“Water, fire, air and dirt

Lead Magnets, how do they work?”

-Digital marketing rap duo ICP (Ideal Customer Profile), probably

Well, it certainly isn’t a “miracle,” but it can work wonders for your list-building strategy.

A lead magnet, put simply, is a deliverable incentive for users to submit their contact information to you.

Bait, if you will.

So, what kind of deliverables are we talking about, exactly?

The possibilities are endless, but usually lead magnets come in these varieties:

• PDFs
• Ebooks
• ZIP files
• Access to gated content or communities
• Newsletter subscriptions
• Spreadsheet Resources
• Videos
• Audio Files
• Webinars/Event Tickets
• Physical Objects
• Slideshow
• Quiz
• Challenge
• App
• Free Trial
• Coupons & Discounts

It may seem like a lot, but honestly there are myriad things that can be considered lead magnets.

Heck, even a free quote for a service can be considered a lead magnet. You’re getting information and giving the user something in return, even if it’s just information about how much they’ll have to pay you later.

Every lead magnet is different, but a good rule of thumb for implementing them is that the more information you want from the user, the more valuable the lead magnet should be.

For most lead magnet types, just an email address and maybe a name are plenty of information to ask for.

Think about it:

The fewer form fields a person has to fill out to get to your offer, the less time they’ll have to carefully consider whether it’s worth it.

And personal information is the currency of the digital age, so the fewer form fields are required, the more free the offer seems.

And people like free.

If you make them fill out more than three fields’ worth of personal information, they may start to think twice about your motives (not to mention their own level of commitment) and drop right out of your sales funnel.

BUT:

If your offer targets someone who is already near the bottom of your funnel, you may be able to get more from them – maybe even purchasing information – in exchange for the right magnet.

A targeted offer with an irresistible one-time discount may be just the incentive a lead needs to buy that item they’ve been eyeing on your site for weeks.

Likewise, if the user understands that the information they give is absolutely necessary for the delivery of the promised item, they’re more likely to submit it:

For example, if you really want a free copy of a book delivered to your house, there’s no way around forking over your mailing address, so you might as well do it.

In general, the best lead magnets do things. They exist for reasons other than just collecting leads and provide some sort of value.

Here are some specific characteristics of a really good lead magnet:

1. It Solves a Problem or Fulfills a Need

One of the best lead magnets this writer has ever seen came from Leadpages, a landing page building site:

First off, they have a lead magnet that is a giant PDF instruction manual on how to build an effective landing page. It’s a great resource for anybody looking to make a landing page on any platform, but especially handy for Leadpages users.

Within that giant PDF manual are little Easter egg lead magnets giving away other, smaller but equally useful resources.

Perhaps the most brilliant of these resources was a ZIP file full of high-quality stock photos, each in various sizes, that were all the perfect style to use on –  you guessed it – the landing pages you can build on LeadPages.

Everything about this process was pulled off brilliantly, never giving too much away at once, but at each step making their product easier to use for those who eventually converted.

2. It Delivers Instant Gratification

For the purposes of this post, we’ll say that something provides instant gratification if it is both easy to obtain and easy to consume.

A piece of candy provides instant gratification if you already have it and it is easy to eat. It does not provide instant gratification if you have to go to 3 different stores to find it and when you finally do it glues your teeth together.

Likewise, a lead magnet provides instant gratification if submitting your information is easy, the magnet gets to you quickly, and it does exactly what the initial offer said it would.

A lead magnet does not provide instant gratification if…

• the submission process is arduous – if your user suddenly remembers that they have to do their taxes, your form is probably too long
• there’s more than a few minutes of latency between submission and delivery – Tip: push instant downloads over email delivery whenever you can
• the delivered product does not fulfill the promises of the initial offer – for example, it is outdated

3. It Has a Specific Purpose

This is closely related to the quality of solving a problem or fulfilling a need.

Your lead magnet should be highly targeted to exactly the things your viewers are trying to do in their daily lives.

Are they writing content? Specifically, do they want that content to be better for their SEO? Give them a checklist specifically for SEO optimization of written content.

Are they trying to keep their household chores organized and on-schedule? Do they have kids? Give them a printable PDF chore chart calendar.

Are they trying to buy a vehicle but not sure if they can afford it? Give them a cash voucher to use at your next sale event to double their discounts.

Some problems your users will have can’t be solved by a general resource. By knowing exactly what your users need and catering to it specifically, you gain their trust.

4. It is Valuable

This has nothing to do with production value and everything to do with how well it caters to the user’s needs and delivers on its promises.

Any content hiding behind a lead collection gate must be more useful, more detailed, and more wanted than any similar content that can be found outside of the “gate,” otherwise the user won’t think of you as an authority.

Savvy users know that anything you put behind a gate has to be the very best intelligence you have to offer, and if your best isn’t as good as what others are willing to give away for free, you aren’t good enough for their business.

And by the way, the savvy users are the ones you want.

While what the aptly named MagnetStreet site is offering here may not seem to have enormous value, it acts as an incentive for the user to give their address and offers them something tangible that feels luxurious.

5. It Makes You Look Good

Ok, this one has to do with production value. Maintain your image by putting out content that not only delivers high-value information, but also looks high value at first glance.

If you’re collecting a user’s personal info, you’d better be giving them something good for it. Otherwise they won’t trust you to deliver anything of quality in the future.

