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As a lead generation tool, your website provides a virtual wonderland of sales and marketing opportunities. It's easily accessible, available 24/7, highly visible, and gives you the ability to present your company and services in your most positive light. 

Plus, your site gives prospects the ability to find you whenever they need to. All this makes it one of the most powerful lead generators at your disposal. 

So... is your website, this powerful lead generating machine, doing all it can to bring new clients to your doorstep?

Chances are it can do more. A few techniques applied to your site can help you take better advantage of it. And, because it is so visible, so accessible, and so interactive, whatever improvements you make will have a high impact on your firm's marketing.

These three tactics – subtle and easy-to-implement – apply to virtually any business-to-business website, and will help to improve its ability to generate qualified leads. To ensure maximum effectiveness as a lead generator, all sites should be designed to do the following:

1. Lead the visitor to the next step in the sales process
   
   
2. Capture the visitor's contact information
   
   
3. Provide the visitor with the information you want them to have

It doesn't matter if your site is big or small, highly graphic or simple. Nor does it matter your company's size, or what industry you're in. These simple techniques can dramatically improve your site's lead generation results.

Lead The Visitor To The Next Step In The Sales Process

One of the most important objectives of your site should be to pique your visitors' interest in your company, your benefits and service offerings. With this in mind, it's important that you limit the amount of information you make available on your site.

Think about it – if you tell them everything they need to know, what reason will they have for any contact with you?

Your website is a great way to disseminate information about your capabilities, but in terms of "selling" it can't beat the one-on-one, personal contact of a telephone conversation or an in-person meeting.

Your website should provide the prospect with enough information, but leave them with some questions that require further interaction – a telephone call, an e-mail, a request for literature. It doesn't really matter; it's all about initiating additional contact.

As a rule, focus most of your content on the benefits of what they'll get from your service and skip the details of how those benefits will be achieved. Case studies, white papers and podcasts that showcase your expertise – and the results of that expertise – are ideal. Be brief and inviting with your copy. Try to avoid long lists of tactics or the methodologies you employ; remember, the goal of your site is to make them eager to get those details directly from you.  

Capture Their Name And Contact Information

Your website should be collecting visitor names for you. All websites should provide multiple opportunities for your visitors to let you know who they are, and even why they were there.

Of course, there's the standard Request for Information page, which is necessary. But the near-certain "salesman will call" response that follows such a request can create reluctance in some people. 

Your website should collect visitors' names in return for providing them with something of value – something they want, for which they're willing to give you their name.

Most often this brief registration gives them access to technical reports, research findings, "how-to" articles, white papers – information they find interesting or helpful. Maybe you have a Resource Library that they can access. You may want to post a brief industry survey, or a contest – there are lots of tactics that you can employ.

According to MarketingSherpa's Most Effective Website Response Tools report, 36% of marketers deemed a free trial/product demo as the most effective website interaction, 30% had most success with a webcast/webinar, 24% with white paper downloads and 23% with an in-person seminar registration. Other tactics included an e-mail newsletter, a live chat button and, lastly, the generic "contact us" form.
 
The registration information should be brief – name, company name and e-mail address. It's become a common and expected online practice, and helps many firms gather a much higher percentage of prospect information.

Give Your Visitors The Information You Want Them To Have

While you want the content of your site to be relevant to virtually all visitors, it should "speak" most directly to the visitors that are most valuable to you.

As with any marketing collateral, your website cannot be all things to all people. If you water it down with too much generic information to appease any and all visitors, you run the risk of losing the attention of everyone.

First, determine who your most important visitors are – that can be by industry, by job title or function within a company. Then ask yourself why they would be visiting your site, and what exactly they'd be looking for.

Then, make sure that your site is most "comfortable" for them – that the information they're seeking is easily accessed, and that your benefit messages are directed toward their needs.

Your goal should be to make your key visitors feel that they've "come to the right place." Your copy, graphics and the way your information is presented should be geared to creating the perception of your company that you want them to have. This can do wonders in influencing their perceptions about your company, and their willingness to move to the next step.

If your service offering is extensive and your audience very diverse, then separate your offerings into the segments that most commonly suit your clients' needs. Then, on your home page, offer visitors clear paths to follow to get information related to those particular segments (i.e., an ad agency might offer categories like "Branding," "Lead Generation," Public Relations," etc.). Fill the pages in each category with your most compelling benefit information on that specific offering, and include links to the specific case studies, articles, webcasts, etc. that support that expertise. 

Of course, they may actually need more than one of your services, but remember – they've come to your site because they have a problem, and it's the job of your site to convince them that you have the best solution to that problem. You'll have plenty of opportunity to impress them with the rest of your dynamic capabilities when you get that in-person appointment!

Your Website Gives So Much And Asks So Little

The beauty of a web presence is that, once posted, your website works for you. It's open 24/7, it's accessible to anyone, and you just never know who it may attract. 

Virtually any website can be tweaked to achieve these simple objectives. Better yet, they're low-cost and easy to implement – certainly worth investigating to make sure your site isn't actually turning your prospects away, but helping to welcome new customers to your doorstep.

Michelle Palmer is President of Leading Edge, a marketing firm that specializes in developing and implementing lead generation programs for mid-market companies. You can reach her at mpalmer@LeadingEdgePrograms.com.

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