Proven Lead Gen Approaches for Manufacturers in APAC

Competition in the B2B manufacturing sector is increasingly getting tight, mainly because of the similarity of products and services offered by companies. Hence, manufacturing companies from various industries are always seeking innovative ways to collect leads.

Manufacturers have distinctive marketing challenges, whether it’s generating leads, driving traffic, or increasing brand exposure. The buying cycle in the said sector is longer, the price points are relatively higher, and the buying process involves numerous decision-makers, which makes lead generation different and quite challenging for manufacturers. Check the following:

Factors that have a profound influence on how manufacturers attract leads

Costly products: Large-scale manufacturing products aren’t single-click purchases. Rather, they’re high-priced investments that require more time and effort to explain the buyer’s distinctive value.

Longer buying process: Since manufacturing products are expensive, potential buyers would usually do product research and ask questions about these offerings before deciding to purchase. Here, buyer education plays a crucial role.

Complex approvals: Aside from lengthening the sales cycle, these expensive products complicate the purchase approval. Authorizations are quite tricky when there are numerous decision-makers and influencers involved.

Lead generation is indeed a complex process regardless of the industry you’re in and if you find yourself in that situation, the good news is that it’s not an isolated case. Hubspot Academy released a report indicating that 61% of marketers admit that it’s their biggest challenge.

Digital disruption, however, affects how the manufacturing industry functions despite being still largely relationship and loyalty-driven. Thanks to the shift in B2B buyer behavior, 73% of B2B buying decisions are made by millennials who use the internet to seek out new suppliers and business partners. In fact, 37% of B2B marketers tend to use marketing automation to generate leads.

Today’s digital marketplace provides consumers with a wide selection across various categories. As the manufacturing sector’s distribution and sales channels expand, the industry must place a greater emphasis on digital-led marketing.

And, given the rise of digital platform users, manufacturing brands must be tightly linked with the voice of the customer as the sector focuses on modernizing their supply chain and transitioning to as-a-service models.

The lead generation process entails careful planning and strategies especially if you want to succeed in today’s fast-paced digital economy. Companies cannot rely on mere instincts anymore, they should employ the right techniques to attract the customers they want. The best way to do this is by using social networking platforms like LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat, to mention a few.

Using such methods, manufacturers will become more aware of their target audience and will attract a steady stream of potential customers to stay relevant. We’ll discuss more lead generation strategies later on in this blog.

Now, let’s talk about why most manufacturing companies prefer APAC as the location for their services.

Join the ranks of successful Manufacturing Firms in Asia! Discover how you can leverage our services to generate manufacturing leads!

B2B Manufacturing in Asia-Pacific Region

The Asia-Pacific (APAC) region, which is located in and around the Pacific Ocean’s western part, is home to numerous manufacturers and distributors that serve an international customer base in strategically-placed facilities.

APAC has long been the driver of prosperity across the globe, given its vast network of industrial supply chains. It’s the largest and most populous region compared to all other continents in the globe, offering a broad market across all sectors. One of the key initiatives for identifying the ideal client profiles for businesses in this market is APAC B2B lead generation.

Looking deeper, there are two shifts that are changing the said region’s growth profile drastically: First, as their incomes increase, Asian economies are becoming markets in their own right. The second is that the capacity to digitally deliver things has changed the primary engine of regional growth away from manufacturing and toward services.

What makes APAC an emerging B2B manufacturing industry giant is the digital revolution that spreads across its regions: from the way of life, work, and how individuals and corporate entities do business. Let’s look at the factors that set the APAC region as a global trailblazer:

Digitally: It houses a fast-growing population of digital natives.

Dynamically: APAC is home to an ever-growing population, workforce, and consumer class.

Demographically: In addition to increasing internet access, and growing income, higher buyer education has generated a new class of digital entrepreneurs who are well-positioned to find and fill gaps in the regional market.

The B2B market is expanding rapidly in the Asia-Pacific region, and it can only be measured through the increase in B2B transactions. To support this claim, a report reveals the following statistics: With a cumulative annual growth rate (CAGR) of 10.5%, B2B transactions in APAC will reach a staggering $1,356.28 billion by 2025, more than doubling from the $671.32 billion they reached in 2018.

