Email Marketing Lead Generation Insights for B2B Success

If generating a steady flow of leads for your B2B business feels like an uphill battle, you’re not the only one. In the B2B industry, 68% of companies struggle with this exact problem.

In this industry, you’re usually targeting people of importance. This could be CEOs, business executives, owners, etc. However, these people are far too busy to be reading blog posts and scrolling on social media. So, how do you get in contact with them?

One tried and proven method is email marketing. Why? Because these individuals can’t live without it. They use email as one of their main communication and collaboration tools. Therefore, placing yourself there could put you in their sight.

But there is a catch. Email marketing is challenging. The average office worker gets around 9,000 to 15,000 emails per year. Those in the top employment ranks probably get 3, maybe 4 times that.

For that reason, you need to master email marketing for B2B lead generation. Whether you’re a business owner or a marketer, this blog will give you the best email marketing practices for B2B lead generation.

Why Email Marketing is Essential for Lead Generation

ROI

Email marketing lead generation is a key player in the B2B sector for its notable return on investment.

The open, CTR, and conversion rates are great, considering how much email marketing costs.

Source: DMA

Important notes:

• High Open Rate – B2B emails see an average open rate of 15.14, indicating that many recipients engage with emails.
• Click-Through Efficiency – The average click-through rate is 3.18%, showing that emails really get clicks.
• Conversion Success – Conversion rates are around 2.6% in major B2B industries, so email marketing can convert leads into customers effectively.
• Budget-Friendly – Considering the returns, the typical monthly cost is $1,000+ for managed email marketing. This is much more affordable than SEO, search, and social media advertising.

This ROI nature is why 64% of B2B marketers regard email marketing as a vital part of their strategy for meeting business goals.

Automation

Another benefit of email marketing lead generation is the power of automation. For B2B marketers, automation is a game-changer. It allows them to manage email campaigns without using too many resources or going over budget.

This is particularly advantageous for teams with limited people. Using automation means sending triggered emails, segmenting audiences, and managing campaigns with minimal input. The only input you’d need is someone to read the email metrics and optimize the content based on the data.

Segmentation

Alongside the above, segmentation is another vast benefit. Segmentation is about turning your long email list into smaller, targeted lists. For example, you might have a list of emails for a specific industry, plumbing, and a list for another one, like carpentry.

This segmentation can be automated and allows you to create more personal emails. Being specific and segmenting your email list makes impactful emails resonate with the receiver. And as you can imagine, this drives open, click-through, and conversion rates dramatically.

How to Use Email Marketing for B2B Lead Generation

Building Your Email List

To kick off your email marketing strategy for B2B lead generation, you must start with list generation.

While you might be tempted to buy a list for quick results, growing your list organically is better. Purchased lists often come with issues like non-compliance, poor targeting, and ineffective segmentation, which can be illegal or detrimental to your ROI.

So, how do you start building an email list from the ground up?

Forget about the overused pop-ups on landing pages. The most effective way is to provide value first. Offer something enticing like a free ebook, a newsletter subscription, or a trial period. This approach gives the prospect a reason to share their email address with you.

Focus on QUALITY Content

Never underestimate the importance of quality content for email marketing for B2B generation.

Think of it like dining at a new restaurant: the ambiance is wonderful, the menu looks promising, and the service is perfect. Yet, when the food arrives, it’s underwhelming. This scenario is similar to sending emails that look great and have catchy subject lines, but the content falls flat.

When focusing on content, you help:

• Establish your brand as a reliable and authoritative figure in your industry.
• Reassure potential buyers that you understand their needs and have the solutions they seek.
• Differentiate your brand from competitors with a unique, personal voice.

The key to quality email marketing content is creating something that speaks directly to your prospects at various stages of the B2B sales funnel. This approach lets you focus on their pain points, provide them with relevant information, and effectively persuade them to consider your offerings.

Always Use Segmentation

Alongside the above, segmentation is another critical component of a successful email campaign. This helps you divide your lead database into distinct groups based on specific characteristics.

Here’s how you can segment your lists:

• Demographics: Sort your prospects by region, spending power, age, and other demographic details.
• Behavior: Group leads based on their actions, such as website visits, email clicks, or interaction with a specific page.
• Funnel Stage: Organize leads according to their position in the sales funnel, ensuring content relevance.
• Buyer Persona: Classify leads into various buyer personas, tailoring your message to their unique needs and use cases.
• Engagement Level: Segment your leads into active, inactive, or lost based on their engagement with your emails.

Segmentation is a powerful method to stand out in busy inboxes and grab your prospects’ attention. It allows you to communicate in a personalized way and send highly relevant messages.

Never Forget Automation

Similar to segmentation, you must remember to use automation. With email marketing lead generation this will save you countless hours.

Here are some automation tips:

• Triggered Emails: Automatically send emails when leads perform a specific action or meet a behavioral criterion.
• Drip Campaigns: Set up a series of automated emails for nurturing leads or welcoming new customers.
• Segmentation: Use your CRM data to implement real-time lead segmentation based on predefined criteria.
• Reporting: Utilize automation for analyzing email performance and generating detailed reports.
• List Hygiene: Maintain list quality with automated processes to remove invalid or inactive email addresses, boosting open rates.

Automation can be extremely powerful if implemented and maintained properly. And it’s for this very reason that 59% of marketers plan to increase their use of email automation.

Focus on Deliverability

Deliverability is a key performance metric that you should track when doing B2B email marketing. Your sender’s reputation plays a vital role in this. If your emails are frequently marked as spam or bounce back, your deliverability rate will suffer. This also promotes email services to filter your emails as junk.

