YouTube can turn out to be very lucrative for lead generation if you know how to leverage the world’s most popular video sharing platform. YouTube tends to hold visitors’ attention for far longer than other social media platforms or search engines, making it more likely for people to interact with your lead magnets.
As is the case with any social media platform, running paid ads can be a costly endeavor. It’s also a bit risky for those who have no experience in running paid ads. Get the targeting wrong or push creatives that don’t convert and you’re basically burning money.
There are methods you can use for YouTube lead generation. They’re relatively easy to implement and proven to deliver great results.
How YouTube lead generation can be powerful
YouTube gets over 14 billion visits per month, including its 1.7 billion unique monthly visitors. Almost 700,000 hours of video are streamed on YouTube every minute. The sheer scale, reach, and potential of this platform are astounding.
If you’ve been building a YouTube channel by posting content regularly, keep in mind that you can extract more value out of the platform in addition to amassing a solid subscriber base. It involves clear use of the call to action or CTA.
At the end of the video, viewers are usually asked to subscribe to the channel or visit a website. By making the CTA more interactive and offering an incentive, organic leads can be generated from viewers who can already be considered a warm audience.
5 proven YouTube lead generation methods
Add landing page links in video descriptions
YouTube lets you add clickable links in video descriptions and this is a great way to get traffic to a landing page. Viewers are already trained to go to the description box as that’s where they commonly find links to products they’re interested in aside from additional information about the video they were just watching.
The link must be placed prominently so that viewers don’t need to expand the description to see it, as YouTube cuts it off after the first line. Add a compelling hook before the link to entice people to click. Send them to a landing page where you can provide a lead magnet or another resource to add them to your funnel.
Utilize YouTube video cards
There are specific ways to add clickable links in the video and this is made possible through YouTube cards. This can be a great resource to generate leads from. These are interactive cards that are typically added toward the end of a video, but it’s possible to have up to five cards for each video.
It’s better to pepper these cards throughout the video, particularly during the halfway mark, to ensure you’re retaining the viewer’s attention. Use the links to direct them to a specific landing page that’s relevant to the video’s topic. Offer a lead magnet on the landing page to get them to sign up.
Create a relevant quiz for a giveaway
People love taking a quiz online particularly if that will get them free stuff. Utilize this engagement tool to create leads by offering a giveaway. It’s important for the quiz to be relevant so it should be based on the video that the viewer has just watched, otherwise they won’t really know what the questions pertain to and would likely exit the quiz page without providing their email address.
For example, if you’re marketing a business that sells cleaning supplies and the video is about the best ways to clean floors, the quiz should ask relevant questions about cleaning methods and supplies. Offer them a chance to win your products for free if they get the answers right. They’ll likely be willing to exchange their contact information in order to participate in the quiz.
Offer free samples of products
Who doesn’t love free stuff! Samples have long been the preferred method for brands to raise awareness about their products. Potential customers are able to try your products before they buy, thus removing any apprehensions that they may have about buying something without trying it out first.
This can be done in a number of ways through your videos on YouTube. For example, you can highlight use cases for your product or share testimonials from other customers. You could also do this through video demonstrations of your products. Towards the end of the video, add a CTA for viewers to get a free sample. They’ll need to provide contact information to receive the sample, thus providing you with a lead that can be used to build an email list for subsequent targeting.
Incentivize newsletter subscriptions
People don’t really link signing up for newsletters if they don’t get something in return. You must sweeten the deal for them. Since their email is what you want, consider incentivizing newsletter subscriptions by letting them know during the video what they’ll get in return.
For example, you can tell them that by signing up for the newsletter through YouTube, they can get 10% off their next order or free shipping. The offer is often enough to get a lot of people to sign up with their emails even if they don’t necessarily make a purchase.
Trust in YouTube’s potential to drive organic growth
YouTube can be a tough nut to track if you don’t already have an established channel with a decent subscriber base. It takes time to build that up but once you get the ball rolling, the channel can continue to grow as long as you’re posting good content regularly.
It can be tempting to rely entirely on YouTube ads to promote videos and subsequently generate leads. However, as highlighted above, there are many ways in which you can leverage your audience on YouTube to achieve organic growth that doesn’t cost anything in ad spend, rather, it provides an additional return on the investment you make to create content.
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