To capture and retain high-converting subscribers, your lead magnet topic must resonate deeply with your audience. Simply covering common topics that your competitors address or that your prospects are already familiar with won’t set you apart. Instead, you need to deliver genuine value by addressing a unique pain point or need.
Follow this step-by-step guide to discover the ideal topic for your lead magnet and make a meaningful impact.
Step-by-Step: Choosing the Perfect Lead Magnet Topic
For some, selecting the ideal lead magnet topic will be straightforward—especially if you’re offering a demo of your flagship product or a pre-configured toolkit that’s already in high demand.
However, if you need to invest more effort into finding the right topic to effectively grow your email list, don’t worry. We’ll guide you through the process step by step.
Step 1: Choose the Format for Your Lead Magnet
Here are seven lead magnet formats you might consider for your website:
1. Checklists
2. Templates
3. Lists
4. Tools
5. Digital Guides
6. Educational Videos
7. Discounts or Demos
Some formats are straightforward, but for others, you’ll need to consider three key factors:
1. What’s the Most Natural Format for Your Content?
Each lead magnet type can be delivered in various ways. For example, an instructional lead magnet can take the form of:
– Basic documents like Word or Excel files
– Clickable or editable PDFs
– Image files such as JPGs or PNGs
– Videos in multiple formats
Choose a format that best suits the content you’re providing.
2. What’s the Best Learning Style for Your Audience?
Understand your target audience’s preferences and time constraints. For instance, a busy CEO or a stay-at-home parent might not have time to read a 30-page eBook. Tailor your lead magnet to a format that your audience can easily engage with.
3. What Are Your Content Creation Strengths?
Be realistic about your abilities and resources. Consider whether you have the time and skills to create interviews, craft engaging stories, or design polished documents. Evaluate what you and your team can effectively produce.
Step 2: Let Data Guide Your Decision
Sometimes, the best ideas for your lead magnet are right in front of you—if you know where to look in your data!
To uncover the topics your audience is most interested in, analyse the following sources in your Google Analytics or other analytics tools:
– Most Popular Website Pages: Identify which pages attract the most visitors and engage them. These pages often highlight topics that resonate strongly with your audience.
– Top Landing Pages: Review the performance of your landing pages, as high visitor numbers indicate valuable content that draws interest from search and referral sources.
– Successful Blog Posts: Look at which posts attract the most visits, keep users engaged for longer periods, and generate interactions such as likes, shares, and comments. Pay attention to posts that lead to the most newsletter sign-ups, as these are indicators of valuable topics.
– Newsletter or Email Clicks: Analyse your email marketing data to see which links receive the highest click-through rates. This will show what content your subscribers find most compelling.
– Social Media Engagement: Examine your social media metrics to discover which posts generate the most interest and engagement, even if they link to external sites.
– External Sources: Explore forums, online groups, and platforms like Quora related to your industry. These spaces can reveal what your audience is discussing, their needs, and trending topics.
By leveraging this data, you can make informed decisions about your lead magnet topic. Additionally, consider repurposing or bundling existing high-performing content into a new lead magnet format. This approach capitalises on content that has already proven to be valuable and can offer it to users in a more accessible format.
Step 3: Analyze the Keywords Your Audience is Searching For
You likely have a good grasp of what’s working well on your site, but that might not be the full picture. There could be additional topics your audience is interested in that you haven’t yet explored. Conducting a keyword review can uncover these untapped areas and help you discover what your audience is actively searching for.
Start by using keyword research tools like KWFinder or SERPs. Enter a relevant main keyword related to the lead magnet topic you’re considering.
Examine the volume of monthly searches for various keywords or topics. Determine whether the search volume is sufficient for your goals. For example, consider whether a topic with only 10 monthly searches, like “Essential Ways to Train Your Cat to Walk on a Leash,” would generate meaningful leads.
Focus on the data to guide your decisions. While you don’t need to chase the most popular keywords, you should ensure there’s enough search interest to make your efforts worthwhile.
Step 4: Analyse the Competition
Don’t hesitate to explore what your competitors are doing with their lead magnets. Observing established businesses with more experience in your industry can provide valuable insights into what captures your audience’s interest.
If you can’t find lead magnets directly on their websites, try checking out:
– Resources Pages: Look for white papers, case studies, infographics, and videos.
– Blog Posts: Review popular and high-engagement posts.
– Social Media Feeds: Analyse content that garners significant attention and interaction.
Evaluate where your competitors excel by identifying the topics that attract the most views, clicks, shares, and comments. This will help you understand what resonates with your target audience.
If competitors don’t offer lead magnets, this presents an opportunity for you to step in and provide something they haven’t. If they do have lead magnets, aim to offer something of equal or greater value, potentially on a different topic, to differentiate yourself and capture the interest of your shared audience.
Step 5: Use Online Tools for More Ideas
The research you’ve done so far might lead you to a basic topic for your lead magnet. While that’s a good starting point, your lead magnet needs to go beyond just addressing common questions or issues. It should:
– Capture enough interest to get people to download it.
– Keep them engaged so they use the content effectively.
– Motivate them to take action, like buying your product, signing up for your service, or subscribing to your membership.
When you’re ready to refine and get creative, use these online tools for fresh ideas:
– Answer the Public
– BuzzSumo
– Google Trends
– HubSpot Blog Topic Generator
Google’s auto-suggest feature is also helpful. Type your topic into Google search, and it will offer popular and relevant suggestions. This can help you narrow down to more specific and compelling topics. For example, instead of a general white paper on “Tax Preparation Tips,” you might find more engaging topics like “Tax Preparation for Freelancers” or “Tax Preparation When You Live Abroad.”
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