Businesses that have grown reliant on Google Ads and other inbound paid lead generation channels are noticing a drastic increase in costs for pay-per-click (PPC) advertising that are driving up their lead costs .As a result, it has become increasingly important for business to take a fresh look at their digital lead generation strategies and explore ways to diversify lead generation spend in order to maintain lead volume and lower costs.

Several factors are contributing to this uptick in the amount your company may be spending to attract customers and generate quality leads with search engine marketing (SEM).

• Competition
  The very fact that inbound paid lead generation is so successful, and therefore popular with businesses of all types, is driving up costs in bidding on Google.
• Economic Factors
  Businesses today have to make lead generation decisions in a fluid, always changing marketplace where outside forces determine their costs. Spending can fluctuate based on higher demand for ad placements during periods of economic uncertainty or as a result of industry-specific trends.
• Costs for Transitions to New Platforms
  New and appealing digital platforms seem to be springing up constantly. There is likely to be a learning curve and initial investment get up to speed on platforms like TikTok or SnapChat or diversifying into popular channels like YouTube and Instagram. This will affect your CPL.
• Better Leads Can Be More Costly
  A successful paid lead generation plan should always be adapting to add new audiences. This can require a greater and more costly investment to specifically target new customers or the creation of ads with broader messaging and content creation to spread brand awareness.

Despite rising costs, SEM remains an important driver of visits to websites with strategic and well-placed digital ads, so it falls on your business to control and develop approaches that diversifies your marketing spend and reaches new audiences. It means using a variety of marketing channels to improve the impact of your digital ads and use data-driven marketing automation to more finely target your audience.

Best Marketing Channel Diversification Practices

Regardless of the marketing channel you plan to use to increase brand awareness, spur business growth, and get a better return on investment (ROI) for every dollar you spend, there are several things you should be doing.

• Know your audience – The number one rule for any marketing strategy, whether it’s digital, print, or traditional, is understanding the behaviors, priorities, and ultimate goals of your prospects and customers. Today’s shopper visit several sites and turn to a variety of sources to help them make a purchasing decision. Although lines can often seem blurred between channels and the audiences that access them, for instance the growing popularity of TikTok with older audiences, focus marketing spend where your audiences are, not just on the latest and greatest channels.
• Personalize – The deeper your understanding of your audience, the stronger your digital ads and other marketing content registers with personalized ads that are relevant. You have the ability to promise value that your competitors can’t offer. Personalization allows you to tailor your content, select images that resonate and are relatable, and build on previous engagements, regardless of the channel, for better engagement at every  turn.
• Create relevant and timely content – When you know your audience, you know the type of content they consume and trust to make decisions. Use blogs, infographics, video, and innovative technologies like augmented reality (A/R) to tap into their interests and stand apart from your competition with helpful content that is delivered in formats they enjoy and trust regardless of platform.
• Keep it Consistent – Regardless of the channels you decide to use for lead generation, it’s important that your brand and messaging creates the same feeling of familiarity and trust whenever and where ever your audience receives it. Although each platform may have different content format requirements, it’s important that even in the brief time you may have to make an impact with a short video or Facebook feed, you communicate and strengthen the value of your brand.
• Follow the Leader – You’re not the only business working to determine the best way to generate leads and find the ideal places to place digital and print ads. Your competitors are also likely committing resources to optimize digital lead generation. You can save time and money by keeping tabs on the keywords, type of content, and the channels on which they advertise to analyze what works for them and what isn’t.
• Streamline everything with automation – Put everything in motion by making data driven decisions to determine where your lead generation spend is achieving the best results. Through-channel marketing automation gives you flexibility to optimize your cost allocations and easy adaptability to create a smooth, customized experience for your prospects and customers.
• Identify key performance metrics – It’s important to stay vigilant and track the metrics that you’ve identified to measure performance, refine spend strategies, and to adjust how and where you advertise accordingly. Realize that CPL may not necessarily be your most effective way to measure the success of digital ad campaigns. Quality of lead also matters and you may have to pay more to outbid your competitors for the top keywords that lead to more sales and long-term relationships.

Four Ideas for Adding Digital Advertising Diversification

1. Make Your Website User Friendly Your website is the most powerful tool in your digital toolbox for collecting information and data from your site’s visitors, distributing content, and generating sales. Focus on removing obstacles that impede their path to completing a purchase regardless of their device.
   
