21 Ways To Generate A Lead with Lawrence Tam
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Full episode transcript
Lightly edited from the original recording — fillers removed, nothing added. Income disclaimer.
Folks, obviously the income examples discussed are extraordinary. The income claims presented are not intended to serve as a guarantee of income. Instead, they're designed to give you an idea of what's possible. Success in this business requires leadership, hard work, and dedication. Since we want to help you make an informed decision, we've gone above and beyond with our income disclosure document.
If you want to see the average earnings, please visit the page at www.empowernetwork.com forward slash income dot php. Hey, this is Lawrence Tam, and welcome to the Inner Circle. And I want to just introduce you to something that's been dear to my heart since 2008 and something that I wish I had known earlier. I wasted a good year of marketing by skipping this step. And I'm going to show you.
I'm going to show you a couple steps. And this is why I called it the 21 different ways to generate a lead. Yes, driving traffic, building a blog, getting people to find out who you are and not generating the lead where someone actually gives you their email in exchange for more information was a big, big, big, big, big no-no for me. So I'm going to show you 21 different ways that you can integrate into your current websites, into maybe your Empower blog, or maybe into your current other outside blogs or websites, or even in social media, any way possible, shape or form. This is not the only 21.
These are the 21 ways you can generate a lead. But these are the 21 ways that pop into mind any time if something comes into you or a situation arises, pick one of them and just roll with it, okay? So people come and go on social media, but one thing is for certain. Email stays. I remember having an email, hotmail, back in the college days.
I think it was like 95, 94. I was using that zip drive. I was like, wow, it has 100 megabytes on it. I know that dates me, right? But people, when they check out on their Amazon card or when they go buy something or when they go register for something, it's always like name, address, phone, email.
Or when they open up an account online somewhere, it's always got an email. So email generally has a very sticky tieback. Now, a lot of social media sites are integrated into websites. That's for the new ones. But traditionally, most people still use email.
So email is a very important part of someone's life. That's directly tied to them. So it's pretty important to always be generating email. So a lot of forms use email, but a lot of social medias don't, right? So let's be clear.
You want to have email. It's pretty cool to have people who like you on Facebook. It's cool to have people who are friends on your Twitter. But let's, in this exercise, focus, focus on generating lead. Are you ready?
Here are 21 different ways you can generate a lead. Number one. Give something away. So a really easy example of this is let's say you have a really good e-book or you have a short seven-video series or let's say you have a pamphlet or a PDF or just something really digital or something easy to give away and you want to share it to someone on Facebook or maybe it's your neighbor. Maybe it's a buddy that ran into you.
And they already have their email. But it's permission-based email and not just adding people to a list, especially to an autoresponder. So give something away. Have an actual capture page or a call to action that goes, hey, if you want my 21 tips on how to generate a lead, go ahead and drop an email in here and I'll mail it to you. Something like that, right?
The second way to generate a lead is having a sidebar widget. So if you go to a website, most websites, they're either one, two, or three columns. One column will be like all the content, what you're looking at with pictures, videos, or images. And then you have these smaller side widgets, like the side columns that are smaller filled with banners and whatnot. Instead of having a banner or having nothing there at all, have a space there that someone can actually opt in.
You'll see this. There will be a box that says, you know, join my newsletter or get my three best cooking tips. Enter your email here and they'll be opting in instantly there. Now, there's one that's like static. So if you're reading a letter and you scroll down the website, that opt-in disappears.
There's actually opt-in forms where they'll hover. So if you've seen this where you're on a website and you're reading a really long article, that side opt-in box will follow you. So even though you're at the very bottom, you still have the opportunity to put your email in. So I want to label that sidebar or side widget bar or side opt-in, okay? Number three, header link top menu.
So what this is, is if you go to a website, you'll see generally like the big banner on the top. And then there'll be buttons like home, resources, contact me, right? Those buttons, if you're using WordPress or if you're using like the Empower blog, that's a button you can direct to a capture page, right? Those, if you use a heat map. Now, if you Google heat, heat map is a breakdown of your website where the general person that visits your website, where they physically click and where their mouse hovers at times.
