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B2B Lead Nurturing: Best Practices, Strategies & Examples

Mahnoor Sheikh
Written by Mahnoor Sheikh
Published at Feb 22, 2024
B2B Lead Nurturing: Best Practices, Strategies & Examples

Ping! Someone just downloaded your ebook.

“Awesome, I’ve got a lead”, you think, beaming with pride.

But before you sit back and relax, consider this: 80% of leads never convert into sales.

Generating leads for your B2B company is only one part of the puzzle.

The real challenge is to keep those leads hooked and eventually convert them into loyal customers. This is where a solid B2B lead nurturing strategy can help.

In this post, we’ll walk you through six B2B lead nurturing strategies to convert your hard-earned leads. We’ll also offer tips and B2B lead nurturing examples along the way so you can learn from the best in the industry and close more deals.

Quick Read

  • B2B lead nurturing is the process of building relationships with potential clients with the goal of taking them from their initial interest towards making a purchase.
  • The top B2B lead nurturing strategies include sending personalized emails, showcasing case studies, hosting webinars, connecting with leads on social media, sharing targeted and valuable content, running retargeting ads and leveraging mobile marketing.
  • Improve your lead nurturing campaigns by narrowing down your ICPs, organizing leads, building personal connections, testing new strategies, nurturing existing customers, and aligning sales and marketing teams.
  • Visme can help you elevate your lead nurturing strategy with high-quality templates for marketing and sales collateral, interactive lead forms, AI capabilities, tools for sharing, publishing and tracking analytics, built-in assets, data visualizations and more.

 

Table of Contents

 

What is B2B Lead Nurturing?

B2B lead nurturing is the process of building relationships with potential clients with the goal of taking them from their initial interest towards making a purchase.

But lead nurturing doesn’t happen overnight. The B2B sales funnel is complex—it’s typically longer than a B2C funnel and often involves multiple decision-makers.

That’s why it takes more time, resources and strategic planning to nurture B2B leads to conversion. You have to qualify leads, understand their needs at every stage of the funnel and then create tailored content for each stage to help them take the next step.

 

B2B Lead Nurturing Strategies (+ Examples)

Lead nurturing is not a straightforward process. You need a long-term strategy that often involves a mix of channels and touchpoints.

Here are six top B2B lead nurturing strategies, along with real-life examples for each one:

 

Send personalized email campaigns

Email marketing is the #1 lead nurturing tactic used by marketers. That’s not surprising—email is affordable, versatile, accessible and delivers an incredibly high ROI.

But generic emails no longer work, especially for B2B brands. Their buyers are swamped with canned messages and can see right through impersonal, automated campaigns.

To stand out, you need to walk the extra mile. That’s why most successful email lead nurturing programs use personalization to make an impact. For starters, use the info collected via lead gen forms to tailor the email content and subject lines.

Pro Tip: Use Visme’s form builder to create interactive, engaging forms online proven to drive up to 2x more conversions. Add animated characters, customize fields and apply your branding to create a beautiful form guaranteed to capture leads.

But we’re not just talking about addressing leads by their name or mentioning their company. True personalization is about going a layer deeper and aligning your email’s content with the buyer’s specific needs, goals and challenges.

At Visme, we send personalized lead nurturing emails that are triggered by specific user actions. For example, if a lead signs up but doesn’t download or publish a project, they receive a sincere follow-up email from the founder asking for feedback and/or whether they need help.

B2B lead nurturing - send personalized email campaigns

This strategy helps you connect with buyers on a personal level so they see you less as a business that wants their money and more like a human who wants to help them.

You can also use email to share helpful resources like comparison blog posts, how-to guides and video tutorials with leads who are still in the consideration stage. Or, share industry news and feature updates to show the potential of your product.

Below are some other email marketing strategies to nurture leads:

  • Create a welcome email series to onboard new leads and get them to use your product.
  • Share research reports, analyses and informative blog posts to establish yourself as an expert and authority in your niche. Here’s an example of a report from Sprout Social.
B2B lead nurturing - Sprout content benchmark report Pro Tip: Want to create engaging, visual reports to nurture B2B leads? Use Visme’s report maker to build shareworthy reports complete with data visualizations, interactivity, stock photos and videos.
  • Share case studies and client success stories to showcase how you've helped similar businesses achieve their goals.
  • Send promotional offers, free trials or discounts to leads who have shown interest but have not yet converted to encourage them to take the next step.

