You’ve made it! You’ve finally grown your business enough to the point where you have both sales reps and one or a few people coordinating your marketing efforts. In the beginning, it was only you, wearing all the hats, which was crazy but you also had visibility into everything.

I have a website that is getting traffic. It offers a great ebook that people can download by giving me their name, email and phone number. So far no one has. 🙁

Does this sound familiar?

There’s a reason you are not generating leads. If you’re generating traffic but no one is downloading your ebook or report, something is missing.

If you’re a small business looking to invest in web-based advertising, Google AdWords is the best place to start. Some campaigns can be set up in as little as five minutes.

However, for competitive industries with high value sales such as IT consulting, we typically recommend a minimum starting budget of $1,000/month.

Let’s settle this once and for all...

You and your business must have a blog.

In an age when consumers are hungry for content but stingy with their attention spans, regularly posting concise, high-quality content comes with several tangible benefits to your business and its marketing efforts.

It must have felt so great to have finished writing your eBook. Especially if you gave your everything to write it: blood, sweat, time, tears and probably a lot of coffee.

But you know what ruins this feeling of accomplishment?

When you put your eBook front and center on your website or on the Kindle Store -- and no one downloads it.

Founded in July, 2013, Orchestrate Technologies went from a small IT provider in Cincinnati to a nationally recognized and awarded managed IT services provider in a few short years.

Although we can’t take credit for that accomplishment, Pronto Marketing has been a fundamental contributor to Orchestrate’s digital marketing success.

If you’re a business owner who wants to carve out a marketing niche by providing quality and unique content that engages and informs, publishing an eBook is one of the most powerful marketing tools in your toolbox.

“But what do I stand to gain by investing all that time and effort into writing an eBook that I’m just going to give away?”  

It’s a valid question, and one we can answer with measureable benefits.

I'm sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but here it is:

There isn’t a silver bullet that will fix all your sales, marketing and lead generation issues.

It’s not unusual for a client to approach us and say, “My website isn’t generating any leads.

Many small businesses have difficulty finding clients, no matter their field or whether they sell directly to individuals or to other companies. One of the things that keeps new businesses -- even those with innovative services or great ideas -- from getting off the ground is their inability to find their market niche and to make themselves visible to potential clients.

When it comes to running a business, no matter how big or small, marketing and advertising is oftentimes the biggest challenge. Promoting the business you’ve worked so diligently to create may seem like a daunting task, but the worst mistake a small- and medium-sized business owner can make is to be nervous and tentative when it comes to the marketing process.

If you need to find some information, what do you do? Do you dust down your encyclopedia, head to your local library, or phone a friend? An encyclo...what? No, these days you’ll do what most of us do: you'll go online.

Most businesses, from Fortune 500 companies to mom-and-pop establishments, need an online presence to survive.

The results are in! At the beginning of October, we mentioned a B2B lead generation survey being conducted by Software Advice. The survey focuses on the marketing efforts of B2B business of varying sizes. After tabulating and calculating the data, Software Advice shared the results with us so we could pass them on to you, and we hope you can gain some insight for this information as you finalize your marketing plans for 2013.
About the respondents
First, let's take a look at what kind of companies and people responded to the survey so you can get a better idea of how your company fits into the data being presented.