Pay per lead (PPL) marketing – also known as the cost per lead model – is an online advertising technique in which payment is based exclusively on leads. In a pay per lead agreement, the advertiser pays just for visitors who “convert” or sign up. In essence, pay per lead is a kind of affiliate marketing where the advertiser pays the affiliate based on the number of leads they drive to your website or page.
What is a lead?
In pay per lead marketing, a converted lead is of the same kind as a paying customer or potential customer. However, a lead can mean different things to different businesses. A qualifying lead for one business might be a customer who completes an online purchase. For another, it might be a website visitor who signs up or leaves an email address.
What is an affiliate?
In the world of marketing, an affiliate is an organization or individual that is officially connected or attached to your business. The classification of an affiliate relationship in this context is one where a company or person is affiliated with another in order to sell products. A pay per click affiliate might be a celebrity, social influencer or who is paid to endorse your services or products online.
Why use pay per lead marketing?
These days, PPL (pay per lead) is used by a lot of businesses as an alternative to the traditional agency model known as retainer marketing. A marketing retainer is basically an agreement between a business and a full-service marketing agency. In this case, the agency works from a monthly or quarterly budget to provide a wide variety of advertising services.
What makes pay per lead just better for businesses?
Pay per lead marketing is just better for businesses as compared to traditional retainer agreements. Retainers have a tendency to be non-specific and held over long periods of time. The advantages of a retainer agreement are that the marketing turns out to be very familiar with the brand, so can help them better execute their long-term business goals. However, the retainer model even has a lot of disadvantages for businesses, such as:
- Lack of transparency – With a retainer agreement, there is no way of knowing the way your retainer money and time is spent. At the same time as the majority of agencies should be transparent regarding the breakdown of the retainer costs and time, there is no guarantee you are getting the best services for your money. This comes down to a simple fact – the cost of a retainer is fixed, irrespective of the results.
- Greater risk – In spite of having a retainer agreement with your marketing agency, there is no guarantee that retainer marketing efforts will produce results. This means all of the risks are attached to you – the business – instead of the advertiser.
- No specialist – At the same time as an experienced marketing agency is likely to be familiar with all forms of digital marketing, each one will specialize in different areas. By making use of an agency that specializes in SEO for all of your advertising, you have the benefit of working with a single vendor and having fixed costs, but you might not be getting the best overall service for your money.
- Not cost effective – Even though a retainer is usually cheaper in contrast to ad hoc services, it is not consistently good value. During quieter months, you might struggle to find an adequate amount of advertising work to cover the cost of your retainer agreement – resulting in unused retainer time and potentially wasted money.
Benefits of pay per lead marketing
The pay per lead model comes with a lot of benefits – the obvious advantage being that you pay for results, not promises. Other advantages of pay per lead include:
- Better brand awareness – With more clicks comes better brand awareness. At the same time as a blog post or a social media campaign may drive leads to your website, an affiliate advert will bring people back to your page time and time again. This means you will have the benefit of more exposure over a prolonged period instead of putting all your eggs in the basket of a single marketing team.
- Longevity – A pay per lead advertisement will sit on the platform of your publisher for a long time. Mull over how many times a successful blog post can be shared, retweeted and reposted on social media over the course of months or years. Each time a person interacts with the post, the algorithm of Google responds by ranking the page higher in its SERPs, meaning it generates new interest and more leads for your business.
- Scalable results – With pay per lead, it is easier to record and keep an eye on your ROI (return on investment). For the most promising results, set up an advertisement campaign with a fixed price per lead so you can see how each conversion has an effect on the bottom line.
- Budget savings – In contrast to other advertising models, the pay per lead model is more cost-effective for the reason that you just pay for leads. Simply be aware of the difference between pay per lead and pay per click, as these can mean different things for your business. A website or page click could be a mistake, and it does not always promise custom, for instance.
- Higher quality traffic – Leads mean nothing if they do not convert to sales, which is why the quality o your traffic matters more than the quantity. With targeted pay per lead marketing, affiliates already have an established audience – whether they are successful bloggers, celebrities or influencers. An experienced affiliate advertiser should be capable of providing you with a profile of their audience so you know whether they are expected to turn out to be customers of your business.
The bottom line
Retainer marketing may seem like a budget-friendly advertising approach, but it can be incredibly risky for your business. With pay per lead, you just pay for actual results. This means it is simpler to track leads and conversions and scale your marketing efforts as a result.
Integrate pay per lead model into your business
If you would like to keep away from high setup costs and no guarantee of a return on investment, pay per lead is a superb advertising choice for your business. At Dwarika Web Solutions, we are driven by performance, offering a number of B2B and B2C services. We work strategically with our clients to drive scalable results. That means we prioritize growth for your business in everything we do. We have experienced professionals who specialize in PPC that leads to real conversions. For more information, feel free to get in touch with us at 1(855) 561-4557. We are just a phone call away!