The hardest aspect of the marketing plan for marketers is implementing APAC lead generation methods. Before proceeding to lead conversion, start first by practicing the top lead generation ideas we’ve compiled for you:

Participating in live industry events and tradeshows

Live and in-person events, conferences, and trade shows are fun tools that engage prospects and boost brand awareness, especially in the manufacturing, specialty retail, and medical device industries.

It helps you connect with your prospect in an authentic way. Sharing with them what you value fosters loyalty and repeat clients. Bringing a personal touch to your strategy sets you apart from the crowd.

Event marketers see these initiatives as opportunities to network with existing customers, partners, and sponsors, and to generate new leads. When executed successfully, these events result in high ROI and good publicity.

Personalized Approach

60% of marketers say that personalization is the key strategy for improving the quality of generated leads.

Personalization offers messaging and content that is tailored specifically to every user’s action. and interest, which makes it an ideal strategy for guiding your customers down the funnel. BY personalization, you can ensure that your products and services are suitable for the individual and may address the pain point that could’ve stopped them from converting.

Why is personalization important? Let’s name a few:

Deliver the right message: With B2B personalization strategies, you can send the right message to the right customer.

Perfect timing: Personalization doesn’t only enable you to deliver the right message in real time.

Choose the right channel: Some clients choose email marketing, while others want to interact on social media or via phone. By personalizing your services, you know exactly where and how to find potential clients.

Most B2B companies forget that their official websites aren’t the only place where their prospects can reach out to them. Aside from this channel, there are many other touch points such as live chat, social media, and mobile apps that can be used to reach out to customers. It’s what we call the Multi-touch Multi-Channel Approach. An example of a B2B lead generation provider that uses this approach is Callbox.

Callbox’s Multi-touch Multi-Channel strategy means connecting with decision-makers through live, one-on-one conversations enhanced through email, search, social media, and direct marketing channels all throughout the different stages of the lead conversion cycle.

Thanks to the proliferation of these different channels, customers have more options when it comes to how they want to gather and consume information.

Email Marketing

With the growing popularity of social networking and other digital marketing channels, it’s quite easy to neglect the importance of email. However, email marketing has constantly shown to be one of the most successful digital marketing channels for promoting conversions and generating revenue.

Email marketing found its silver lining in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic and will continue to thrive this 2023, given the 89% of marketers that use it to generate leads. In this age of automation, marketers should find better ways to reach out to clients, keep their interests at peak, generate leads, and set business appointments-and these are all possible through email marketing automation.

To make it more effective for you, why not try integrating your email campaign with other lead generation tools like social media, B2B telemarketing, interactive content, email list building and segmentation, and providing advanced options for email customization, organization, and optimization?

Outsourcing your email campaign to professional email marketers can help you get your message straight to the right prospects’ inboxes in the most time-efficient manner.

Telemarketing

Way back then, telemarketing is the act of making calls to sell goods or services. It involves making random calls from a list of phone numbers. Most people find unsolicited calls annoying and rather shop online rather than talk to reps over the phone, making telemarketing an increasingly unpopular choice.

However, this strategy can’t be disregarded. With the rise of modern technological marketing tools, telemarketing still serves as a strong lead generation and sales force that unifies all the other channels.

Modern telemarketing isn’t all about calling random contacts anymore. Integrating video conferencing helps develop rapport. Besides, it provides human connection, so your prospect knows he is interacting with a human being at the other end of the line.

Event Marketing

When it comes to lead generation, nothing beats the value brought by event marketing. This best explains why businesses heavily invest in making the shift from in-person to virtual events. Let the numbers speak for themselves:

95% of marketers believe that in-person events can have a huge impact on attaining their company’s primary objectives. In another report, it’s revealed that 53% say that webinars are the top-of-funnel format that generates the most high-quality leads.

Some examples of event marketing include:

Product launches
Conferences
Seminars
Thought leadership events
VIP events

Lead generation at events opens great opportunities for your business. Whether you decide to take place online, in-person, or hybrid, you can work with Callbox to create innovative events that are informative, manageable, and sure to convert your leads into revenue.