So they've noticed that towards the top and towards the left, there's a lot of action. And those buttons, if you make it in WordPress or in Empower blog as a page, those can be directly linked off the page or in the page, but those can go straight to a capture page. So it could say, get more information. Or get money. Or opt in here.
Or join the team. Those links can then be an opt in to a capture page either on or off the page. But the idea is it's a button that's a gateway to another place to opt in, okay? Number four, clickable image. Now think about this, having a clickable image, go into an opt in.
So what if you had an image and instead of, you know, there's general, you know, the digital default way an image is loaded onto a website is you click it, and it expands into a bigger version of the image or the full-size version of the image. What if you click the image, and it physically took them to an opt-in page? Like why not? Let's say you had an image that had like a really detailed stat, right?
Like maybe opt-in email conversions, and it had a graph, and it looked really cool. If someone clicked it, take them to a capture page that goes, want to learn more how I do email marketing. Or let's say you detail cars, and you had a really cool image of a car that maybe the engine compartment is open, the hood is open. And someone clicks it, you go, would you like to have – or a capture page that says, would you like to know who the best person is to remake your car? Or something congruent to the image.
Three different ways to get bird poop off your hood, right? Someone who's in a car looking at car pics. Someone who's in a car looking at car pics might be interested in, yeah, how do I remove bird poop from my car, right? And have that as an opt-in. So you have that image, even though it has no text, if someone were to click it, it's very congruent.
Now, the problem with that is there's no call to action to click in the image unless you like embed something into it. Like on an image, you can add a caption. You can say, click image to learn more. It's a direct call to action for someone to click your image. And when they click it, instead of it being nothing.
Or instead of it going to a larger version of it, have it go to a capture page where you can capture their information by giving them something that they're looking for, right? Recipes or whatnot. Okay, number five, congruent offer. Let's say you do a video interview with a gentleman. And the gentleman is like an author of a book.
And it's a great 30-minute interview, chock full of ridiculous information that's so awesome. And you can have an opt-in that goes, if you would like to have the transcript for this video, click here. And so the person who clicks that, that lead is so hot for number one, they're going to give you their correct email because they want the transcript. Let's say you do a cooking show and you have a recipe. And you're showing how to cook these pancakes or whatever.
And you go, hey, look, if you want to know the exact ingredients and what types of ingredients or brands that I'm using, go ahead and click the link below. And I'll mail it to you. I'll send it to you by email. The person who sees that and actually clicks it, I bet you the type of person who clicks that link over 50% opt-in with almost 90% actual email. Because a lot of times people will put in an email, it's like, oh, I don't care.
I'll give you my bad email just so I can see what the offer is. But if you go, I'm going to email it to you, you're pre-framing that person and go, hey, look, if you really want this information, you've got to give me the good email because I'm going to send it back to you. It's like having a two-way street. You give me your email. I give you information.
It's not you give me email that's bad. I can't give you anything. So they're going to want to go, oh, crap, I do need to give you my email. So this will drastically increase your open rates down the road having a congruent offer for something that they want delivered to their email. Number six is called a welcome gate.
A welcome gate is one where a website, for the first time, it's a cookie. A cookie is a digital piece. It's a piece of information that tells the website, hey, this is the first time you've been here. So the first time you go there, generally a cookie gets fired off and they go, hey, this person is the first time visiting. They're going to show you like a really big, like blocked site on their website.
You can't do anything except look at this site like a giant banner or a big opt-in box. And so generally it will have two options. Hey, first time here. Why don't you go ahead and put your information here so we can stay connected? Second option is close.
Now the attempt on this is if someone's coming maybe through organic search or through Facebook or through social media, before you even give them the content, you're making them either close the banner or that pop-up looking thing or have them opt in so you can become a registered guest. I'm going to assume anywhere probably below 10 percent, but that's leads you would have gotten that you wouldn't have gotten if you didn't have your welcome gate. So welcome gates are pretty cool. And plus welcome gates can integrate social media so you can have people go, hey, why don't you like and send me an email or sign up for my newsletter so you can get people to multitask and give you their Facebook to connect with you and their email just because they came in through a welcome gate.
Another one. How about a straight landing page from social media?
