Best Tools for Lead Generation in 2022
In 2020 and 2021, there have been notable changes in lead generation techniques for both B2B and B2C businesses, along with a tumultuous change online in general.
Lead generation is a very dynamic industry that is constantly evolving and getting new, more and more effective tools. For example, marketing sales funnels in a short time have gone from the AIDA (attention-interest-desire-action) model to more complex and diverse technologies for attracting, capturing, nurturing and heating leads.
Today, 2022 is already in full swing, so it's time to discuss the lead generation trends that have appeared during this period. And it is to them that we decided to dedicate our next article. From it you will learn about the latest trends in the field of attracting new customers and get useful tips on how to apply them in practice.
Social networks
Social networks in 2022 are rightfully considered the largest trading platforms and almost inexhaustible sources for attracting the target audience. As of October 2021, the estimated number of social media users exceeded 4.55 billion. This means that 9 out of 10 Internet users access some social media at least once a month.
Thus, social networks are the most promising lead-generation platforms in 2022. Just as importantly, they provide entrepreneurs and marketers with built-in tools for capturing potential customer contacts - namely, lead forms. Their forms are highly customizable, customizable, and autocomplete to help save visitors time and increase conversions. In addition, the competent use of forms can reduce the CPL (cost per lead) by more than 60%. Here are the most effective social media in terms of lead generation in 2022:
- TikTok. The platform with captivating short videos has appeared relatively recently, but has already reached the milestone of 1 billion users, and their number is constantly increasing. In 2021, TikTok overtook Google, Amazon, Facebook and Netflix as the most visited sites. TikTok lead forms are one of the best tools for lead generation, and they also allow you to automate the process of adding leads to a CRM system.
- LinkedIn. The largest professional social network provides ample opportunities for lead generation. These include a promising new ad format, Conversational Ads, and highly customizable lead forms. Using these methods, advertisers can generate high-quality, actionable leads from targeted audiences.
- Google Ads. The most famous and popular contextual advertising service provides advertisers with a wide variety of advertising formats. This includes SERP ads, display ads (GDN, Google Display Network), Google Discovery Ads text and image ads, YouTube ads, etc. The platform allows not only using standard lead forms for each of the listed formats, but also expanding their functionality with additional options.
- Quora. The popular Q&A service is also one of the most effective lead generation platforms. The lead generation forms created here are ideal for gathering contacts of motivated users who need additional information on topics of interest to them. There are also useful options for audience targeting.
How do Chatbots Qualify Leads
The next relevant lead generation trend is chatbots, which allow you to automate not only the process of communication between a company and its customers, but also the process of collecting data from leads. Modern tools for developing bots provide them with a very rich functionality.
Chatbots can be used for a wide variety of marketing scenarios. For example, from simply collecting contacts or processing many similar applications to sending lead magnets and warm-up email chains, as well as studying the preferences and needs of the audience through surveys. These features will be extremely useful for quickly filling the subscriber base and their flexible segmentation according to the required criteria.
Chatbots on websites, landing pages, mobile apps and instant messengers help businesses not to miss potential customers by processing the maximum possible number of requests automatically 24/7. They provide the audience with quick and most relevant answers to requests and questions, without forcing them to waste time waiting for an operator to connect.
With the help of chatbots, you can automatically qualify leads and match the contacts they send with the existing database. If you want to know how to get more leads on Facebook or through another source of lead generation, then we recommend that you definitely use this tool. Moreover, now it is not necessary to develop chatbots from scratch, it is enough to use popular constructor services. There are also ready-made chatbot solutions for messengers: Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp for Business and others.
Data Enrichment
The current data enrichment trend is aimed at solving the problem of how to improve lead quality. According to statistics, no more than 20% of leads are able to bring real sales by default, and data enrichment technologies help make them better and more effective. The essence of this method is to collect as much diverse data as possible from several sources, as well as their further segmentation and analysis.
- Automate the work of an online store or landing
- Empower through integration
- Don't spend money on programmers and integrators
- Save time by automating routine tasks
The most common use of the data enrichment method is to collect missing contacts. For example, you have a fairly large database of phone numbers and you would like to supplement it with email addresses. In this case, you can start collecting this information from all possible sources, including from the clients themselves (1st party data), from third-party resources, for example, databases of partner companies (2nd party data), as well as data aggregated from the first two groups (3rd party data).
The technology allows you to enrich not only contacts, but also other types of data. For example, information about the location of potential customers (addresses, coordinates, postcodes), which will be very useful for mobile advertising and automatic detection of the nearest points of sale. In the same way, demographic data can be supplemented for more accurate campaign personalization, as well as behavioral data important for mapping the user journey.
QR codes
Next in the list of best tools for lead generation are QR codes, which are rightfully among the most promising technologies for attracting new customers in 2022. The main advantage of QR codes lies in their versatility, which makes them an extremely effective and versatile tool for online marketing. Among the main ways to use QR codes are the following:
- Links with lead forms. QR code is considered to be a very effective lead capture method in combination with contact forms. All you need to do is generate this code with a link that will redirect the visitor to a page or a one-page site with a lead form. This technology is very effective for collecting contacts of leads sent from mobile devices, since reading a QR code is much faster and more convenient than entering the link address manually.
- Registration by QR. Another popular free lead generation tool is the use of a QR code with a link to the registration form. This method also takes full advantage of the versatility of QR technology, allowing you to attract new potential customers from a variety of sources. For example, from a website, mobile application, social media accounts, product packaging or promotional printing.
- QR business card. Among other things, QR codes are a useful tool for creating and distributing digital business cards. You can place any contact and other data that you want to share with your audience on them. By scanning a QR from a vCard, a potential client will be able to instantly call you by phone number, write in instant messengers or save it to the contact list without entering the number manually. Also, QR business cards often contain email addresses and links to pages on social networks.
Lead generation services
In the end, it is worth noting some lead generation platforms that help entrepreneurs capture, track, qualify, verify, and flexibly manage leads.
For example, in the Driftrock service, you can create high-converting lead forms, landing pages, banners, and other customer acquisition tools. It is especially useful for those who use Facebook for leads, as well as Google, TikTok, LinkedIn and other social networks, in total, over 20 different sources can be connected here. Driftrock also has built-in lead verification tools and is able to automatically send them to CRM, email marketing platforms and Google Analytics.
Another of the current lead generation trends is the Mixpanel business intelligence service. It flexibly tracks all user actions on websites and mobile applications, and also provides functionality for personalized communication with them. The collected data is used to generate customized reports with an assessment of audience engagement and retention, as well as other important marketing indicators. Thus, Mixpanel helps to visualize user behavior and get useful insights.
Conclusion
In this article, we discussed what lead generation tools are and which ones are the most popular in 2022. Social networks like Facebook, TikTok, LinkedIn, and Google services remain some of the most effective channels for attracting new customers. Additionally, tools like chatbots and QR codes are renowned for their versatility in capturing leads.
Another powerful method for lead generation is the use of landing pages. By embedding forms created through services like Formcrafts—think of it as an alternative to Jotform — businesses can efficiently gather potential customer information using multi-step flows.
Furthermore, data enrichment technologies are equally effective, as are lead generation services equipped with specialized tools like Driftrock and Mixpanel. Utilizing these tools can significantly improve the quality of your leads and streamline your marketing efforts.
Apix-Drive will help optimize business processes, save you from a lot of routine tasks and unnecessary costs for automation, attracting additional specialists. Try setting up a free test connection with ApiX-Drive and see for yourself. Now you have to think about where to invest the freed time and money!