: Some might be surprised to hear this from a partner in a search marketing agency, but I don’t recommend search engines as either your first or second source of online leads. The best source of leads online is word-of-mouth (WOM) marketing.

Encourage your customers to talk about you in their Internet communities, whether through social networking, online reviews, blog postings or forum threads. Prospects generated in this manner are often consider-ably warmer than those generated by other methods, and concordantly have higher close rates, shorter close times and larger order sizes.

The next-best source of leads is a well-run press and media campaign. Properly designed and managed, a press and media campaign can both generate leads directly, and significantly improve your company’s reputation in the public’s eye.

Bloggers should be considered in both WOM and PR strategies. Lesser-known bloggers can be reached via WOM from the marketer directly or through satisfied customers. As long as you are polite, hon-est and straightforward, these bloggers can generate material Web traffic and leads.

The so-called “A-List” bloggers are much more like the media, and should be treated as such. Without a personal connection and/or established reputation, they can be very hard to reach.

After WOM and PR, turn to the search engines. Start with a paid search campaign to generate results quickly and find out what works. Next, take the lessons learned in your paid search campaign to inform organic search engine optimization. l

GLOVESOFF

What’s next for online lead generation? As companies scramble for new online lead-generation options, word-of-mouth and referral incentive programs are among those emerging ideas. Our experts assess strategies

> CONTENDER Brian CoombsFounder, SVP and chief futurist, Apogee SearchEngaged in online marketing since 1991

McKusick contends that moves such as positioning your company as a thought leader or exploring referral incentive programs are good investments in building online lead generation. Coombs is

DMNEws’ DECIsIONbanking on word-of-mouth strategies and other PR efforts ahead of paid search campaigns. HAVE YOUR SAY E-mail your topic to nancy.kearney@dmnews.com

: As budgets get squeezed and the focus on ROI becomes an even higher priority than before, marketers must use the most effective ways to generate business online. No matter your definition of a conversion — whether it is a request for more infor-mation, a newsletter sign-up or an online purchase — this is going to be a crucial ele-ment to an organizations’ sales efforts in the coming years.

One of the most cost-effective, but time-consuming, means to generate online leads is to establish your business and team as industry thought leaders. Commonly, this is accomplished by publishing relevant white-

papers, hosting seminars or speaking at events. By offering a unique and informed perspective, a company can set itself apart from its competition and solidify a position as a leader in its specialties.

There’s an added bonus to teaching oth-ers. By doing so, you’re giving back to your industry and helping others become more proficient — thus furthering the advance-ment of your field.

Exploring referral incentive programs or forming strategic partnerships are two other avenues marketers can take to boost online lead generation efforts. These tactics help marketers forge mutually beneficial relation-ships with companies that can help produce qualified leads. Doing this will generate a higher number of more qualified leads because they pass through an extra filter before reaching a sales team.

Generating leads online ultimately boils down to giving back. Share with others and make it as easy as possible for people to find you, and your products and services. l

> CONTENDER John McKusickEVP and director, Performance Marketing GroupFourteen years of experience in digital marketing

SPOTLIGHT

The picture of sales successTukaiz’s Defino discusses how personalized images can help marketers By Bryan Yurcan

Job: VP and managing director, TukaizPrevious roles: Has worked at Tukaiz for his entire professional careerFavorite Chicago restaurant: ”It’s actually a place in the western suburbs of Chicago called The Grotto. It’s an Italian restaurant and bar.”

Frank Defino

Q: How can a company successfully market through this recession? A: I am firm believer that you should not cut the marketing budget in times like these. But you should be looking at it very closely, and have a very focused game plan and have a goal in mind and go after that goal. Sometimes, though, it’s the reality that marketing budgets will be cut. We work quite a bit with businesses that have large marketing budgets and those who don’t.

Q: what would you suggest to marketers who might be facing these cuts? A: The key to remember is that market-ing doesn’t always have to be about sell-ing something. If you can get your name out and make people feel good about receiving your message, then people will remember it. Those are the kinds of things that have staying power. Busi-nesses are using things like personalized URLs and targeted messages, but you can take it a step further and use picture personalization, [which includes creative tactics] such as using items in an image to spell out the recipient’s name.

Q: How can using personalized images help achieve that kind of reaction?A: It really tends to make a piece stand out from the crowd. The rate of re-sponse and the metrics we use all show that. To effectively use it, you truly have to be sure that you have a specific targeted audience with a very, very tar-geted message. I would rather see a very targeted message sent to a smaller group of people rather than a blanket message sent to a larger group of people.

Q: why is picture personalization effective? A: That’s kind of getting into the realm of psychology. It’s really emotional mar-keting. It’s a feel-good, put-a-smile-on-your-face kind of marketing. It’s similar to seeing someone in the street and shaking their hand — it’s an emotional event. If you spell a name out in an image, and if it is done cleverly and cre-atively, it’s different than most mail or e-mail we’re used to seeing. It’s the kind of marketing that has staying power.

Q: How can this be done in direct mail? A: Let’s say you receive a postcard, and it’s an image with your name spelled out, and above it is copy with

the marketing message you are trying to send, and there’s also a call to action. That is very effective. The response rates show it. When we use picture personalization, we use copy in a very minimal form. We don’t like to overkill the piece with copy, we would rather let the image tell the story. And, there’s a wide range of things you can do. As long as the piece can come off a digital press, you can do a lot of different types of mailings.

Q: Considering the cost associated with direct mail, do you see more companies investing in online and digital forms? A: I am seeing a combination of all those media. Maybe starting off with a direct mail piece directing someone to a Web site, and following it up with an e-mail. Some companies go even further and follow up with a text message. I really don’t see it heavily swayed one way or another. You can use image personalization in all those media and be successful. l

&Q A

10 | DMNEws | February 23, 2009 | www.dmnews.com