   Use your website to establish your credibility and act as your online storefront. Your website is a great way to generate leads with forms for downloadable content, contest offers, and coupons, discount codes, and loyalty programs.
   
   

2. Employ SEO Across Every Digital Channel – If you’ve been bidding on keywords to achieve high search rankings for your digital ads, you have a ready resource of the words and phrases your prospects and customers use when conducting a search. Put those words to work organically in page titles and descriptions, metadata descriptions, suggested searches on TikTok videos and YouTube pages, and on landing pages.
   
   Use keywords on your website in relevant headlines, subheads, and links to pages that engage your audience with credible and trusted content. Tools like Google Search Console, Google Analytics, and SEO platforms can track performance to identify underperforming keywords and test new ones.
   
   

3. Automate and Personalize Email – An advantage of email lead generation is that your prospects and customers have granted you permission to use their data for personalized recommendations and content crafted to their interests. You can nurture them as you introduce your brand and move them along their buyer’s journey with well-timed or triggered emails.
   
   Use subject lines that grab attention and quickly convey the benefit of the content within the email. Emails have proven especially effective for reminders of abandoned e-commerce shopping carts and giving customers that final nudge to go back and complete their purchase.
   
   

4. Capture Leads with Social Media Influencers – Partnering with social media influencers gives you access to their following. An influencer can lend your business instant relevance with audiences for wide brand reach without high costs. They know how to create and craft compelling, visually engaging content that their audiences find trustworthy and relevant to their lives.
   
   Influencers can drive people to your website with mentions and links that are shared among enthusiastic and targeted audiences to boost SEO results. Influencers can be extremely important for communicating your messaging to niche audiences that matter most to your business.

Four Ideas for Adding Print Advertising Diversification

1. Direct Mail for Targeted Local Leads – Direct mail continues to show excellent results as a trusted lead generator in local markets where demographic and other factors help precisely target new audiences. It results in higher quality leads with tailored messaging and high visibility in neighborhoods and communities that can be segmented based on purchasing behavior or interests.
   
   Direct mail campaigns can support digital marketing and advertising, adding a tactile element that arrives in household mailboxes and can drive people to your website or through the doors of your business with special offers and coupons.
   
   

2. Print Marketing to Drive Traffic – Another tried and true method to generate interest and leads in local markets is print signage and other commercial print products like door hangers, menus, brochures, catalogs, point of purchase displays, and other printed materials that your prospects and audiences notice and hold onto.
   
   These materials stand out in a digital world and engage with people who place greater trust in advertising that not only looks great but is constructed with sturdy materials and attractive finishes. You can also track print performance with QR codes, personal URLs (PURLs), redeemable codes, and coupons.
   
   

3. Out-of-Home Print for Front-of-Mind Lead Generation – By strategically placing out-of-home (OOH) signage where you know your prospects and customers will see it repeatedly, it becomes a fixture of their commute or travels.
   
   It’s been established that it takes people more than one viewing of a sign or message until it creates greater awareness and brand recall. OOH is an inexpensive, relatively maintenance-free, and often larger than life way to make an impact and generate leads with messaging that can’t be missed. High levels of brand awareness help drive down costs of pay per click campaigns by driving more searches for your brand name which have lower average click cost relative to generic keyword terms.
   
   

4. Connect It All With Multi-Channel Campaigns – Expand your lead generation opportunities by integrating your print marketing with digital content and advertising using QR codes and personal URLs (PURLs) on printed materials. Consumers today visit a variety of sources, both print and digital, for information to support purchasing decisions and other actions, and you can make it easy for them.
   
   Multi-channel campaigns let your customers access and accumulate information in the formats they use most through the platforms they trust most. They also provide you with new and exciting ways to repurpose content to further reduce your cost per lead.

How you allocate your inbound paid lead generation spend depends on a variety of factors, but with rising CPL costs and increased competition for impactful, high-ranking keywords, diversifying your lead generation strategies makes sense. The solutions you find depend on knowing your audience well and identifying the right blend of digital and print content and the channels they trust. Marketing.com can help you connect the dots and find ways to build a diversified and effective lead generation strategy.