There are many factors that consider this. Factors like list hygiene, the volume of emails sent, and the frequency of your messages also significantly impact the success of your B2B lead-generation campaigns.

To enhance email deliverability, consider these best practices:

• Authenticate Your Emails: Using custom authentication methods helps establish your legitimacy as a sender.
• Include Unsubscribe Options: Make it easy for recipients to opt-out, which can improve the health of your email list.
• Avoid URL Shorteners and Spam Triggers: Refrain from using URL shorteners and words commonly flagged as spam.
• Use Alt Text for Media: Ensure all media in your emails is accessible with alternative text.
• Focus on High-Value Content: Engaging, valuable content is key to keeping your leads interested.
• Limit Excessive Images/Media: Too many images or media files in an email can trigger spam filters or affect loading times.

Following the above will improve your email deliverability while reducing the chances of email services filtering your content as junk.

Use A/B Testing-friendly Email Templates

In email marketing B2B lead generation, crafting emails from the ground up can be demanding. Why? You have no actual data; it’ll require more testing, and, honestly, the wrong email could impact your ROI.

The solution? Use email templates that can be A/B tested. They simplify the process and accelerate your lead generation activities.

Here’s a look at some effective templates:

• Before/After Template: Illustrate the situation before and after using your product or service. This format showcases features and uses cases tailored to different buyer personas.
• Competitive Edge Template: Grab attention by comparing your offerings to a competitor’s, subtly highlighting how your solution stands out. Conclude with a strong call to action (CTA).
• Sales Trigger Events Template: Tailor your emails to recent events like promotions or funding announcements. This approach shows you’re informed and ready to make an immediate impact.
• Problem-Agitate-Solve Template: Identify a key pain point, then amplify the issue before presenting your product or service as the solution. This template is versatile and can be adapted to various sales funnel stages.

Email Example

Subject: A Day in the Life: With and Without [Your Product/Service]

Hi [Name],

We’ve been thinking about the typical day in your industry and how [Your Product/Service] might fit into the picture. Here’s a quick glimpse:

Before Using [Your Product/Service]:

• Common Challenges: [Outline usual struggles faced in their industry].
• Resource Constraints: [Mention the limitations they might be dealing with].
• Workday Hurdles: [Point out the everyday inefficiencies they encounter].

After Introducing [Your Product/Service]:

• Smoother Workflow: [Explain how your product/service could ease their workload].
• Potential for Increased Productivity: [Suggest how productivity could be improved].
• Possible Positive Outcomes: [Indicate the kind of success they might achieve].

We’re curious to hear your thoughts on this and whether [Your Product/Service] could fit your needs.

Feel free to reach out if you’re interested in exploring this further.

Best, [Your Company Name]

This template can be easily adapted for different industries by altering key details like location, name, industry, problem, and solution. Once you find a copy that resonates, it’s easy to customize it for various applications.

Get Personal

Studies have shown that personalized email campaigns can ramp up revenue by as much as 760%. Therefore, it’s very clear why you should make emails more personal to the recipient.

To effectively personalize your lead-gen emails, consider these strategies:

• Segment Your Leads: Utilize in-depth research to segment your leads, enabling more targeted and relevant emails.
• Behavior-Based Automated Triggers: Set up automated emails that respond to specific behaviors of your leads.
• Regular Database Maintenance: Keep your lead database current to avoid inaccuracies hindering personalization efforts.
• Contextual Personalization: Include personalized questions, calls to action (CTAs), and references to demographic events in your emails.
• Copy and Design Personalization: Use personalized subject lines and tailored design themes to make your emails stand out.

Without question, there are a tonne of personalization elements you can change. For more inspiration, check out the top personalization factors used in Litmus’s research.

It’s worth noting that emails with personalized subject lines see a 26% increase in open rates. Therefore, definitely get personal when creating an email campaign for your B2B leads.

Track and Record Important Metrics

Finally, it’s crucial to track and record important metrics. This step is vital because it provides insights into the effectiveness of your strategies and guides your future actions.

In simple terms, A/B testing plays a significant role here. It involves comparing variations of an email to understand which elements resonate best with your audience.

You might want to test:

• Subject Lines and Preview Texts: To see which combinations lead to higher open rates.
• Email Length and Structure: To find the most engaging format.
• Personalization Techniques: To gauge how personal touches affect reader engagement.
• Word Order and Content Flow: To understand how the structure of your message influences its reception.

Set a clear objective for each test, such as increasing the click-through rate, and allow enough time, typically 4–5 days, to collect actionable data. A go-to email marketing checklist works perfectly here.

Also, managing the frequency and timing of your emails is key. The right number of cold emails per day varies, but the goal is to maintain consistent engagement without overwhelming your audience.

Timing is just as crucial – sending emails when your audience is most likely to be attentive can make a significant difference. By continuously monitoring and adjusting based on these metrics, you can fine-tune your email campaigns for optimal performance.

Need Professional Help?

As you can see, email marketing for B2B lead generation can be lucrative. However, you need to approach it correctly. Failing this, you’ll end up with unopened emails, poor conversion rates, or, even worse, you might go straight to the junk folder.

If you don’t want to encounter this, consider contacting professionals. At Mailbox Labs, we’re exactly that: professionals. We’ve helped many businesses scale their email marketing lead generation campaigns, ensuring they reach their goals. If you’d like to know how we can help, feel free to book a free 30-minute call with us today.