Boost your email marketing success by segmenting your list based on behavior, lead score and interest, and then send tailored content to each segment.

You can also use dynamic content to customize your emails automatically for each lead based on attributes like company, role, location, etc.

Pro Tip: Visme’s Dynamic Fields lets you create dynamic content not just in newsletters but also in other online content like reports, presentations, proposals and other documents.

 

Showcase customer success stories

Customers need to know you can deliver on your promises. Truth is, 82% of B2B buyers will actively look for another supplier if they’re not offered a “performance guarantee.”

Case studies provide tangible proof of how your business has helped other customers achieve positive outcomes, which builds trust in your solution. They also back your expertise with relevant metrics and quotes, which help prospects visualize the concrete value you offer.

But email isn’t the only touchpoint for sharing customer success stories. Here are some other creative ways to showcase your case studies:

  • Feature vivid testimonials and reviews from happy customers on your website. Have a dedicated customer stories page showcasing various use cases.
B2B lead nurturing - image of customer testimonial on Asana
  • Develop detailed written case studies and ebooks detailing a customer’s journey from problem to solution. Gate these behind a lead capture form to nurture visitors.
  • Produce engaging video case studies by interviewing your best clients. Share these on social media and embed them on relevant landing pages, as Shopify does in the example below.
B2B lead nurturing - videos on Shopify website
  • Secure logos from reputed customers and display them prominently on your site to build social proof. If you have any badges or awards to show off, add them too.
  • Promote and repurpose customer wins across other marketing channels through PR, ads, sales collateral and more.

Don’t be afraid to experiment with different content types. Videos in particular can drive up to 86% more conversions. So, equip sales reps with compelling video testimonials to weave into their pitch. Finally, rinse and repeat with new customers to build your repository of social proof.

 

Host a webinar or live event

Webinars are proven lead generation tools. In fact, 73% of B2B marketers rank webinars as the best strategy for generating high-quality leads.

But they’re also excellent for nurturing B2B leads to conversion by combining real-time interaction with thought leadership and product education.

Host webinars that offer actionable advice to build authority around topics valuable to your audience. Collaborate with experts to speak at your events, conduct product demos and even invite happy clients to discuss how your business helped them win.

At Visme, we love hosting helpful webinars to educate leads about our product and how to use it to achieve specific goals. Here’s a snippet of Visme webinars on our website:

B2B lead nurturing - Visme webinar landing page

Live events allow for interactivity and engagement, but recording on-demand webinars is also a great idea. Sales reps can share them with prospects in relevant conversations via email or link to a dedicated page on your website.

You can also repurpose your webinars into other types of content like blogs or short-form videos to nurture leads.

 

Connect with leads on social media

Social media is the perfect place for more casual yet consistent interactions with prospects beyond formal email outreach.

Follow and engage directly with individual leads and target accounts rather than sharing public posts. The personal element helps you deepen connections and build familiarity.

Also, show leads you care about their opinions and social media growth. Comment on their posts with thoughtful remarks, likes and shares. Instead of leaving generic responses, add value to discussions by injecting unique perspectives.

On LinkedIn, you can also contribute insights to collaborative articles to demonstrate your expertise and build authority.

B2B lead nurturing - Contriibuting on LinkedIn

Finally, share your latest content on relevant topics and showcase customer testimonials and success stories. The goal is to establish your brand as a helpful resource tuned into their needs before active sales conversations open up.

 

Share targeted and valuable content

This might seem obvious, but publishing awesome content is one of the best lead nurturing strategy for B2B companies. So, what kind of content are we talking about?

It means content that helps prospects achieve business goals, like driving revenue, cutting costs or improving productivity. This will vary depending on where they are on their journey.

Build a content library spanning various formats—all laser-focused on overcoming specific challenges for your customers at every stage of the funnel. This could include:

HubSpot’s blog, for example, is a rich hub of insightful content beautifully organized into different categories and types.

