developer knowhow to get an eye-catching pop-up created and displayed (I threw one up on my site within about an hour of discovering Hello Bar). Branding options are limited if you don’t pay for an account, but if you’re not too concerned with their logo showing up on your website, you may not care.
You’ll choose your pop-up based on your goal, whether that’s growing your email list, getting more phone calls or making sales (you can also target a specific URL, make an announcement or send people to your social profiles). When you grow out of the free plan (because you have more views, want to add more pop-ups or targeting options, or feel like opening up extra design features), you can start with the Growth plan for $29 per month.
HubSpot
Best for: Creating landing pages that convert visitors into customers.
HubSpot has a ton of business tools for everything from CRM to sales, but for our purposes, we’re going to talk specifically about their marketing hub. You can:
- Create drip campaigns to send leads on the path to purchase.
- Launch landing pages (without the help of a designer or developer).
- Attach forms to gather information.
- Chat with website visitors in real-time using live chat.
- Perform A/B testing to discover which methods will increase conversions the best.
Let’s talk a little more about the landing pages since they’re the true conversion tools. Once a prospect is on your landing page, you can encourage them to opt-in to a free trial, demo, email list, webinar, etc. Enrich landing pages with features like embedded videos and personalized CTAs (which are based on the details you add about the contact in your CRM, like the industry they’re in).
To create landing pages, you’ll need HubSpot’s Starter plan for $50 per month ($40 if you pay for one year up front). However, you can start using some of HubSpot’s free tools right now to see if you like the CRM. No-cost features include contact management, list segmentation, email marketing and others that will most certainly help with free lead generation.
And.co
Best for: Freelancers who have to prove their worth.
Any freelancer knows that there’s a big hurdle between discussing a project and actually having a potential client take the next step, like signing a contract, paying a deposit or even just saying, “Yup, let’s do it!” Having a professional and thorough proposal shows that’s you’re a trustworthy expert, and laying out all of the details removes a barrier to entry that far too many clients never make it through.
You may write each proposal from scratch or plan to design your own letterhead and template at some point, but And.co provides an easy-to-use alternative. Create a proposal, add your branding, flesh out project details and accept a contract. There’s a lot more, too:
- Accept e-signatures for contracts and proposals.
- Process deposits or full payments (the ultimate lead generation goal).
- Set milestones so everyone knows what to expect.
- Set up smart alerts so you know when the client views or takes action on the proposal.
- Schedule auto-reminders to clients to nudge them to approve the proposal.
The free plan lets you create proposals for one client, includes the company’s branding and supplies standard contracts. If you like how it works and feel like you’ll use And.co a lot, upgrade to a Pro account for $18 per month — which is a bargain, considering all of the admin it streamlines for you.
What are the features of lead generation software?
When it comes to shopping for a lead generation system, here are the five key features you should look out for.
Intuitive interface
Even the most powerful software will be ineffective in your hands if you can’t use it. Marketing teams are experts in marketing, not web development. Look for lead generation programs with an intuitive interface and multiple options for training. Then anyone on your team can use it without suffering technical headaches.
Integrations
You’re probably already using business apps, so any lead generation software you decide on should include integrations. This will allow you to share data between your lead generation system and your CRM, email apps, and other business-related platforms you’re currently using.
Integrating your lead generation software with your other platforms eliminates the need to constantly switch browsers. Or double-check your data between platforms to make sure it’s accurate.
Analytics
Having accurate and up-to-date data is vital to strategizing better business practices. Any lead generation software you invest in should have a comprehensive analytics and reporting feature. That way you can always have an eye on the numbers. This lets you make data-driven decisions for improvement, and identify where you’re falling short of your goals.
Automation
Automation saves huge amounts of time by responding to leads, analyzing data, and prioritizing leads. You don’t have to automate every task on your to-do list. But having the option means more control over how your teams are spending their time.
Customer relationship management
In your search for lead gen software, you’ll probably come across something called CRM software — customer relationship management. Lead generation is often included as a feature of CRM. Because it all falls under the umbrella of nurturing customers in your sales pipeline and building a loyal customer base.
If you’re worried that CRM sounds too big for you at the moment, don’t be. CRM for small businesses is specifically designed to scale with you. While still providing all the benefits of lead generation, contact management, and sales tracking.
Most CRM platforms will let you add on features as you grow. Meaning you can pick and choose which features you can afford to invest in at any given time.
Conclusion
Lead generation is the process of attracting potential consumers to your website through various strategies. In the past, this has taken the form of print ads and telemarketing, but today, you need to use a variety of different tactics to penetrate your target audience. As we have discussed in our previous articles, the term lead generation has been used to describe the entire process of purchasing a new prospect’s contact information and converting them into a full-fledged customer. However, at its core, lead generation means that you are generating leads for your business.
Using the right lead generation strategies is important since this will help you reach your target audience. There are different strategies that you can use to generate a consistent flow of leads but using tools is one of the best ways to achieve this.