Leads are the thing we all need to keep the sales pipeline filled. There is no denying that. As a business, you generally know how many leads it'll take for you to close a certain amount of deals. (If you don't, stop right now and figure it out before you run out of money.) You hustle to get those leads  and concentrate on tactics that will drive as many people to your website as possible. You create forms to capture email addresses. You post ad, after ad, after ad. You attend trade shows, create videos, the list goes on and on. And, at the end of all of this, not much happens. Why? Because leads don't bring you money. Clients do. And those people that are visiting your site are possibly not quality leads.

You can have 100,001 leads with 0 new clients. Or, you could have 10 leads with 1 new client. I hear people talk about it all the time as it relates to social media. The term "friends" on Facebook has warped our whole idea of what an actual "friend" is. Would you rather have 1,239 contacts on your phone you can't rely on that heavily or 5 contacts on your phone you could call anytime you needed anything? We all know the answer. We like the world to see quantity, but we really care about quality.

Don't fall for it

I get a bit angry when I hear about marketing companies that approach businesses and promise a certain amount of leads for a certain dollar amount. These businesses get soooooo excited about the prospect of hundreds (or thousands) of new leads per month! Then, they run ads, or whatever, to get those leads. They need to live up to their end of the deal, right? They promised leads, and by golly, they will get some leads! But, those leads visit your website, maybe try out what you have to offer, only to realize that it's not a good fit at all. Those promised leads are horrible. They do nothing but justify the existence of that marketing company. 

What has this "marketing company" failed to do? They have failed to embrace and execute your brand in a way that targets, attracts, and delivers the right people at the right time to your business. These fly-by-night "marketing companies" don't care about your brand. They say they do "branding", but I'm not sure they know what that means. How long do they spend with you getting to know your company before launching the first ad, or website change? How much effort do they put into generating clear and unique copywriting that speaks to your audience? Are the photos, typography, or website templates they use pulled from a mass-produced library of designs they've used for 1,000 other businesses like yours? Don't fall for it. Don't be another tally on their whiteboard. You deserve better.

The struggle is real

65% of companies struggle to generate traffic and leads. No surprise, right? Driving leads is hard! That's why we are so eager to pay someone else to get us more traffic and more leads!

We get it. We like leads. Like I said before, without those leads we all die. The point here is to make sure we are getting the right kinds of leads. This is where a real brand strategy can help. Taking the time to define who you are, what you are, why you exist, who you're targeting, what you're selling, and what you want people to say about you when you're not around will pay off for you in the end. We are so eager to get that logo done, get some business cards, launch a website, set up a Facebook page, and get t-shirts printed, that we don't take the time to understand where we've been, where we are, where we're going, and why we exist in the first place!

The Challenge

I want to leave you with this challenge. Show your website to a complete stranger and give them 7 seconds to tell you:

1. what you do, and

2. how you will make their life better.

Next, ask 5-10 people inside or outside of your business what you do. How many different answers do you get?

Just start there. Think about what was said. Is that who you want to be? If not, then it's time to step back and strategize. Tactics without strategy just leaves feeling empty and lost. Tactics fail, strategy is for the long haul.

Let's take time to think about strategy. Then, we can use that info to drive the right kinds of leads. The leads that turn into clients. Because they are the ones that pay us real money.

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