Now, depending on the social media, and the more congruent that social media is on your landing page, the higher the conversion. So now an example would be, let's say you're promoting on Twitter and Twitter, you're, you know, you're following on Twitter. You have some content on Twitter, but let's say on Twitter, you have a link that goes straight to a capture page that goes, hey, Twitter fans, would you want to learn how to do X, Y, and Z?
Would you want to learn how I made this cake? But you specifically talk to the person where they're coming from. If they're from Facebook, identify them as Facebook.
If they're coming from Twitter, identify them as Twitter. So they're more congruent. The chances of them opting in greatly increases. Number eight.
Run a contest. Give something away. Hey, I'm giving away a bamboo. Hey, I'm giving away a, you know, a six pack of beer. Hey, if you're over 21 in the States.
Hey, I'm giving away a, you know, a free digital product. I have, you know, whatever it is, run a contest and then before they can enter, you go, hey, look, the only way I can give it to you is if you send me your email to register and from those registered, I will pick an email out of that and I will contact you by email. So the person who wants to register for this, whatever the contest winnings are, they'll want to give you their good email because you're telling them I will only connect and notify you by email. So if you want to win this X, Y, Z product prize, you've got to give me the good email so I can send it back to you. Easy way to run a contest and generate leads that way.
Another one. Banner images. This is very traditional where you have a big image on the side or maybe at the top or on the left and it's strictly an image with call to action already on it. Click here to learn how to generate, you know, 10% sales on your product. Three different ways to write, you know, better ad copy.
Number 10 is clickable text, a clickable text link, a contextual text link in your actual article. You have like, say, click here. And when you click here, it takes them to a capture page. This works best when you've actually delivered some content or some value before having it click here.
So an example would be, hey, here are the three best prices for this Porsche. And if you want to know what the best prices is in your area, click the link below. Click here. You're then telling the person, say, someone's looking for a Porsche in your area.
They can then go, yeah, I am looking for the best price for that. They watch this video or they watch an article breakdown on what you've done. Then they go, they click here. It's congruent, but you're directly calling them on a link that you highlight and then you hyperlink it. It's a standard tool on almost any WordPress, or even website.
It looks like a link, like a physical chain mail link, like a chain link loop link, and that signifies the image of a link. So you just highlight the text, hit link, and then it'll ask you where, what link do you want to put it? Like where, what website or URL you want to send that person if they click it.
You put the website in there, which is generally a capture page. Someone comes in, clicks, click here or learn more here. They click the actual string of text. It takes them on. Number 11, one of my favorite ones and one, I don't even know how I found it, but I stumbled upon it and I use it a lot.
If you're using a service like AWeber, AWeber has a thing where you can do an email to AWeber, but it actually goes to you now. It's that trickery. It's a very specific method and you should tell someone how to do it. It's number one in AWeber. Everyone has a specific list and it's an identifier to your email list, right?
So my, say my email list is, Lawrence, Tam, ABC. No, that's not my list. I don't want to give you my list. I don't want you on my list. All right.
But let's just say I have a list called Lawrence, Tam, ABC. It doesn't exist, but for examples purposes. So that's my list name in AWeber. So inside of AWeber, let's say I have like 20 different lists and one of them is Lawrence, Tam, ABC.
Now, what you can do is you can say, put us on Twitter, Facebook. You can even just give it to somebody and go, hey, look, if you want to get on my newsletter, or if you want to learn more about what I do, or if you want me to email you back, what you can do is email me at Lawrence.Tam.ABC@AWeber.com. So what happens is instead of you emailing, like say your Gmail, your personal email, which, you know, is more manual, you want someone to opt in to your list.
So let's say your list is, you know, you do cooking tips and your newsletter has like, 10 days of the test, 10 best ingredients that you suggest for your clients and your customers and your newsletter reader. You go, hey, if you want the 10 best ingredients that I have, why don't you go ahead and just email me at Lawrence.Tam.ABC@AWeber.com. Now someone goes ahead and actually goes in there and emails it. Instead of going to your personal, it goes into AWeber, and AWeber then goes, hey, someone wants to become a lead, but there is another step. It forces you to do double opt-in.
