Category: Lead Generation

In this blog, Richard Peters, Senior Content Creator at Whiteoaks, discusses:

  • How Performance PR powers inbound lead generation by building visibility and trust
  • Tactics for earning influence through media coverage, peer advocacy and search-optimised content
  • Practical steps to turn thought leadership, case studies and employee-generated social posts into qualified leads

 

Outbound methods of driving leads are under the spotlight. Smarter spam filters and the influx of AI-generated sales emails are pushing cold email strategies to become irrelevant, and even encouraging organisations to go back to cold calling in some cases.

The ongoing expansion of privacy regulations means that buying lists now carries genuine legal and reputational risk, while with today’s tougher email authentication rules, just a few spam complaints can cause every message from a domain to land in recipients’ junk folders.

As outbound strategies face an uncertain future, inbound strategies are coming to the fore. It is an approach that makes perfect sense when you consider that potential future customers often encounter a brand or visit its website before that business proactively contacts them.

In fact, according to 6sense, 69% of the purchase process happens before B2B buyers engage with sellers. So, it is imperative that businesses can draw these prospects in by ensuring that when they get in touch they get a good impression of the organisation and what it does.

The inbound methodology focuses partly on attracting potential customers with relevant content, but it is also, more broadly, about building reputation and influence. Performance PR plays a crucial role across all these areas by building trust with target audiences.

The inbound advantage

Part of this is via secured media engagements. Dedicated teams of B2B media relations specialists leverage their relationships with key journalists, analysts and influencers to secure content placements and opportunities.

Experienced and expert content creators profile executives within an organisation and elevate brands in industry leading publications, through in-depth thought leadership articles, client case studies and whitepapers.

However, inbound lead generation extends beyond media relations and the formal press environment. It’s about finding ways to shape a business’s reputation. At its root, reputation is a collective perception that is made up from a combination of image and reality.

Businesses that want to create a positive impression need to score highly on several key criteria: being seen and understood, establishing points of differentiation, and perhaps most important of all, being well trusted.

Over the past few years, trust has migrated away from institutions and towards a wide range of other audience groups: customers, colleagues, analysts, niche influencers and user communities.

These peer groups play an increasingly important role in inbound lead generation.

Trust-building tactics that work

There are a wide range of PR tactics that could be deployed to harness these groups to help businesses improve their reputation and begin to exert more influence over prospects.

They include everything from encouraging staff to generate their own content on product launches or industry trends on platforms like LinkedIn and Stack; to building video or written case studies for social right through to encouraging users to deliver positive feedback on review platforms.

Performance PR campaigns also focus on enhancing content for search engines with keyword optimised content and relevant backlinks to boost domain authority.

This makes it more likely for target audiences to see expert articles, bold commentary and informative case studies from the brand when searching for a topic or solution online.

Woven together, these elements create a cycle of visibility and trust that guides potential customers from first glance to genuine interest, often before the sales team is aware of them, or even before they first reach the company website.

Ready to let your expertise do the talking? Speak to the Whiteoaks team today.

In this blog, we explore:

  • Why good solutions alone aren’t enough to differentiate IT providers
  • The challenges many IT providers face in trying to build awareness and visibility
  • The role Performance PR can play in helping IT providers overcome those challenges

 

You’re leading an IT business in one of the most competitive markets out there  – and one of the fastest growing. 

The UK IT services sector is already worth over £100 billion and is projected to hit £181 billion by 2032. Managed IT services alone are booming, expanding at 13% annually as more companies outsource to keep pace with cloud migration, cybersecurity demands and large-scale digital transformation.

On the surface, it sounds like a golden opportunity. 

However, not only are B2B buyers spending more, they’re also evaluating more options and doing more research than ever before. In fact, they’re considering 62% more brands than they did four years ago before making a decision. But despite all this activity, only two in five companies feel providers are doing a good job of tailoring their offering to meet their needs.

So where does that leave you?

Unfortunately we have bad news for you; success isn’t down to your product alone. Your buyers want a partner. Someone who understands their challenges, offers a fresh perspective and stays with them for the long haul; from guiding them through scoping and setup, to supporting growth and evolving with them as their needs change.

The challenges faced by IT providers

You’re chasing leads and firefighting day-to-day demands, you’re not building the visibility or authority which signals to buyers: we understand your world, and we’re the partner you’ve been searching for.

And this is costing you. Without a strong presence in the places buyers are researching – industry media, LinkedIn or the conversations shaping their decisions, you’re invisible, even if your solution is world class.

You’re not seen as a thought leader

To win long-term partnerships, you need to show up consistently as the expert buyers want on their side. That means leading with insight, challenging outdated thinking and earning a reputation as the go-to voice in your space.  If they can’t see your expertise, they’ll assume it’s not there.

You’re missing opportunities to generate leads

Buyers don’t want to be sold to anymore. As we said before, many are doing their own research, forming opinions long before you even know they’re looking and they’re already shortlisting providers. And we all know traditional approaches like cold outbound or scattergun ads rarely hit the right audience at the right moment. Trade shows and events often fail to deliver ROI because the conversations don’t continue once the stand comes down. 

In a £100 billion (and growing) market, not addressing the fundamentals of building trust and credibility is a risk. 

Your competitors will step in where you are not. 

