B2B lead generation via your website: 9 ways without purchased addresses

Purchased address lists are a dying model in B2B. They are often out of date and bring few replies. Emails to such lists are not permitted in Germany and Austria without prior consent. Your own website is the better place to win leads: anyone who arrives there is already looking for a solution. Here are nine ways, arranged by the three jobs of a website in sales.

Being found

1. Specialist articles on real questions

Write articles on the questions your customers ask in the first meeting. Not „Our solution for X“ but „How do you choose X?“ or „What does X cost?“. Such articles are searched for and used as a source by search engines and AI assistants. An article that answers a question thoroughly works for years.

2. Comparison and pricing pages

Anyone about to buy searches for prices and comparisons. An honest pricing page, even with ranges instead of fixed figures, picks up these visitors. Pages such as „Alternative to ...“ help if you stay factual and do not disparage competitors.

3. Pages per industry or use case

A mechanical engineering firm searches differently from a tax office. A page per industry with fitting examples has more impact than a general home page. It is important that every page has its own content. Interchangeable texts with a different industry name are treated as spam by search engines.

Winning trust

4. Case studies with figures

A case study with the starting situation, approach and result is more convincing than any list of benefits. Obtain the customer's consent and, if possible, name the company and industry.

5. Calculators and checklists

A cost calculator, a self-test or a checklist to download delivers value immediately. Whether you ask for an email address in return is a trade-off: more contacts against less use. For advertising to this address you need separate, express consent, ideally with double opt-in.

6. Webinars and short demonstrations

Half an hour with questions at the end brings you closer to prospects than any text. Recordings can keep working on the website afterwards.

Making contact easy

7. Several ways to enquire

Not everyone wants to fill in a form. Offer phone, email, a request for a call-back and, if needed, a calendar for a short conversation. Keep forms short: name, company, email and a free-text field are enough.

8. Newsletter with a clear promise

„Three specialist articles once a month, no advertising in between“ is more convincing than „Stay informed“. Anyone who signs up has consented. Over the months these become the warmest contacts.

9. Recognising company visits and following up sensibly

Most visitors never enquire. With visitor identification you see which companies came from company networks and what they read. That does not replace any of the ways above. But it helps sales to approach the right companies first and to start the conversation with the fitting topic. How to do this without being pushy is described in Approaching identified companies: from website visit to conversation. Which channels are legally open for this is covered in Cold outreach in B2B: what is allowed in Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

Effort and impact compared

Measuring what works

Assign every enquiry to a source and look once a month at which ways bring conversations, not just clicks. What a lean monthly report looks like is described in Analysing website visitors in B2B: which figures really count.

Frequently asked questions

What is a lead? A contact in whom you assume an interest in your offer and whom you continue to work on. Whether a company without a known contact person is already a lead is best decided jointly by sales and marketing.

How quickly does a website bring leads? Contact routes and pricing pages work immediately. Specialist articles take months to rank high in search.

Do I need an agency for this? Not necessarily. The content comes from your expertise anyway. An agency helps with technology, design and ads.