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Website Optimization

Another effective way to generate manufacturing leads is through website optimization. This is the process of utilizing tools, cutting-edge strategies, and experimentation to optimize website performance, drive more website traffic, boost conversion rates, and grow income.

One of the most crucial factors of this strategy is search engine optimization (SEO). This method does not only focus on getting your website pages to rank higher in Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) for specific keywords but also makes it easier for your prospects to locate your brand in search engines.

Another important aspect in line with this process is on-page automation. This ensures that the prospects that visit your website have the best user experience that persuades them to take the desired action, converting them into leads as a result.

Websites offer a distinct advantage over physical stores as they remain accessible around the clock. This continuous availability enables customers to explore products, complete transactions, or gather data at their own convenience, significantly improving customer satisfaction and brand distinction. By optimizing your website, you can reach untapped markets without spending money on advertising and create opportunities for more conversions and revenue.

If you currently do not have a website, consider the benefits of outsourcing to professionals. Creating and maintaining an effective website involves various technical aspects, design considerations, and content management. Outsourcing to experts with a proven track record in web development and digital marketing guarantees that you obtain a website tailored to your specific needs.

Chat

With the help of live chat software, your website visitors can directly communicate with your sales reps and customer service teams in real-time.

This is an ideal tool for customers that seek quick and humanized support. Moreover, these are usually implemented to enhance customer satisfaction and boost conversions.

Live chat software, in most cases, shows up on your site as a pop-up chat window or a widget icon. These tools provide a proactive way of engaging customers and encouraging visitors to start a conversation by entering queries.

This software’s capabilities include the ability to co-browse with consumers while chatting with them and personalized automated responses. Live chat provides prompt, personalized, humanized, and versatile responses, which makes it an efficient lead-generation tool.

Social Media

Social media platforms have generally higher engagement rates compared to other platforms like landing pages and emails, making them efficient lead generation tools. In addition, they provide brands with high-quality leads or the ones who are most likely to convert to customers.

With these platforms, you can choose who you get your message in front of and locate leads who are already engaged with your brand or industry, given that you can search for and find leads through social media rather than having them come to you through organic marketing.

By capturing leads who are readily interested in your brand and offers, you gain a higher chance of converting leads and improving your lead gen metrics. It’s all about choosing the right platform to convey your message and product value with.

Here are some of the social media sites used by companies to generate leads:

Source: Top Social Media Sites for B2B Lead Generation Success

LinkedIn: Known for its professional focus, LinkedIn is the best lead generation platform to reach out to decision-makers for networking and content-sharing purposes. Some of the most popular posts on the platform include industry news, polls, career advice, and leadership blogs.

It’s also used by employees in building and establishing personal blogs and in sharing insights. With 722 million users, it provides a wide-reach of audience for manufacturers in the B2B setting.

Facebook: Facebook, with over 2.07 billion active users, is also currently one of the most popular social networking sites around the world. Facebook lead ads are a commonly used social media lead-generation tool that allows you to create a message that reaches people with just one click.

Facebook Ads helps businesses create a lead generation plan by extrapolating user characteristics such as age, gender, geography, career, interests, and hobbies.

Twitter: This app functions well for small businesses whose main goal is to grow their leads organically. It serves as an excellent platform for starting conversations and generating brand interest among your audience. Maintaining an active presence on this platform allows you to analyze and assess your business success through metrics like hashtags, follower growth, shares, comments, mentions, and click-throughs.

Instagram: Instagram works as a visual medium, which gives you many options for content creation. It’s a flexible platform that enables you to engage followers with videos, lives, narratives, walkthroughs, compilations, collaborations, and hashtags.

By making videos with styling tips and contests that your followers can enter, you may wish to develop a diverse and unique portfolio of content that may appeal to the largest audience and market possible on various levels.

Instant Messaging

Instant messaging, which is often shortened to IM or IM’ing, is the act of exchanging near-real-time messages using embedded software or a standalone application. Compared to chatrooms wherein multiple users are engaging in overlapping conversations, IM sessions typically take place between two users in a private and back-and-forth communication style.

