What is a Lead Magnet?

In marketing terms, a lead magnet is a valuable resource that your leads —  potential customers — can download or access in exchange for their contact information. If email addresses were currency, lead magnets would be the product your leads buy with their currency. The best lead magnets for direct sales have a high percieved value to your potential audience, giving them plenty of incentive to provide their email to you, as well as an invitation for you to contact them with information about your company, products or services.

You can find thousands of lead magnets online, and most likely, you’ve downloaded some yourself. Coupons, free gifts, samples, e-books, training guides, video access; these are all considered lead magnets. Lead magnets for direct sales can be a game changer for your business, as it can provide exceptional value to your customers, establish you as the go-to person, help you brand yourself, and so much more. If it can work for millions of brick-and-mortar and online retailers, it can work for your small business and direct sales business!

Lead Magnets for eCommerce

Of course, as a direct sellers or small business owner on a budget, freebies or complicated and time consuming e-books may be off the table. Additionally, you may be limited to what you can provide to an external audience according to your company’s policies and procedures. As you’re planning your lead mangets for direct sales, consider these factors: How much time can I commit to creating this? How much money can I allocate to a lead magnet? Does this adhere to my company’s rules? You might flex your creative muscles a bit when choosing your lead magnet, but it will pay off in spades, and can help you generate new leads on autopilot.

Gift with Purchase

 

One most-utilized lead magnets in the retail industry are the gift with purchase and for good reason. It not only gives an added value to your customer but also sales for your business. Gift with purchase can be anything with percieved value, from a handful of samples to a full-sized free product. For direct sellers, you may consider something complimentary to your product you can send for free — a small makeup bag if you sell makeup, a glass roller container for essential oils, or deluxe samples of a full-sized product for skincare. In all three of these examples, the free gift is very inexpensive or complimentary to you. Makeup bags, glass rollers, and small jars to distribute samples are all available for less than $1 per item. Each provides a personalized touch to your sales.

Video Series

Video has exploded on social media, with live video being top of the list. In fact, more than 95% of brands in a recent survey said live video would be a part of their marketing plan. Video can help showcase your personality and solidify your personal branding for your direct sales business. It can also be used as a lead magnet!  A video series can include tutorials on your products, DIY follow-along videos, demos and more. Once you decide on your video series topic, take some quick videos ( less than 2 minutes per video) and upload them to YouTube as unlisted videos. After your new lead signs up, send them the video links via email each day for the legnth of the series (p.s. email automation can help tremendlously with this!)

Your video series should have a percieved value to your potential customers. What can they learn from you that they can’t get elsewhere? How can you simplify their lives or meet a need? How can your video series solve their problems or address their pain points? Videos should address at least one of these questions. Remember: a video series is designed to show YOUR expertise with your product or service, so don’t stress about how it looks! A short smart phone video is all you need to get started.

Digital Download

If you’re the creative type, these lead magnets for eCommerce idea are perfect for you. This category of lead magnets includes:

• Checklists
• Workbooks
• Guide to..
• Stylebook
• How to..
• Cheat Sheet

And so so SOOOO many more. Seriously, the list could go on and on with ulimited topics. A great digital download 1) solves a problem or addresses your potential customers have and 2) compliments a paid product or service you offer. It has to fit both parts of this equation to work for your business. One of the most creative I’ve seen is from Young Living essential oils. I could mark off all the products I used, and the guide told me which YL products I could use instead. Brilliant!

Digital downloads are usually created in a design program like Canva, uploaded to a cloud storage site (like a website, Google Drive or Dropbox, or email marketing platform), and emailed to the lead upon request. Again, automation can help this, but as you start, you can send them individually through your personal or business email address along with a personal note. Encourage your leads to engage with you by prompting questions or feedback about the digital download.

Don’t think you have the design chops to knock out something like this? Think again! Canva has tons of pre-made templates in the platform and even more for purchase on other websites, like Etsy and Creative Market. It’s worth the investment!

Quiz

“Answer some questions and we’ll tell you what kind of cheese you are!” Buzzfeed is basically the king of the quiz.

But they are definitely doing something right. Judging by my Facebook feed, people love to take quizzes and share their results, which means the companies who created the quizzes are getting traffic and leads while they sleep. Quizes can work for any type of company and aren’t difficult to create. Your quiz should focus on the benefits of your product or service in a fun way, and each question should lead users to an outcome that compliments one of your products. For example, if you sell organizational tools, you may develop questions about your potential customer’s degrees of disorganization (“You’re a neat freak!” or “You’re a total pack rat!”) (but nicer, because who wants to be called a pack rat??) Your quiz results will provide: 1) an email address 2) valuable information about your customer 3) a ready-made sales tool for you to follow up with the specific product to meet their needs.

Quizes can be set up easily with almost no tech knowledge on Outgrow.co

(Don’t forget to grab a copy of my eBook, How To Grow Your Business with Quizzes)

Once you’re settled on the ideal lead magnet, get ready to find even more customers to nurture and serve!