So you have to go ahead, and AWeber automatically sends them a reply email that says you are requesting information from this list name of Lawrence, Tam, ABC. If this is correct, click the link below to confirm. It's a double opt-in. It's an extra step, but the person who would take the time to send an empty email, or if there's text in the email, AWeber doesn't care. It doesn't use any of it.
So generally what I tell people on Facebook is like, hey, if you want to get on my list and learn my, you know, three ninja tips on how I rank on YouTube, email me at the email list name at AWeber.com. And then I tell them, and to be approved to get on that list, it will email you to confirm your email, then hit okay, or click the link. And then you'll be officially on my list. It's a two-stage process, but they never saw a capture page.
Think about this. They never saw a headline. They never saw your face. They never had to see an opt-in box. You didn't have to build anything.
It's all built in. So you don't even have to have a capture page and you can build in leads through social media, through your blog, through Facebook, through Pinterest, Instagram, definitely a really cool way to connect with people and all you need is your list name at AWeber.com. I don't know if the other autoresponder services do that, but I know for sure AWeber does. All right, number 12, something I learned from a good friend, Chris Christopoulos, he said he was talking about retention rates in his emails. He's like, you know, how do I get such really, really high email retention, is like, how'd you do that?
He goes, what I do is I'll do like a bootcamp or like a seven day training or like a three day course. That's free, but for you to get it, I need you to fill in your user information, like your name and your email, so I can send you the information. So the person who's expecting the training has to give you the right information. So what you do is you go, hey, look, I have a seven day bootcamp or a three day video course, and say it's on a banner, or let's say it's in your blog post and you just have an opt-in form. The person goes, wow, I really want that training.
Okay. And you pre-frame it and it's free. They go, oh, that's even better. Here's my name. Here's my correct email.
Cause I need to get the information to my email inbox. Cause if they didn't want to give you the email, they would have never opted in the first place, but you pre-frame it. It's not just, let me just give you one thing, it's not like, let me just send you one sales video or one how-to video. I'm going to show you with a free membership or free training, but I need your information. Here you go.
So your opt-in plus your retention would be really high. Let's see. Number 13, making banner on website clickable to an opt-in. So we kind of cover this, but banners have been like the dinosaurs of advertising, right? And banners can be everywhere.
And I mean everywhere. They can be in the footer. They can be in the sides. They can be in the header. They can even be in the text, but this one specifically is talking about if you have a website and let's say the website, you know, is, you know, how to build a mousetrap, and that's the top banner. You can make that banner clickable. Now, the average person wouldn't click it because generally they don't. They don't associate a top banner being clickable. They generally associate buttons as clickable, highlighted texts as clickable, banners on the side. Yeah, they're boxes and they have calls to action on it.
They're clickable. So what you do is you have your top banner and you have a call to action on the banner. The Empower Network viral blog has this option. Click here to learn more. Click here to see more on the physical banner.
So even though it's a banner on the very top, and it spans the width of the entire blog, you actually make that a clickable banner so that when someone looks at your website, it says click here to learn more about, you know, marketing, or click here to get started. Click here to get my three day course. They see this. It's actually a giant banner on the very top, but most people don't associate it.
But what you do is you make it associated by making the banner with a call to action at the very top with your website name, or maybe it's your profile if you're branding yourself, right? But it's the very top, it's a very specific type of style. All right. Number 14, signature file.
So let's say you write a blog post, or let's say you write an article or piece of content or shot a video at the very end of that. A lot of people do nothing. They go, thanks, or that is it, or see you tomorrow. Well, automatically what you want to do, your intuition should kick in.
You should be the author of this and just write a little bit about yourself. A lot of times there'll be a section automatically pinned out or automatically broken out. Like the Empower viral blog has this. You can go ahead and just put it in there every time. Copy and paste the link.
And you just copy and paste a short, you know, what I do is I do engineering your success, comma, Lawrence Tam, and then I do PS and I'll have some type of call to action, like going to a capture page or learning about a three day series I have, and that will go there, but it's always in the very bottom as a signature. So it denotes who authored this article, right? So if it's missing, go ahead and add it on every single one. And I would definitely have a postscript, like a PS or PPS, have a call to action to take them to a capture page. Number 15, pop under.
