Two years ago Marsha attended a webinar that talked about building small websites to capture leads that were then resold to businesses.
Because she wanted something that was mostly passive income and could be scaled, she decided to give it a try.
First, she had to decide who she was going to target. She knew she needed a specific industry, and since she already worked in insurance, she decided that was the place to start.
She knew that insurance companies paid good money for hot leads. Deciding to focus on life insurance, she decided to target new parents. Being a mother herself, she already knew the needs and pain points of the market, enabling her to nurture leads more effectively.
Next, she created valuable content targeted at expecting and new parents. Interestingly, the content covered many things about being new parents, not just the need for life insurance, showcasing a broader range of product or service interests. She quickly gained an audience through her educational materials, effectively using them as a form of nurturing leads.
She used clear calls to action to get her audience to raise their hands to receive a small book she wrote about how to choose the right life insurance. Knowing the company she worked for was an excellent choice, she approached her company about providing them with leads. They readily agreed to pay her a fee per lead, plus a commission on policies sold, recognizing the value of buying high-quality leads.
And she was quite clear with her readers that they would receive information from the one company she personally recommended.
Granted, this wasn’t like most lead generation websites. She was offering more information than most, being more helpful, and building a solid audience that continued to read her materials. Most lead generation sites simply advertise, grab leads, sell them, and move on to the next prospects.
Marsha captured her insurance leads with a landing page offering the insurance book. Only about 5% of her readers opted into this particular offer, but the percentage of those who actually bought the insurance was impressively high. These were super hot leads of people who were ready to buy right away – they simply needed to know which company to buy from and Marsha’s recommendation sealed the deal.
Within six months Marsha was making as much money selling leads to her company as she made in salary.
It was then she attended a marketing seminar and realized she was sitting on a goldmine. While you and I are quite aware of things like affiliate marketing, it is all new to Marsha.
She then began segmenting her list into different interests and promoting appropriate products and services to her readers based on what they wanted, a tactic to ensure quality leads.
Now her income from the affiliate products was nearly as much as her income from insurance leads, and she decided it was time to retire from her job and work her business full-time.
She now sells leads to several different industries, all of which cater in some way to expecting and new parents. She knows that if any of her clients ever stop purchasing her leads, she can simply go to a similar company and offer them her leads.
By nurturing trust and rapport with her audience, she cultivates a receptive environment for sales. When readers request more information, they’re genuinely open to hearing from sales representatives, making this an effective lead gen strategy. She encourages the businesses to use her name during outreach, paving the way for successful sales conversions.
To further build her audience, Marsha is now branching out into video as well as leveraging her social media presence and appearing on podcasts, which are modern lead generation strategies.
It’s amazing what she has accomplished. Remember, she started out simply wanting to generate leads she could sell, and along the way, she’s built an entire business with multiple streams of income and an audience that is growing every day.
