Conjure up visions of your favorite restaurant.
Now, imagine you’ve never eaten there before. But one day, you walk past this restaurant that you are no longer familiar with and realize that there are a couple of people out front. They are giving away free samples to anyone who wants one. You walk up, they offer you your favorite food (in small portions) and you immerse yourself with enthusiasm, until …
Ewwwwwww.
The food is cold. It looks soggy and stale. It feels like it’s been sitting on a cake warmer for 3-4 days. And wait a second … is it a worm?
You throw it in the nearest trash can, shake your head, and forget to go back there.
No restaurant would be foolish enough to promote themselves like this.
But online, thousands of companies are more than happy to offer heated “seconds” samples to potential customers.
What I’m talking about
Lead magnets.
Offers that attract prospects and form a key part of lead generation strategies across the global web. They can come in the form of e-books, guides, reports, videos, or email courses. And while these content pieces are the most popular, lead magnets can be just about anything you can offer to a potential customer. Trials and demos are popular for cloud applications. Service-based businesses offer free consultations or audits as lead magnets.
But they all have one thing in common: attracting leads with the goal of building a relationship that eventually turns them into paying customers.
It makes sense that a lead magnet has to be good, if not amazing. If the prospects don’t want you, that relationship dies before you are born and you lose it. If it’s junk, that’s what your potential customer equates the business with. Either way, he’s out of luck … and he’s a potential customer.
And while no business wants to be seen as junk, that’s what they serve most of the time. For example, you’ll see dozens of “How to Write a Killer Headline” guides that are used as lead magnets in the marketing world. They all have the same repeated advice on duration, using a buff or phrasing it with little phrases like “a weird trick.” They all offer little to potential customers. And yet companies persist in serving this porridge, wondering why so few want to bite (and those who do turn around and run).
If you have a lead generation or sales funnel that uses a lead magnet, take the time to revisit that crucial offer. Are you serving your best dish so the prospects who walk through the door are left doing nothing? Or are you handing out the leftovers, hoping that some of those who taste it won’t turn their noses around?