Creating an Audience for Your Lead-Generation Campaign
Getting an audience is a tremendous challenge for people who use Webinars, physical events or other platforms for the purpose of lead generation. Data collected from thousands of sales and marketing professionals who attended Bulldog Solutions Beyond the Event Webinar series in 2005 indicates that more than 40% of those who conduct Webinars for lead generation identify getting an audience as their #1 challenge.
This white paper reviews best practices for creating a high-quality audience for your lead-generation initiative. It covers:
- Creating compelling content
- Speaker selection and format
- Event planning and logistics
- Developing effective promotion plans
- Partnering with publishers to increase promotional reach
DEFINITION OF SUCCESS
A successful lead-generation campaign is one that ultimately generates measurable incremental sales and revenue. It's important to note that getting an audience is just one step albeit a critical step in a successful campaign. But it's not just a matter of quantity. Exceptional audience creation also focuses on quality: identifying high-quality leads that are more likely to turn into sales. It's critical to deliver the right audience to the event, and then use the data you collect from that audience to facilitate follow-up engagement. While attendance is important, it should not be the primary driver of success in the context of lead generation.
CREATING COMPELLING CONTENT
Content is a critical component of a successful lead-generation campaign. When developing a topic, it is essential to ensure the event is going to deliver value to the attendees. Unless a prospect is well into the buying process, they probably don't want to sit through an infomercial. Even if a sales-oriented event does get an audience, statistics show it will be hard to keep the audience engaged for the duration of the event and even more difficult to get them to come back for another event. If a product demonstration is necessary to illustrate the message, it should be placed at the end, and framed as an option to stay on after the primary content has been delivered.
Teach, Don't Sell
The best content strikes a balance between education and promotion. An event should be built around the business problems the company solves, leveraging its expertise and establishing thought leadership in its core area. The content should speak to the needs and questions of the audience and address their biggest business problems.
Timely content always creates a buzz. If an industry is faced with demands of new legislation or constant change (for example, technology companies), timely information is always a draw.
If getting people to register once they open a promotional e-mail is a challenge, compelling content is part of the solution. It helps drive the conversion from open to click-through to registration. Later, it makes the segue into the sales engagement easier, because the company, as a thought leader, is perfectly positioned as the expert and has built a relationship by helping the prospect solve a problem.
Speaker Selection
If the topic around which you're building a campaign is truly a platform for education and thought leadership, an analyst, editor or other industry expert typically makes an excellent guest speaker. A customer testimonial or case study also helps round out the presentation. A third party talking about how a company solved their problem adds a lot of credibility to the message.
In-house personnel such as product managers, industry experts and company executives can help put an event in context and even act as moderators, leading presenters through their discussion and interactive Q&A. The ideal speaker blends knowledge with presentation skills. They must be articulate in delivering their information. A speaker who knows the topic but falls flat can make an event much less effective. Some presenters are engaging in person but may come across as boring on an event. Ability to engage and a good level of comfort with the material are particularly important during a Q&A session, where a speaker will need to go off-script.
If your campaign uses a Webinar, a rehearsal and, if needed, speaker training before the event can greatly improve the live event presentation.
