In the marketing world, there are twins who a lot of people often wrongly refer to (and prepare for), especially when it involves content marketing. It’s easy to say you can’t blame them because, well, it’s often the case about twins, but when you’re in marketing, you’re supposed to know them beyond what they appear to look like on the surface. You know, like family knows which twin is which.
We’re talking about Lead Generation and Demand Generation.
Some would just wave it off as something insignificant, and that’s where their folly begins. In fact, the difference between the two is important enough that applying to one what you prepared for the other could turn out to be a major stumbling block if not a huge blunder. Here’s why.
Demand Generation vs. Lead Generation
Demand Generation is when you create awareness of, interest in, or demand for your company’s products or services through marketing, particularly content marketing. You do this by giving away free relevant content in the hope that the reader or audience understands or is inspired by it and eventually demands your product or service. Usually, there’s a call to action at the end part of the content. To put it simply, the objective and the expected results of demand generation are the same: to make people demand or buy your product/service.
Lead Generation, on the other hand, takes place when you collect relevant information about potential clients or prospects, usually in exchange of content, and then follow them up with other marketing channels in order to turn them into qualified sales leads. There’s often also a call to action at the end of the content.
With lead generation, the objective and direct result are different. Your purpose for lead generation is to make the reader want your product or service, and the outcome is the information you gather.
Another difference between the two is how content is presented. While demand generation-directed content is given for free, content for lead generation is usually “gated”.
In other words, people who need it can only have it if they give away specific information first, such as their name, email address, or phone number. These are then stored in a database so the sales team may follow up by reaching out to them and vetting who among the prospects are most qualified leads.
Related: How B2B Marketers Craft an Industry Related Content and Generate more Leads
Which Kind of Content Works for Which?
This article is an example of content designed for demand generation. Anybody can read this. No forms, no submissions, no divulging of personal information. We want to educate you through this and hope that one day when the need arises, you remember our blog, The Savvy Marketer, as a reliable sales and marketing partner and seek our help.
Actually, The Savvy Marketer’s Blog just recently received a recognition as one of the Top 100 B2B Marketing Blogs and we will be giving more efforts to the days to come.
Other sample articles for demand generation that we want to share with you:
- Email Marketing Series: How to Make your Emails Impossible to Ignore [Video]
- Classification of Sales Leads: Hot, Warm or Cold
- Introducing: The Ultimate Lead Generation Kit To Jump start your Business!
Share it with as many of your friends. I mean, sharing is loving, right? The more people this article reaches, the more people we educate, the more people will improve their marketing plans and strategies. It’s a pretty noble objective, too, I have to say.
For lead generation, we’re also running a campaign which goal is to generate sign-ups. We’ve just released an ebook, The New and Improved Lead Generation Kit to Jumpstart your Business.
It’s based on one of our most popular articles and we’re sharing it to as many people as possible. It’s very, very useful and it’s really worth more than the name, email address, and contact number we’re asking from you in exchange for it.
Related: 6 Most Important and Untold Benefits of Repurposing Old Content
Conclusion
At first glance, demand generation and lead generation may look and sound similar, but once you understand their purpose and the desired outcome of each, you can tailor your content to fit whichever you want to prioritize. Remember, you cannot hit two birds with one stone here. You have to focus on only one at a time.
Tell us what kind of content worked best for your Demand Gen campaign. How about your Lead Gen? Share your comments below.