So some websites have the ability, if you add some scripting or a special plugin, you can have a website where there is like, you'll read it. And then a little banner will rise from the bottom of the website. It'll be like a strip, like a banner, but it will appear from the bottom. And the thing is, since it moves, and sometimes it moves with you as you scroll down, it's just real estate that you can then have eyeballs click and use.
So it's a different approach than the header banner, but the bottom one is called a pop under. It pops up under the content, under the website. And generally it moves from like, you know, rising from the bottom. So people catch it and go, oh, what is that? So it's a really cool way to get someone to look at a website and then take their attention off into that.
Next one is pop over. I've seen some programs you can do this with, a lot of programs use iframing for this, where you can take a website, click it, and then it'll just embed like a giant banner or an opt-in box. It doesn't work like a welcome gate, cause they don't happen almost every time. You can force it to happen every time, but the pop over is kind of like a welcome gate in a sense, but you know, it's more specialized. If you can really do this with iframing, or if the pop over isn't so much about the cookie, it's more of that every time someone comes in, it just pops over.
It just appears, right? So you can do a pop over where it appears on top of the content. Very similar to a welcome gate. Okay. Number 17, exit pop.
Now, what is that? When someone is starting to creep their mouse and they're about to exit the website, a thing pops up like a capture page or an opt-in buzzer goes, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Let me tell you what you can do. X, Y, and Z. So let's say you have a cooking blog, right?
And someone's going to close it. Whoa, wait, here are the seven things you cannot eat because they're toxic, you know? So someone's like, oh, wait, I'm on a food blog and you're telling me I can't eat these seven things. Sure. What is it?
And so they'll opt in to find out what it is. Download my seven things you need to buy organic and seven things you don't need to buy organic and seven things you should never eat. Here's my special report. Download it here. So when someone is about to hover, they don't know this thing exists until they're about to leave, right?
So a popover sometimes can pop in like 10 seconds when you're on the website, 15 seconds when you're on the website. It happens all the time. You've probably experienced this on large websites. They use pop-ups, pop-unders all the time. We call popovers all the time, right?
All the time. But the exit pop is when you're about to leave. The reason I like the exit pop is you're allowing the visitor to digest your information, your video, your content undisturbed. But if they were to leave, you have one last chance to get them on your newsletter.
And this is really, really cool way. I prefer that over a popover because let's say they're on Google and they're searching for something and they go, how do I make fried green tomatoes? And they click it. They go to your website and then they're expecting to see a recipe, a video, some images.
But then if you interrupt them with a popover, the number one thing, like 99%, I would assume or higher, would quickly exit it so they can see the content. But let's say they're on Google and searched, you know, how to make fried green tomatoes, and they go to your website and they go, oh, cool. I see a video. I see ingredients. Okay, cool.
All right, I'm done. And they're going to exit out of your website. That's when the exit pop should kick in and go, hey, but check this out. I have an even better recipe on how to do fried green tomatoes. It's very congruent.
You're trying to recapture that same traffic and gather their email before they leave. And the main reason is so you can connect with that person again. And if your content was good, it'll work, right? Number 18, host a webinar. So there's a lot of cool places.
You can do this with like GoToMeeting and YouTube hangouts, hangouts on air. So before you send to a hangout, that's free, have them opt in. So let's say, you know, you see this a lot with like video gamers. Well, they'll like show up tomorrow at noon.
I'm going to show you how I do this on blah, blah, blah. Video game, same thing. You're going to do a live event or you're going to do some type of training event before they go to it, have them opt in and you can pre-frame it so I can send you your registration, so I can send you where to attend, so I can send you the reminder and the link. So they're like, oh, I got to give you my right email, my correct email. So building a list through a webinar is a very good way to build a relationship, build a brand and get emails because they're registering.
I just did the air quotes for you, registering for a webinar. Number 19, why don't you do a survey? And the cool thing is you can do all kinds of surveys. Let's say you want to do one for internet marketing. And you're sending out a survey to your current list, or maybe someone who just opts in, or let's say you're sending a survey to Facebook, whatever it is, a survey can be for your leads.
It could be for non-leads. It could be for your social media. It can be for a YouTube. Let's say you're doing a video and a video is like you're teaching seven different things on how to cut a tomato, right? Cause obviously cutting a tomato isn't as easy as it seems because it gets all very hands.