Make your lead magnets polished, refined, and consistent with your brand’s aesthetic. If your normal content is a network TV series, your gated content needs to be the feature film.

6. It Has an Element of Urgency or Exclusivity

Users are more likely to convert if they feel the offer will expire soon or will not be offered to them again. They’re also more likely to accept an offer that they feel will give them an advantage over others who can’t get what they’re getting.

7. It Retains Most or All of its Value Into the Future

This doesn’t exclude magnets that may become dated but are easy to update.

If it can be evergreen, it should be. There’s nothing more valuable than a resource that you can return to over and over again and continue reaping benefits from.

Plus, a resource like that is going to get you loyal users who may even become brand advocates.

Bonus: It Pre-Qualifies Your Leads

We’ve put a lot of emphasis on making opt-ins easy in this article, but in some cases there is utility in making the opt-in process a little trickier: it filters your leads for you.

If, say, your process first requires users to take out their phone, then text a word to a specific number to opt in to an offer, then submit their email address to receive the offer, then take that email to an event to redeem it, then only those who were really interested in that offer end up reaching the final conversion point.

Your list of leads will be smaller, but your conversion rate will be much, much higher. How do we know? Well, we use that exact process all the time, and it works like a charm.

This is a lead qualifying lead magnet from an auto dealership event campaign. People who followed through to the offer went on to attend the sales event, and purchase cars.

Bonus: It Leads Them to Take Immediate Purchasing Action

We glossed over this earlier when we mentioned that “a targeted offer with an irresistible one-time discount may be just the incentive a lead needs to buy…”

But truly, the absolute best lead magnets are the ones that make such a persuasive argument for the quality and utility of your product that the viewer can’t help but convert on the spot.

Bonus: It Keeps Them Coming Back for More

Access to gated content is good, even when the content is static (like an article or checklist). But it’s even better when it’s a dynamic resource.

Think tools, calculators, apps, and more – things that provide so much utility in so many different circumstances that users will return to them over and over again without being reminded, and will recommend to their colleagues as well.

Where people see your lead magnet is just as important as what’s in it. You need to deliver your deliverables when people are ready to receive them – not a moment, click, or page view before or after.

This means targeting is of the essence. It can be as sophisticated as tracking and retargeting through multiple channels, or as simple as putting the link for your lead magnet right on the page or blog post that most relates to it.

However baroque you decide to get with your targeting methods, here are some characteristics of good lead magnet targeting and ad/offer copy to keep in mind:

Know exactly what your audience wants (and deliver it) and they’ll trust that you know what you’re doing. This includes:

• Knowing what stage of the funnel they’re in
• Knowing what products or services they’re interested in
• Knowing what they’re willing to give in exchange for what they want
• Knowing where to find them (different types of social media, their email inbox, or a specific page on your site)

Pictured: In an act of perfect targeting, Sleeknote places a giant lead magnet pop-up directly on a post that poses the question “Are Lead Magnets Dead?”

Once you know where to find your target user, make sure that you’re serving them a lead magnet that will make for a smooth transition from what they’re already looking at.

For example, if they’re on Facebook, serve them what they’ll be in the mood to see on social media: Checklists, good (but easy) reads, and quizzes are all good ideas here.

To clarify, when we say quizzes can be lead magnets, we’re talking about personality type quizzes, knowledge quizzes, and others that deliver valuable information in their results.  Think “What Kind of Leader are You?” rather than “Tell us your favorite hobbies and we’ll tell you what kind of pizza you should order for dinner.”

Oh, and if your social media lead magnet is a downloadable, try using a Facebook Lead Ad for the form – the user will never even have to leave their timeline to get it. Now that’s convenient!

I addressed this a bit earlier, but urgency is just as much about targeting as it is about copywriting.

If a user sees essentially the same offer on every page they visit on your site or every day on their social media feed for months or more on end, they know that they can bypass it now and find it again if they ever need it.

How do you stop them from ignoring it?

Well, you may find that you need to increase the value and shorten the barrier of entry to your lead magnet to appeal to a picky audience.

But also, make it clear that what you’re offering won’t last forever. Tell them now is their only chance, and (this may sound a bit cruel) have them believe that you have ways to make sure they won’t have the opportunity again, whether you do or not.

This can also be called shareability.

If you get one lead, that’s great. But what’s even better is if they convert and like it so much that they share the offer with their friends, and their friends share it with their friends, and so on.

People know what their friends are likely to be interested in, so that’s more qualified leads on your list!

This is a tricky question, but one that many marketers may ask when confronted with a proven marketing technique that requires a lot of creative groundwork.

The best way to determine how to create lead magnets from existing materials is to think of your ads and offers as a conversation between your business and your audience. Who is doing most of the talking?

If the answer is you, then how can you get your customers to participate in the exchange?

A great way to do this is to bring creative that already works in the physical world into the data-rich digital world. For example, mailers that involve scratch-to-reveal or similar offers can easily be turned into ads and landing pages that collect email addresses to reveal the hidden information.

By keeping the information exchange minimal but effective, you maximize the value of the offer and minimize the user’s time to second-guess the reason for giving their email address.

To frame it in terms of the conversation model, it turns a marketing technique in which you, the business owner, cast value into an audience (which may or may not be targeted) without really knowing what happens after, into an exchange of information: one email address for one instantly gratifying lead magnet.

And now you know how lead magnets work!

Did you find this article informative? Let us know what you learned in the comments!