What is Demand Generation Marketing?

Share:

Have you ever bought a product from your favorite brand and then started receiving targeted, relevant emails related to your purchase? This is an example of a demand generation tactic. Generating demand for your product or service first is essential if you want to ultimately drive leads. Not seeing your digital marketing strategies drive the qualified traffic you are looking for? This is where demand generation steps in.

Demand gen builds brand awareness, supports new customer acquisition, and drives demand for your products and services. Let’s dive into what demand generation marketing is, how it’s different from lead generation, and some examples of demand generation strategies you could use.

WHAT IS DEMAND GENERATION?

Demand generation is a strategy that focuses on increasing brand awareness, attracting higher-quality traffic, and growing your overall customer base. But a strategy like this seems like a pipe dream, right? Demand generation is often overlooked in a digital marketing strategy. Still, it is necessary to capture the attention of potential buyers looking for the solution to their pain points that your goods or services can solve. Demand generation is a long-term strategy that covers all stages of the customer journey so having the right assets is essential

Content marketing goes hand and hand with demand generation. To drive quality traffic, you need to show your audience you can be trusted and that you are someone they can go to for the answers to their problems.

Content is the lintel that keeps a demand generation strategy structure in place. But not just any piece of content can be thrown into your strategy. To attract those you want in your target marketing funnel, you need content that will educate and inform those about topics for which you can provide solutions. Once a prospect is familiar with your brand and expertise, use lead nurturing to drive your qualified leads into the sales pipeline.

HOW IS DEMAND GENERATION DIFFERENT THAN LEAD GENERATION?

Demand and lead generation are very different strategies that strive to attain different goals. In the process, demand generation comes before a lead generation strategy and takes more time. Before we dive in deeper, let’s define what lead generation is.

Lead generation is the process of converting prospective customers interested in your business into clients for a service or good. It is all about generating a list of qualified leads and nurturing them. A big part of this strategy is using content to increase brand visibility to encourage those leads to buy into your product or service.

EXAMPLE: GUIDING YOUR STRATEGY OUT OF MURKY WATERS

Let’s say you are an outdoor recreational guide and want people to sign up for your two-night guided kayaking camping experience. As the guide, you want to drive leads and attract potential customers to your offering. One way to do this with a lead generation strategy is to plan a free webinar around kayak camping and have a call-to-action at the end of the webinar that drives sign-ups to your guided experience. 

What role does demand generation play in this example? As mentioned previously, demand gen comes before lead gen. So stepping back into the shoes of the recreational guide, how did you build a database of potential customers that know about your company and want to attend events? Demand generation. When marketing this business, you’ll need to build content that solves your customers’ problems so they know they can trust you with their outdoor recreation questions or problems. This could be done through weekly blog posts and a monthly newsletter that keeps your customers up-to-date with new information.

This is where both strategies differ. A prospective customer needs to know your brand, trust it, and engage with it. This is done through content that is informative and educational. It targets the top of the funnel to position your brand as a thought leader, while lead gen focuses on nurturing the leads toward a buying decision at the bottom of the funnel.

WHAT ARE SOME EXAMPLES OF DEMAND GEN STRATEGIES AND TACTICS?

Below is a list of some demand generation strategies you could try to generate customers.

• Offer a free tool. Everyone loves a tool that will help make their lives easier. And if it’s effective, they’ll more than likely share it with their network. Check out Sprout Social’s social media image resizing tool.
• Create downloadable content. Downloadable content could be an infographic, checklist, or educational one-sheeter that you could attach to a blog post or landing page. This could be gated or ungated. It is recommended to try both.
• Host a free webinar or in-person event. Long-form pieces of video content and in-real-life events are the perfect way to engage your target audience and build long-lasting relationships. Craft webinar topics around a trending problem you’ve seen in your industry lately.
• Increase brand exposure with social media. Don’t forget that social media is a powerful tool that you can use to build trust with your audience. Connect to people through the use of engaging posts, user-generated content, and storytelling.
• Design a nurture campaign. Automated nurture campaigns are the perfect way to segment an audience and keep them engaged with relevant content. Going back to our example, a group of users may have filled out a form for a kayaking 101 guide on a blog post. You can nurture them with related content to reach your ultimate goal of getting them to buy your book or attend in-person training. Just remember, audience segmentation is key here.

Conclusion

With the right tactics, you can generate sales-qualified leads for your organization through demand and lead generation. It all depends on your goals. Ask yourself – do I want to generate more awareness? Or gain more qualified leads? Regardless, having a demand generation strategy is key to ultimately driving leads. What’s the point of going fishing for dinner (goal) if you don’t have a fishing pole (tools), the skill (strategy), or the bait (content) to capture those big tunas (leads)?

“What’s the point of going fishing for dinner (goal) if you don’t have a fishing pole (tools), the skill (strategy), or the bait (content) to capture those big tunas (leads)?”

Interested in finding out how our lead gen partners typically see an 18% increase in new customer acquisition while holding costs flat with Adlucent PCLV across Facebook and Google? Reach out today.

Victoria Flores

Victoria Flores is a Demand Generation Manager at Adlucent. She has a background in content marketing, SEO, and graphic design. Her passion for creative marketing allows her to develop unique and effective solutions to drive demand. You can find her out on the Texas trails or bouldering when she is not at her desk.