YouTube isn’t just for watching cute cat videos and hilarious fails (although, that is an important part of the platform’s purpose, mind you).
It’s also a great place to generate leads for your business.
The platform gets 14.3 billion visits per month — which is more than Facebook, Wikipedia, Amazon, and Instagram. It’s also 140 times the distance (in miles) from the earth to the sun.
So… it’s a LOT.
That’s why it’s a great place to generate leads. Your target market is already on the platform… we’re just going to inject a bit of YOU and YOUR BUSINESS into the content they consume.
Here’s how.
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1. Work Backwards
The biggest mistake people make with YouTube — at least, those who are leveraging YouTube for lead generation — is they just start making videos.
Those videos might be awesome.
And they might even get a decent amount of views.
But… What then?
You’re not trying to become an influencer on YouTube (although you’ve got to admit, that would be cool), you’re trying to generate leads.
And you’ve got to keep your vision on target.
The trick is to work backward.
What’s your end goal? Since you’re trying to generate leads, we’ll assume that it’s a win if you’re driving people from watching your videos to signing up for your email list (either directly via a newsletter or indirectly through a lead magnet).
Okay.
But how are you going to do that?
First, you’ll need an offer — something to compel people to give you their email addresses. This could be an ebook, a cheat sheet, a masterclass, a free course, or something else.
Here’s an example of an offer I recently created as a front-end product to generate leads for my freelance coaching business…
If I was trying to generate leads on YouTube, perhaps I would try to drive my audience here — where they could learn how to find and pitch the perfect clients.
That’s the sort of offer you need to get people’s email addresses.
And you need to drive people there from your YouTube Channel.
How?
You need to put the link to your lead-gen sales funnel on your YouTube Channel… and make it easy to find.
On Flipping Mastery TV — a YouTube Channel for real estate investors — notice that his lead-gen link is right in the description of his featured video.
He also has a long list of lead-gen links on his YouTube Channel’s “About” page…
Why is this important?
Because when people like the video content you’re creating on YouTube, they will often go searching for more information about you and the value you can provide.
You want to make it as easy as possible for them to go from YouTube Subscriber… to email subscriber.
So that’s the first set of tips…
- Create a compelling lead magnet and sales funnel — if you need help with this, click here for the cheat codes 😉
- Make it easy to find your lead-magnet offer on your YouTube Channel. Include it in the description of your featured video as well as on your Channel’s “About” page.
From there, it’s about creating engaging videos, getting views, and using the end of each video to drive people toward one of your lead magnets.
2. Brainstorm Video Ideas
Okay. That’s all fine and dandy.
But what the heck are you going to talk about on your YouTube Channel?
Just as importantly, how are you going to use those videos to guide people toward your lead magnet?
Well, this step is going to require you to have a clear understanding of your audience… what they want… and the lead magnet you’re offering.
Let’s look at some examples.
Here’s a video that Ryan Dossey did offering three direct mail tips for real estate investors…https://www.youtube.com/embed/JnC3jUD_SCk?feature=oembed
Now, there’s no CTA or lead magnet link in the description of this video. Instead, he’s put in the first comment and pinned that comment to the top…
The link leads to Ballpoint Marketing, a company he owns that provides direct mailers for real estate investors. As you can see, then, there’s consistency between the video topic and the thing he’s offering…
Which is exactly what you want to do.
Here’s another example from Russell Brunson’s YouTube Channel. Here’s the video.https://www.youtube.com/embed/AFC4q7DQYfk?feature=oembed
And in this case, the lead magnets are directly inside of the video description…
In both cases, notice the continuity between the video topic and the lead magnet?
Ryan Dossey is talking about direct mail… and his lead magnet is also about direct mail.
Russell Brunson is talking about sales funnels… and his lead magnet is also about sales funnels.
This leads us to an absolute goldmine for coming up with topic ideas. Think of your niche, your area of expertise, and the lead magnet you offer. Then answer these questions…
- What questions does your target market have?
- What do they struggle with?
- What would they love to learn from you?
That’s what you should talk about. And ideally, those topics will also be relevant to the lead magnets you offer… so you can guide people toward them at the end of your video and in the description or comments of your video.
3. Use Open Loops
At this point, you should have outlined some topics for your lead-gen videos on YouTube.
But we still have a problem to address.
Quite frankly, a lot of videos on YouTube — probably the vast majority — are as boring as watching water boil.
How do you create videos that catch and keep people’s attention?
The trick is something called the “open loop” — this is a technique that copywriters use to keep people’s attention.
And it works really well on YouTube.
Here’s a video that explains how open loops work.https://www.youtube.com/embed/PcILOPrg5ls?feature=oembed
The basic idea is that you make a promise for something you’re going to show the person how to do later on in the video… which encourages them to stick around.
