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New Business Leads: The Pros And Cons Of Various Lead Generation Solutions
Some methods are expensive, but you can get results quickly. Others are free marketing strategies that require more effort and time from you. Choosing a lead generation system for your new network marketing business will depend on your marketing budget, your marketing experience and your target market. In this article, I will list the advantages and disadvantages of the methods available for home business lead generation. Offline marketing: Pros: * For network marketers with a huge business network, an extensive contact list and credibility, personal contact marketing can work exceptionally well. * With some enthusiasm and plenty of energy (and a low budget) flyers, drop cards and banner signs can work well for someone that starts out with their business. Cons: * In a specific demographic area, many network marketing business owners can use the same advertising technique and you may find several ads in the newspaper and several banners and flyers all saying the same thing. * Some demographic areas are not allowed to use banner signs or place flyers on cars and you may encounter a run around with law enforcement * Print media advertising can be expensive and often outside of the budget of a new home business owner. * Producing radio and TV ads are very expensive. Joining a marketing co-op is an option to do this marketing. The price paid (between $500 and $1000 per month depending on the co-op) does not justify the quality and quantity of the home business leads obtained through this method. Administration fees for the co-op and the lead allocation management, adds to the cost of this type of marketing. Offline to online marketing: Pros and cons: * As above, as the only difference is that a website address is added to all print media. The idea is that the prospects will visit the website first where some frequently asked questions are answered. The prospect that needs more information and is still interested is encouraged to enter their details for a telephonic interview. Buying leads Pros: * This is a quick method. You can pay for your leads today and have the details of the leads available within 24 hours * The method is perceived to be fairly cheap. The price paid for leads will vary significantly depending on the various lead generation companies. You can pay around $120 for 50 telephone verified opt-in leads from one of the service oriented lead generation companies with a good service record. Cons: * The quality of the leads is not great. Many lead providers have to offer an incentive to encourage prospects to enter their contact details on a contact form. These leads are business opportunity seekers that want the tax benefits and the extra cash without thinking what they want in life and why. * Not all lead generation companies are ethical. Some sell the same list to more than one customer, resulting in irritated leads by the time you connect with them. * There is often a long delay (often as long as 60 days) from when the lead entered their details on the lead companies’ website to when you get the lead information. Many leads cannot recall they entered their details and you lose any possible impact. * These leads have no connection with you, as they have not visited your blog. Talking to them would be similar to doing cold calling, which is not fun! Buying genealogy leads Pros: * This method is quick. You can pay for leads today and have the details of the leads available within 24 hours * This method seems like a quick solution to anyone with a shortage of new home business leads and without a plan to learn to generate their own. Cons: * Network marketing companies sell the information of their distributors to anyone that will buy the information. They do not have the consent from the distributors when they sell the lists. You can buy lists and the distributors are still active in the company. Be prepared to handle highly irritated prospects that request you to “take me off your list, now”! * The sellers of these genealogy lists often obtain them in an unethical. Most people you contact off genealogy lists did not give their consent to their companies to sell their information and did not ask for a phone call by people selling a new business opportunity to them. You will talk with prospects that are disenchanted and negative towards any new network marketing business opportunity. * These leads have no point of reference to your business as they have not visited your website and requested you to contact them. Talking to them would be more difficult than doing cold calling, as these leads are also very negative towards any new business opportunity! Ad hoc online marketing Pros: * This method is quick initially. You can have a free job listing or free listings listed within 1 day. You can design and post a newspaper ad or banner ad within 1 week and a pay-per-click campaign and article listed within 24 hours. * Anyone with some online skills can try all the various methods available to advertise and can get results Cons: * You never learn to fully comprehend and master a specific online marketing skill if you continuously jump from one method to another * You compete with hundreds of other network marketing owners for the same market and unless you learn to market like the industry leaders, the competition in this type of marketing results in high marketing costs e.g. a PPC campaign using the highly competitive keyword “business opportunities” could cost you over $2 per click. Your own, targeted lead generation Pros: * Learn real marketing skills from industry leaders and you learn to master one marketing skill at a time. * This is not simply a gunshot marketing approach. This is a targeted marketing approach where you control to whom you market and you attract a higher quality lead. * You learn to present value to the online market and learn to use your acquired skills to display yourself as the leader you are, instead of just another home business owner. * You learn to use credible marketing systems with qualified marketing funnels, lead capture pages, auto-responders. * You learn to build relationships with the visitors to your website and you learn to use social media to make you real in the eyes of your prospects. Cons: * You need to give yourself the time to learn the marketing skills you lack and become skillful in one marketing strategy at a time. * You need to put the effort in to learn and apply the various marketing techniques until you can use them well. You cannot pay someone to learn it for you. There is no comparison if you evaluate the pros and cons of the various methods available to get new business leads. Some methods seem like a quick solution for a home business owner with a lack of leads. Most quick solutions are not real solutions to the problem of a lack of leads. The only real lead generation solution is to learn to generate your own, targeted leads. To learn and apply real marketing skills. To use a credible marketing system with customizable marketing funnels, capture pages and auto-responders. To be able to graft your down line into the same system to ensure they get the same quality marketing training, access to the same online marketing tools and that they too, can duplicate their success in their down line. Article Directory: http://www.articledashboard.com Melanie Kok is a Lead Generation Coach and an Online Marketing Strategist assisting home business owners to start generating their own business leads.. More articles on lead generation tips and new business leads is available on Melanie's Blog. To get access to training to learn to generate your own business leads, go to Online Lead Coach Training. |
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