B2B lead nurturing - HubSpot blog post

Share your content on social media, send it during relevant sales conversations and optimize it for search so it shows up in front of the right people.

Remember, your customer is a business—just like you. They’re also looking for ways to make more money and grow in their niche. Help them get there faster and they’ll see you as a partner rather than just another supplier.

 

Run retargeting campaigns

Retargeting campaigns help nurture B2B sales leads by keeping your brand top-of-mind across channels after they've interacted with you initially.

For example, let’s say a prospect visits your pricing page but doesn't convert. Follow up by retargeting them with personalized ads, content and emails over the next few weeks.

Pro Tip: If the reason they didn’t convert was high pricing, you could show them discounted plans and exclusive offers to encourage them to buy.

The constant exposure to your brand will remind them to come back and revisit your offer when they’re closer to a decision. Align your messaging and content across the retargeting campaign to help leads better understand your overall value proposition.

 

Leverage mobile marketing

If you thought mobile marketing was only for ecommerce or B2C, think again.

Research shows 80% of B2B buyers use mobile phones at work, and 60% say mobile played a key role in a recent purchase decision.

Take advantage of this and offer consistent lead nurturing experiences via mobile. For example, you could integrate SMS into your existing marketing strategy to send subscribers exclusive offers, reminders and news alerts on the go.

But perhaps the best mobile strategy for nurturing leads is to optimize everything for multiple devices. Make sure your forms, demos, pricing tables and case studies display correctly on smaller screens.

B2B lead nurturing - Visme pricing on web and mobile

Running retargeting ads? Optimize the creatives, messaging and CTAs for a mobile user experience.

Arm sales reps with collateral designed specifically for mobile, such as accessible decks, one-pagers and interactive demos. You can create responsive sales materials like these easily in Visme. Here’s an example of a B2B sales deck you can optimize for mobile:

Customize this template and make it your own! Edit and Download

Check out our full sales template library for more ideas.

Finally, test and experiment with innovative tactics like location-based push alerts, augmented reality, apps, and AI mobile chatbots. Doing so not only helps you nurture leads more effectively but also positions you as a modern, up-to-date business in the buyer’s mind.

 

B2B Lead Nurturing Best Practices (+ Expert Tips)

Crafting campaigns to nurture prospects is one thing, but converting those leads into sales? That's an art.

Sure, you can set up emails, create social posts and host events. But not everyone who does enjoys success.

The devil is in the details. What content best connects at each stage? What psychological tricks can you use to improve your conversion rate?

That's where lead nurturing best practices come in handy. We've also gathered insider tips from B2B experts in the trenches daily to show you how it’s done.

 

Identify your best customers

Lead nurturing only works if you’re targeting the right people. But what if you’re generating the wrong leads to start with? You could have a full pipeline but still fail to convert if these people don’t match your company’s ideal customer profiles (ICPs).

That’s why the first step is getting crystal clear on who your best-fit customers are. Conduct detailed interviews and research to build out your ICPs—what key attributes like role, industry, size, revenue, pains and values do your best prospects share?

Complement with rich buyer personas to further break down your ICPs— give them a name and personality, and list specific behaviors for each one. Doing so lets you create highly targeted, relevant nurturing programs and strategies.

Here’s a buyer persona template from Visme you can customize and use right away.

Video App Customer Persona
Customize this template and make it your own! Edit and Download

 

Organize your leads

Not all leads are created the same. Treating them as such can result in misaligned efforts, wasted resources and poor conversion rates.
It’s a good idea to break down leads into groups or categories so you can streamline your nurturing process and send targeted messages at the right time to the right people.

Here are three ways B2B companies can organize their leads.

  • Lead qualification: This involves determining whether a prospect fits your target market and has the potential to become a customer. Break down leads into information qualified leads (IQLs), marketing qualified leads (MQLs), sales qualified leads (SQLs) and product qualified leads (PQLs) to create tailored nurturing strategies for each type.
  • Lead scoring: Develop a methodology to attribute points for every website page hit, email open, content download, site search and more actions showing interest. Set thresholds, such as 100+ = hot lead, 50-100 is warm and <50 is cold. Now you can gauge the level of nurturing needed for each lead.
  • Lead segmentation: This involves categorizing leads based on key attributes like industry, company size, tech stack or apps used and channel source. Group leads into batches with similar traits, challenges and motivations for hyper-targeted campaigns.

