Lead generation strategies that hold up

Each strategy below has a condition. Without the condition it still produces leads, and they do not buy. That is worse than producing nothing, because it costs you the time to find out.

1. Rank for the buying question

Condition: people search for what you sell. Someone searching “MAP monitoring service” is further along than anyone you can reach any other way. Fewer searches, far better leads.

2. Rank for the problem question

Condition: the problem is recognised before the solution. These convert more slowly and they are how you reach people who have not shortlisted anyone yet.

3. Publish a tool

Condition: the reader performs a repeated calculation or check. A tool that does their job produces leads with intent, because using it requires having the problem.

4. Publish original data

Condition: you operate something that generates numbers others cannot get. Gets referenced, gets linked, and the leads arrive pre-convinced that you know the field.

5. Paid search on high-intent terms

Condition: the value of a customer exceeds the cost of enough clicks to get one. Do this arithmetic before the first campaign and not after the third month.

6. Retargeting on the pages that indicate intent

Condition: enough traffic for the audience to be worth building. Retarget people who read the pricing page, not everyone who read a blog post.

7. Comparison pages

Condition: you have named competitors people are choosing between. Being honest about where they are better is what makes the page credible enough to work.

8. Partner and referral routes

Condition: someone else already sells to your buyer without competing with you. The highest quality leads available, and the slowest to set up.

9. Community presence where your buyers already are

Condition: you can contribute usefully without selling for months. The forums, subreddits and Slack groups where your field talks. Done as advertising it gets you removed. Done as help it produces enquiries from people who watched you answer questions.

10. Outbound to a narrow, well-chosen list

Condition: you can name why this specific company needs this now. A list of two hundred researched targets beats twenty thousand scraped addresses. It is the only version of outbound that does not damage your domain.

11. Webinars and workshops

Condition: the subject is hard enough that an hour of teaching has value. Attendance is a strong intent signal and the recording keeps working afterwards.

12. A gated asset people actually want

Condition: the asset is worth the email address. A template, a dataset, a real tool. A twelve-page PDF restating a blog post produces addresses and no interest.

The three that produce leads that never buy

Broad paid campaigns aimed at awareness terms, purchased contact lists, and competitions. All three generate volume and a pipeline that does not close.

If a channel’s leads consistently fail to reach a second conversation, it is producing the wrong people and no amount of nurture fixes that.

How to choose

Take the two conditions you can satisfy today. Run them properly for a quarter. Measure to closed revenue, not to lead count.

A channel producing ten leads that close twice beats one producing four hundred that close once, and lead-count reporting hides that completely.

Getting the arithmetic right per channel is part of how we run growth work, and it is usually the conversation that changes the plan.