How Performance PR helps address these challenges 

Every Performance PR campaign is aligned to your business goals and designed from the ground up to deliver measurable outcomes. 

Ultimately, being seen as a thought leader is the authority which draws buyers in and fills your pipeline. So in order for you to be seen as an expert, you need to design PR activities accordingly. 

This is where we’d help you stand out by creating bold, insightful narratives which showcase your expertise. A campaign’s deliverables would include creating touchpoints to warm up your buyers, build trust and ensure you’re at the very front of their mind when they’re ready to act. That could mean:

  • Securing high-value media coverage in publications your buyers trust
  • Producing benchmarking reports that position you as the authority in your niche
  • Writing opinion-led content for LinkedIn which sparks engagement and invites conversations
  • Hosting webinars or podcasts where you share insights and bring your expertise to life

And the great thing about Performance PR is that it’s all measurable. Examples of KPIs and outcomes include:

  • Increased share of voice in key industry media
  • Top-tier coverage in publications like TechCrunch or Computer Weekly
  • Percentage uplift in website traffic during campaign periods
  • Inbound leads, with prospects already educated on your expertise
  • Social media impressions and meaningful interactions
  • Webinar sign-ups and attendance rates
  • Downloads of reports and gated content – tracking resulting leads and their progression through the sales funnel from PR-generated conversations

We’d report on all of this, so you’ll see exactly what’s working, what’s driving ROI and where we can optimise for greater impact.

The Whiteoaks way

You’ve probably heard agencies talk about “accountability” before, but we don’t just talk about it, we build it into the way we work. At Whiteoaks, we operate on a ‘fixed fee for fixed outcomes’ model. That means we agree targets upfront and if we don’t hit them, you don’t pay. Everything is backed by a service level agreement, so you’re not taking a leap of faith, you’re choosing a partner who’s as invested in your success as you are.

We don’t chase vanity metrics or hide behind vague promises. We create a clear, measurable path to ROI and give you the confidence that every pound you spend is working as hard as it can. 

So, if you’re ready to become the partner your buyers have been searching for, get in touch with us now.

Generating high-quality leads is one of the biggest challenges facing emerging and growing B2B tech companies. Despite having innovative products or services, attracting and converting potential customers into leads often proves difficult. One approach that can play a part in helping to overcome this challenge is focusing on your company’s reputation.

A strong reputation, built on a foundation of credibility and trust, naturally attracts leads, making potential customers more likely to engage with your business and resulting in higher conversions and sustained growth. The solution lies in measuring and strengthening your reputation strategically.

In B2B tech, reputation is a critical factor. Potential customers are more inclined to engage with companies they perceive as credible and trustworthy. A strong reputation reassures them that your company can deliver on its promises.

However, reputation isn’t just about being well-known. It’s about being well-regarded in your industry for reliability, innovation and customer satisfaction. Companies that successfully build and maintain a positive reputation tend to see a significant impact on their lead generation efforts. But how do you measure and enhance something as intangible as reputation?

Measuring your reputation

The first step in improving your reputation is understanding where you currently stand. This requires a comprehensive assessment using a variety of metrics and tools. For instance, monitoring media coverage can provide insights into how often and in what context your company is being mentioned. Positive media coverage can boost your reputation, while negative press can damage it, which is why sentiment analysis of these mentions is crucial to understanding their impact.

Customer reviews and social media sentiment also offer valuable clues about your reputation. What are people saying about your brand? Are there recurring themes in the feedback you receive? By paying attention to these channels, you can better understand how your company is perceived by current and potential customers.

Another powerful tool is brand perception studies. These can be particularly useful for understanding both prompted and unprompted awareness of your brand. By surveying a representative sample of your target audience, you can gauge how well-known your brand is and what qualities are associated with it.

Strengthening your reputation

Once you’ve gathered data on your current reputation, the next step is to use these insights to enhance it. This is where a performance-driven PR approach becomes crucial. Rather than relying on generic strategies, you can develop targeted campaigns that directly address the areas where your reputation needs improvement.

For instance, if your media coverage has been lacking, you might focus on securing more positive press through thought leadership articles, product announcements or industry commentary. If customer reviews reveal dissatisfaction with a particular aspect of your service, you can address those concerns and communicate the changes to your audience.

Storytelling is another powerful way to strengthen your reputation. By highlighting your company’s strengths and successes, through carefully crafted compelling narratives, you can shift public perception in a more positive direction. Whether through blog posts, social media updates or press releases, consistently communicating your value proposition will help build a more robust reputation.

As you strengthen your reputation, you’ll likely notice a positive feedback loop forming. A stronger reputation attracts more leads, which in turn provides more opportunities to demonstrate your company’s value and further enhance your reputation.

This loop is particularly important in the B2B tech sector, where decision-makers are often cautious and methodical in their purchasing decisions. They want to be sure that they’re choosing a partner who is competent and trustworthy. By consistently improving your reputation, you’re giving them the confidence they need to take the next step and engage with your business.

For B2B tech companies, generating leads is not just about having a great product or service – it’s about being perceived as a leader in your field. By focusing on measuring and strengthening your reputation, you can create a solid foundation that attracts high-quality leads and drives long-term growth.

Discover our PR and media relations services and the role they play in strengthening business reputation.