It's all mushy. And then you cut your finger super hard. So let's say you have a video on how to cut up a tomato, right? And then you go, I would love, like instead of survey, maybe questionnaire, slash the kind of the same, hey, if you love this video, I would love to know what else you would like me to cut up. What other fruit or vegetable would you like me to dissect?
What other method, like you're asking them questions, someone who is willing to be involved in your discussion, someone who wants to be involved in your office. I would love to be involved in your article or your video or your training or your discussion on Twitter or your discussion on Facebook or LinkedIn, that person is interested. And if that person is willing to answer a questionnaire or a survey, they're probably going to want to leave an email. Now, if your ad copy is good, you can have some sort of ad copy in your survey or any questionnaire that would make them want to, yeah, here's my email so I can communicate with you. So one way would be survey results will be emailed to you.
So someone's like, well, I want to know what it is. So they'll put the real email in, right? Easy, easy, easy way to do that. Number 20. How about paid traffic?
Do you know, just the stuff we learned from the internet traffic formula, stuff we learned from the 15K formula, things you learn on calls like this on the Inner Circle, just having paid traffic like solo ads, Facebook PPC, direct mailing, newspaper ads, you know, banner ads, media buys, traffic agency, there's a ton of different ways to just, you just pay for traffic and you go straight to a capture page. As long as that capture page is congruent to that traffic, you'll get leads, right? And number 21 to wrap up this 21 different ways to get a lead. Now there's other ways to get a lead, but the 21st way is ask for it, right? Just straight up.
Ask for it. Now, what does that actually mean? Well, you go, hey, we're friends on Facebook, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. You find out what their pains are. You find out what they're about.
You find out what they're doing. And let's say you run a cupcake shop. Like you bake cupcakes. You're a baker, right? And you're like, hey, you know, that's awesome.
And they go, you know, I love, you know, eating. Oh, cool. Well, I run a cupcake, I have a cupcake restaurant. And I just wanted to connect with you because it seems like you like to eat too.
And I like to eat. I like to make cakes. Cool. Well, how about I send you some discounts for our cupcakes? And they go, cool.
How do I do that? Right? So one way, kind of sneaky, is you go, well, here's a coupon, right? And all you have to do is here's the coupon, and go here to register a free account. So that we can send you our newest newsletters on which cupcakes are on sale, or we can then be able to send you one, like maybe your small operation.
So the example being is instead of you taking their email by writing it down or copy pasting it, because you could copy paste it into your autoresponder, right, the problem with that is it will make them auto confirm. So if I were doing that method, I would just make them go, you know, list name at AWeber.com. I would rather them have them email me so that AWeber does all the work. But if you're physically asking for it, you can then just send them a capture page, like physically go, hey, why don't you just go ahead and go to this website and I'll send you the information.
Even though it's all automated, right? Even though it's completely automated, all you're doing is giving them an email to the capture page or the website with information. But ideally it's not just a website with just names. Right? It's not just information.
It's a website with some information, but the clear direction of having them opt in. Right? So by asking for it, giving them a link, connecting with the people, you can do this on any format. It's just like in real life at a party. An excellent way to do this.
So my name is Lawrence Tam. You have come away with the 21 different ways to generate a lead and I'm going to run through them really quickly. All right. And by all means, listen to this again, but let's go one through 21. Give something away.
Sidebar widget, header link using pages, clickable image, congruent offer, welcome gates, landing page run through social media, direct congruencies, run a contest, banner image on the very top, clickable link, contextual link, list name at aweber.com using your list name and having them email it. Sign in to a free membership, making a banner on a site that's clickable to an opt-in when they think it's expanding, but it's actually a congruent offer, signature file, a pop under, then a pop over, and then an exit pop, and then host a webinar, then a survey, then direct paid traffic, and number 21, straight up asking for it. So my name is Lawrence Tam. I want to thank you for spending the time with me today. I hope you enjoyed the time with me to listen to how to 21 different ways to generate a lead.
Go ahead and listen to the archived Inner Circle calls and of course listen to the new ones coming out. My name is Lawrence Tam. I appreciate you and have a good day.
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