When it comes to B2B lead generation, remember that the most compelling offers are those which provide value to the visitor whether they make a purchase or not. In other words, offers like ‘Sign-up for a discount’ tend not to be very compelling.

Here are a few ideas for compelling offers for B2B lead generation:

• Offer a guide to selecting the right
• Top tips, or a checklist for accomplishing
• An essential guide to
• A free audit or consultation
• Webinars relating the the hottest topics in the field/industry

A great example is the Free Website Conversion Analysis offered by Conversion Results.

I’ve been thinking about the new benchmarking feature in Google Analytics, and while I’ve signed up to see this data (it looks like it’ll take a few weeks before we’re actually seeing anything), I must admit that I’m a little concerned.

No, this isn’t another conspiracy theory about how Google is mis-using all the data they collect - it’s far simpler (and perhaps more serious than that).  My concern is that by reviewing benchmark numbers,  many marketers will settle for mediocrity.  If you look at the ‘average’ numbers published by Marketing Sherpa and others, you’ll see that about 5% is considered a typical conversion rate for B2B lead generation.  However, I’ve found that much higher numbers are possible (certainly into the teens and even as high as 40%) by the use of effective conversion best-practices, split testing, etc.

My feeling is that just because your site is doing as equally badly as everyone elses, that doesn’t mean that you should just live with it…

I haven’t even had time to check this out, but Google has just announced that it is offering ‘benchmarking’ in analytics.

Excerpt from the announcement:

The industry benchmarking feature is currently in beta. Once you have enabled benchmarking, it may take up to two weeks before the categorized, aggregated and anonymized benchmarking data shows up in your reports.

More information on the Google Analytics benchmarking service.

Just in case you needed a reminder that Google is the top-dog when it comes to Search Engines, recent numbers list Google with staggering 67% market share!

See the full report from HitWise

Inside CRM just published a pretty helpful list of ‘50 Ways your Site is Discouraging Conversion’.  It’s a good list for both lead generation and ecommerce.