For instance…
“In this video, I’m going to show you how to get more leads for your business on YouTube… WITHOUT even making videos. But before we talk about that…”
See?
You’d have to keep watching that until you found out what they’re offering.
(This is also a great trick for Webinars, FYI)
Start your video with an open loop — make an exciting and compelling promise right off the bat to encourage people to stick around and hear what you have to say.
That’s how you catch people’s attention and keep their attention.
4. Optimize For YouTube Search
You’re creating content, you’re keeping people’s attention, you’re driving them to your lead magnet…
Woohoo!
But hold on.
How do you get people to watch your video in the first place?
After all, if you don’t have very many subscribers, then where are those views going to come from?
That’s where SEO comes in — SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization and it usually refers to Google.
But YouTube also has a massive search engine that you can optimize your videos to rank for.
Get on the first page of results for some high-value keywords… and you’ll start driving consistent traffic to your videos, so long as you’ve taken all the previous steps within this article, you’ll also start generating a consistent flow of leads.
Cool, right?
Here are some simple (but effective) tips for nailing the SEO on YouTube…
- Do Basic Keyword Research — How do you know what keywords people are typing into YouTube? Type in some relevant keywords and look at how YouTube autocompletes the text. There’s your goldmine of keyword phrases to target.
- SEO Housekeeping — For ground zero optimizations, include your target keyword phrase in the title of your video, at the beginning of the description, and the video file name.
- Make Longer Videos — As long as you have interesting stuff to say, longer videos perform better. The average length of a video in the top five positions of search results is 11 minutes and 44 seconds.
- Add Tags — Add a few video tags (6-8) that are relevant to your target keyword phrase.
- Focus On Intent — Why are people searching for the keyword you’re targeting? Make sure the content of your video perfectly matches the information people are searching for. That’ll make them watch your video longer… which will help your rankings even more.
That’s it!
SEO isn’t rocket science… but it is a science. Follow the above steps and you’ll be head-and-shoulders in the ranking above most other YouTube creators.
5. End With a CTA
This tip is quick.
But important.
What do you want people to do after they watch your video?
Depending on the video and its purpose, you might want to direct them toward some other videos… or toward a product… or, more than likely, toward your lead magnet.
We already talked about how to do that on your Channel and in your video descriptions.
But what about in the video itself?
At the end of every video, don’t be shy — tell people what you want them to do next.
You’ll reap far more rewards if you’re clear about the next step than if you just sort of say “Thanks for watching!” and turn off the camera.
people want to take action.
Just tell them how to do that.
6. Try YouTube Ads
We couldn’t talk about generating leads on YouTube without mentioning YouTube ads.
BUT…
We also realize that this is a big topic that probably deserves its own article.
So instead, here’s a great video with some relevant and recent YouTube advertising tips to improve performance and decrease ad spend…https://www.youtube.com/embed/fbQaX8qOtIQ?feature=oembed
7. Use The Dream 100 Process
Finally, we’ve got to leave you with our very best piece of advice.
Leverage something we call “The Dream 100”.
Here’s an UBER simplified version…
- Make a list of 100 different places where your target market congregates online. This includes influencers they follow, YouTube channels they subscribe to, newsletters they read, Facebook Groups they engage in, so on and so forth.
- Infiltrate your Dream 100 list with your lead magnet to turn those people into your very own list of subscribers. You can either buy your way in (pay someone to be included) or work your way in (build meaningful and authentic relationships with key decision-makers).
As you might have guessed, this process gives you complete access to the places where your target market is already hanging out online…
Usually, we’d be talking about every channel. But in this case, we’re just talking about YouTube.
So you’d make a list of YouTube Channels and try to infiltrate those popular channels (rather than creating your own channel) by either earning your way in or buying your way in.
Check out the video below to learn how Russell Brunson used this to grow ClickFunnels and befriend Tony Robbins!https://www.youtube.com/embed/oSREdtxF7a4?feature=oembed
If it worked for him… it’ll work for you!
To learn more about the Dream 100 process, get a copy of Russell’s bestselling book, Traffic Secrets — that link will get you a free copy 🙂
Final Thoughts
YouTube is a huge platform.
And we can GUARANTEE YOU that your audience is already hanging out and watching videos over there.
Why not inject a bit of YOU and YOUR BUSINESS into the content that they consume?
That’s the goal.
And by following the above tips, you’ll be able to create engaging content, keep people’s attention, drive them toward a lead magnet, and generate leads like clockwork through YouTube.
If you’re ready for the next step, click below to take our 5-day lead-gen challenge!