To efficiently connect with prospects, the Callbox team makes use of messaging services like WhatsApp and SMS. We are always accessible to offer tailored, timely 1:1 touchpoints, whether it’s answering questions, offering helpful resources, or just checking in to see how they’re doing.

Callbox leverages instant messaging as an efficient tool in nurturing leads, following up with prospects, and confirming, reminding, and/or rescheduling sales appointments.

Marketing Automation

This lead generation strategy allows you to automate your marketing operations like webinars, social media, and email.

Marketing automation helps sellers around the world by persuading them to think outside the box. It replaces manual and repetitive tasks, taking on tactical work and therefore allowing marketers to save time and allocate more of their resources to content, strategy, and creative problem-solving.

Moreover, it proves to be an effective solution in sending out targeted messages and pushing deals further in the pipeline. One tool that is used in customer data gathering and organization is Customer Relationship Management (CRM) tool.

CRM allows you to manage company relationships and customer-prospect interactions. For instance, it stores data on how long a person has been a customer and his purchase history. It also helps in customer segmentation, sales activity planning, customer service improvement, and streamlining processes.

The integration of marketing automation and CRM helps in the strengthening of marketing and sales efforts, enables a deeper understanding of customer behavior, improves lead quality, and saves time and resources.

Reengage with past clients

While you most likely have repeat clients, it’s also highly probable that you have clients in the past with whom you have done business and walked away. Lost deals aren’t lost forever. In fact, you can re-engage with this valuable customer group.

What benefit does your business have from it? Read on:

The best customers are often those who come back. First of all, if a customer returns to do business with you after a previous engagement, they probably loved it and were satisfied with the outcomes. If not, they at least have faith that the problems from the last interaction can be fixed.

With a returning customer, beginning a new relationship is simpler since you already know one another or at the very least, are familiar with one another’s enterprises. Despite any modifications that may have occurred, you have a solid grasp of the client’s website and business strategy, and you probably know a few of the campaign’s participants.

Adopt Account-based Marketing (ABM)

Account-based marketing (ABM) is a strategic marketing and sales method that identifies, reaches, and nurtures sales prospects by focusing on high-value business accounts rather than specific people. An ABM strategy acknowledges that individuals, not just one, frequently work in groups to make B2B purchasing choices.

To generate leads and increase income, traditional B2B marketing casts a wide net over a big number of potential clients. Targeted marketing is far more the norm in account-based marketing.

ABM unites sales and marketing through a targeted, strategic approach to B2B marketing. Rather than concentrating on more leads, the key is to focus on the appropriate leads. ABM allocates marketing resources to a certain group of target accounts and the contacts inside them. This highly focused strategy demands marketing and sales teams to coordinate to align to provide the correct message and content to the right individual in an account.

Why choose Callbox for your next Lead Generation for Manufacturing Campaign?

Lead generation is undeniably the lifeblood of any business, including those in the manufacturing sector, As much as it’s of utmost importance, it’s also a challenging aspect. If you are one of those manufacturing companies that experience lead gen difficulties, the next logical move is to partner with a tested B2B lead generation service provider like Callbox.

As a lead gen services company that’s been helping industries reach their business and revenue goals since 2004, Callbox offers the following services: Content marketing, SEO, Email Marketing, Social Media, Content Creation, Event Promotion, and Appointment Setting.

Our Multi-Touch Multi-Channel Approach helps your manufacturing business connect with prospects at any time and place through different channels: email, voice, social, chat, website, and webinars.

Callbox team’s expertise enables your business to gather the most qualified prospects while saving your team from activities that eat up their energy and productivity. Teaming up with the best B2B professionals in the industry can help you raise your standing and maximize your manufacturing company’s potential in the APAC region.

Our lead generation services can be availed with flexible and tailored pricing according to your business needs (request for pricing).

Check out this successful campaign story with one of our manufacturer clients: Callbox: Instrumental to Manufacturer’s Marketing Success.

Partner with us and reach your Manufacturing business goals. Contact us now!