5 Sure-Fire Lead Generation Tips for Your Blog Jessica Lunk Blogging leads to small business success. In fact, small businesses that blog gain 126% more leads than businesses that don’t. When it comes to building business, blogging is a no-brainer. But, is your business blog working as hard as you do to generate fresh leads for your company? Here are 5 fool-proof lead generation strategies that can turn your blog traffic into revenue for your business: 1. Add a Blog Subscription Sign-Up There are over 78.5 million WordPress blogs across the globe. That doesn’t even include the millions of blogs on Tumblr, Blogger, Technorati and more. People love blog content, but there is so much info online. It can be tough to build a loyal following of visitors. Adding a form to your blog so that visitors can easily subscribe to new posts helps you stay top of mind, instead of getting lost in a sea of millions of other blogs. To make sure you don’t miss out on sign-ups: Include a clear call to action to sign-up on your blog Indicate how often you’ll be emailing blog updates to avoid spam complaints Losing out on connecting with ideal prospects who are visiting your blog is scary. Instead, capitalize on the excitement visitors feel when they’ve hit your blog. Capture prospect info by offering a subscription to your awesome content so that you can stay in touch. 2. Tap Into Evergreen Content for Conversions Some content never goes out of style. Those blog posts or articles that light up your prospects and customers long after they’ve been written are pillars of content that bolster your brand and messaging. Evergreen content strikes a harmonious chord with your ideal buyer independently of time or place. Evergreen content is powerful, because your audience will continue to share it with their social networks regardless of when you published the content. In addition, pillar content also appears in coveted top-of-the-page search results, driving valuable organic traffic to your site. You can turn organic visitors that come to your website via social and search engines into a wealth of opportunity for your business. So how do you make the most of evergreen content? Here are a few places to start: Spruce Up Evergreen Content: Give your evergreen content a refresh from time to time. As your business evolves, update evergreen content so it remains appealing and relevant to your audience. This includes making sure that evergreen content falls in line with your keyword strategy as search terms and phrases change. You can use Google’s Keyword Planner to help generate keyword ideas. Drive Visitors More Deeply into Your Site: Don’t let potential buyers bounce from your site once they’ve hit your evergreen content. Add links to relevant pages on your site, like a related blog post or article. This will keep them engaged with your brand, raising awareness of who you are, what you do, and the problems you can solve. Capture New Leads: For top-of-the-funnel evergreen content, add an enticing call to action to gather contact details from new visitors to your site. For example, encourage visitors to subscribe for more great blog posts, or to download a game-changing resource or guide. The key to turning these captured leads into new customers is not just to capture their information and let it sit on the sidelines, but to keep your business top of mind by nurturing them with relevant content over time. Drive Opportunities: For bottom-of-the-funnel evergreen content, drive opportunities and customers by adding a call to action to learn more about your products or services. For example, ask visitors to schedule a consultation, take a demo, or request a meeting. Here’s an example from the Leadpages.net blog. At the end of the post, they include a call to action to sign-up for a resource. This helps to capture information from strong prospects who have hit their blog from social media or organic search: Evergreen content is fertile ground for tapping into a rich channel of prospects. Optimizing evergreen content can help fill your pipeline with both top-of-the-funnel leads that are just looking, as well as bottom-of-the-funnel opportunities that are ready to buy. 3. Syndicate Your Blog Content Consistent blogging is more than an awareness exercise – it can add to your bottom line. The key is to get your riveting, targeted blog content in front of the right audience. Email marketing and social media are both avenues that can increase traffic to your blog. But if you want to extend your reach to an even larger audience, there are lots of sites that will push out your content by syndicating your blog’s RSS feed. Where to start syndication? Check out these sites: Alltop shows readers what’s trending in the topics they’re interested in. By syndicating your feed here, you can reach an audience that is enthusiastic about thought leadership and news in specific categories. Business 2 Community is a reputable content aggregator for business professionals. They manually screen contributors, maintaining a high quality of content that attracts a large number of readers. The site’s content is also picked up by third parties including Yahoo Small Business Advisor and Google News. Scoop.It lets you curate content on the topics that apply to your interests and industry, but you can also share your content there. Sign-up for the free personal account to share up to 10 links a day, and get your content in front of a new audience. Social Media Today is a community of PR, marketing, advertising and other professionals that require a social media background. If your content has a social media spin to it, this is a great place to become a contributor and submit individual blog posts or submit your RSS feed. Syndicating your blog content can help a brand new audience gain awareness of your brand. For syndication to really work for your business, choose sites that align closely with your ideal buyer to generate quality leads for your business. 4. Gate Your Best Blog Content Repurpose your best blog content and recycle it into downloadable bundles. Offer these blog bundles as resources to your audience, giving you another tool for generating new leads for your business. Pull together related posts to put everything you have to say about a popular topic at your audience’s fingertips. Or, bundle together all of your posts so your audience can download your blog as a whole. Gating blog content is a great strategy because the content already exists, so you don’t have to create anything new. In addition, your original, individual posts stay live on your website so they can continue to do their job to boost organic search traffic. Turn your blog posts into lead generators by bundling them up in exchange for the contact details of prospects in your audience that fit the profile of your ideal buyer. For example, here is a bundle of our most popular blog posts on lead nurturing: 5. Feature Your Team Members When it comes to generating new leads, a little transparency can go a long way. We do so much business online, so giving your audience a glimpse behind the scenes of your company generates trust in your brand and opens the door to create new, fruitful relationships. Feature your team members on your blog to put your talent and expertise on display. Introducing team members to your audience also drives home how your business’s mission and values are aligned with your team members and the culture they’ve created. J/E Bearing & Machine does a nice job of highlighting their employees and also adding social links, making it super simple for potential prospects to reach out to team members. While you’re highlighting team members and your awesome company culture, take the opportunity to attract great talent your way. Mention job openings, emphasize opportunities for growth, outline employee perks, and let interested job candidates know how they can get it touch. Not only does an open call for talent attract potential team members, but it also sends a positive message to your audience – your business is growing. No one wants to work with a business that is going to disappear the next day. Calling attention to opportunities within your company sends the message that you’re not going anywhere and are here to stay. Providing that sneak peak into your company’s culture and talent pool not only attracts the right employees, but attracts the right type of customer. With a few improvements, your business can be wildly successful at generating quality leads from your blog.