The good news is that if you know how to use social media correctly, it can be your most effective lead generation platform. With 3.6 billion users using social media throughout the world, it’s the ideal platform for businesses to reach out and acquire new customers. It’s simply a matter of employing the appropriate strategies at the appropriate moment.

Here are some of the most innovative approaches to generating sales leads using social media.

Launch Compelling Offers

People are often compelled to readily disclose their information with you if they are given the correct incentive. You’ll need to design compelling lead magnet offers that customers want in order to accomplish this. This might be anything from a research paper to a free software program. Discount codes, case studies, webinars, whitepapers, and other resources could be considered.

Create User-Friendly Landing Pages

If you’ve managed to persuade someone to click on your link, don’t let them down with a shoddy landing page. The landing page must be relevant. If someone clicks on your link expecting to find a specific product or information, it had best be there. It’s easy for someone to shut a window or forget why they clicked in the first place if the content is missing.

A good landing page will have a consistent aesthetic appearance and be easy to skim. It should give users a clear path to follow and try to be as personalized as possible.

Keep it simple if your landing page includes a form. Each question you add decreases the likelihood of someone completing it. The more delicate the information, the less likely you are to obtain it. Pre-fill as much information as you can if at all possible. This raises the likelihood of someone filling out the form.

Related: How to Optimize your Landing Pages for your Multi-channel Campaigns

Create Clickable Content

You won’t get any leads if your content isn’t interesting. That’s all there is to it.

Keep in mind that everyone on social media is vying for attention. And people’s attention spans are shorter than they’ve ever been. Images should be sharp, and the copy should be even sharper. If you want to create leads, make sure your creatives support that goal.

You’ll want to make sure folks have a spot to click with click-worthy information. Make sure each post contains a clear link and an appealing call-to-action, if at all possible.

You can tag products in the Facebook shop, add swipe up on Instagram stories, make shoppable Instagram posts, and avail shop the look pins on Pinterest.

Host an Event

Virtual conferences and events are an excellent method to reach out to a targeted audience while also showcasing your expertise and authority in the industry. That means they’re also fantastic for generating social media leads, especially since individuals will need to supply their information in order to sign up or attend the conference.

Organize a virtual conference on issues that will interest your target audience and are relevant to your brand’s expertise. You can use the event to talk about hot industry subjects, give practical advice, and bring in notable speakers. Furthermore, you may generate a lot of content by publishing on social media during the event or repurposing information into lead magnets.

Related: 5 Ways to Promote Your Virtual Event to Drive More Webinar Attendees

Run Social Lead Ads

There are social lead ads if you’ve exhausted organic lead collection methods or if you want to bolster those efforts.

Facebook leads ads: For advertisers, Facebook has a specialized lead ad format. Facebook lead advertisements are just promoted forms. The leads generated by these advertising can be synchronized straight to your customer management system or downloaded for follow-up by your sales team. When it comes to lead nurturing, Facebook’s retargeting tools are very useful.

Make sure you have Facebook Pixel installed on your site. This makes it easier to keep track of leads and calculate their value.

Instagram lead ads: Instagram, like Facebook, offers lead advertisements to assist marketers in collecting information. Instagram allows users to partially pre-fill forms. In these ads, you can pre-fill the email address, full name, phone number, and gender fields.

YouTube TrueView for Action ads: This YouTube format is intended to assist advertisers in achieving a certain goal, such as generating leads. These ads feature prominent call-to-action buttons that may take you to any website you like. Simply choose “Leads” as your aim when producing these advertisements.

LinkedIn Lead Gen Forms: LinkedIn also has a special ad format for lead generation called Lead Gen Forms. These adverts are now available on the platform as Message Ads and Sponsored InMail. LinkedIn, like Facebook and Instagram, leverages information from your profile to pre-fill fields. A LinkedIn Lead Gen Form converts at a rate of 13% on average. A typical website conversion rate is 2.35%. Direct call-to-actions are also available in LinkedIn Dynamic Ads, which can assist in generating leads.

Make Testimonials Social Proof

Customer testimonials can provide the social proof you need to generate new prospects. Customer reviews show how well your products and services benefit the customers, which improves the brand value.

Two out of every three individuals are more inclined to purchase anything after watching a testimonial film that shows how a company, product, or service has benefited someone similar to them. You could collect client reviews and put them into an animated film to offer as social proof.

Leverage Social Listening

With effective social listening, look for lead generation possibilities. Keep an eye on social media conversations to see what people are saying about a particular issue or a competitor’s brand. This will assist you in identifying any opportunities for your company to create high-quality leads.

Someone who is unhappy with a competitor’s product, for example, could prefer a different option. And everyone looking for recommendations would be delighted to hear your advice. Furthermore, people who inquire about your brand and products will appreciate your proactive approach when you respond to their concerns. So, use social listening to nurture your prospects for conversion.

Run Contests

Contests are an excellent approach to raise brand awareness and create social media leads. Businesses can get major benefits from contests in terms of obtaining leads, and participants will share their great experiences with friends and coworkers, resulting in a viral effect.

For instance, IKEA is a well-known brand that sells furniture all over the world. IKEA has a substantial social media presence, with millions of Facebook fans and tens of thousands of Twitter followers. Its catalogs are chock-full of eye-catching images that are ideal for posting on social media.

They used social media networks to distribute content and get new leads. The US Ikea page has 1.7 million followers. It is much more often updated, with three or four posts every day.

Through social media, anybody can participate in a contest for lead generation.

By clicking over to the landing page or retweeting, sharing, liking, and following your social posts.

Design a Referral Program

Referral programs are a great way to double your sales leads. Your leads will be rewarded for referring their friends and/or colleagues if they participate in these initiatives. As a result, those who are recommended will have the opportunity to discover more about your products or services and may become new leads.

To make this work, you may offer a tempting incentive in exchange for the recommendation, such as a gift card, a free gift, or a discount.

MasterClass, for example, devised a referral program that allowed users to receive a free annual subscription when they received one as a gift. It then marketed the campaign on social media, using both organic and paid posts.

Related: Making the Distinction: Affiliate Marketing vs. Referral Marketing

These are the top 9 ways to generate leads and boost your sales. Social media marketing is an effective way of boosting your business, and you should execute the aforementioned tips. Moreover, if you are not competent with social media marketing, then hiring a social media marketing agency can be a good idea to generate profitable business from social media. So, make up your mind and start working to achieve the off-the-charts leads and sales.