So, which method is right for you? It could be one or two, or all three of them. It entirely depends on your unique business needs and buyer journey.

For example, you could start by qualifying leads to set baseline criteria, add scoring to assess temperature and interest for prioritizing effort, and then further segment leads to customize nurturing tactics and paths.

Organizing your leads provides structure and focus to your lead nurturing strategy, which helps you improve efficiency and conversions in the long run.

 

Use an omnichannel approach

The most effective B2B lead nurturing strategies combine multiple channels—both online and offline—tailored to buyer needs and funnel stage. Even if you implement a million lead nurturing strategies, sticking to one channel won’t get you anywhere.

Studies show B2B buyers use at least 10 different channels. Utilize email, newsletters, social media and webinars, but also reach out on LinkedIn, run retargeting ads on Google, pick up the phone and even send in-person gifts to local prospects.

As long as you keep your messaging consistent and prioritize channels based on customer preferences, an omnichannel approach can boost your lead-to-customer conversion rate.

But let’s be real. Going omnichannel and still sending targeted, personalized messages is nearly impossible without automation. You need the right tools under your belt to help you create email workflows, schedule social media posts, manage comments and track analytics.

Visme's social media scheduler - lead nurturing

Visme’s social media scheduler, for example, can help you create and share posts with ease. Use a drag–and-drop editor, templates, built-in graphics and AI design tools to whip up a post in minutes, and post it directly to your social pages without leaving Visme.

Visme's social media scheduler - lead nurturing

 

Make connections, not sales

The best lead nurturing strategy is viewing prospects as potential long-term business partners rather than just short-term sales targets. Show genuine curiosity in their challenges, goals and success. Ask thoughtful questions and provide helpful, strategic advice.

When clients see you invested more in enabling their growth versus simply making sales quotas, they’re more likely to respond and convert. In fact, these are the clients who will stick around and even refer you to their network.

I have tried every lead nurturing strategy under the sun, and the one that moves the needle 90% of the time is one-to-one connection. Connecting on calls once a quarter one-to-one, offering a community where they can access you directly or helping them—introducing them to someone, referring people to them, offering a spotlight opportunity. I combine these one-to-one touch points with weekly nurture emails and connect on LinkedIn to convert my audience to customers. Last month alone, this tactic brought in tens of thousands of dollars in sales.
Sarah Noel Block,

Tiny Marketing

 

Pay attention to the little things.

Going above and beyond the basics helps you stand out from your competitors and shows customers you’re willing to put in extra effort to convert them.

Whether it’s tracking key dates, congratulating clients on their achievements or following up on customer issues without being asked—these small, proactive nurturing gestures show clients you value their business. This not only helps you win deals, but also their loyalty.

B2B buyers are inundated with canned messages and smart people can see through automation a mile away. Take a few minutes to research a prospect. Make a small donation to a charity listed on a prospect's LinkedIn page because you know that cause is dear to them. Find a podcast or webinar they were a part of and reference something they said, showing you actually listened to it. These efforts all take time, but can show the person you put a little effort in versus copying and pasting some AI research that is available to anyone.
Charlie Riley

VP Marketing, Send

 

Test and adjust your strategy

Experiment with different strategies and don’t be afraid to test innovative ways to nurture leads. You never know—you might just come across a unique, winning combo that works wonders in driving conversions for your business.

That said, experimentation doesn’t always mean chasing new methods and wandering into uncharted territory. It can be as simple as revisiting your current strategy, identifying what already works and making calculated tweaks to improve it.

We're often so focused on finding the next great strategy that we forget what a functional system with a little tweaking and personalization can do. For example, we revisited our email marketing campaigns, a traditionally strong channel for us, and implemented dynamic content that adjusted based on the lead’s previous interactions with our content. This new approach creatively enhanced what was already working.
David Bitton

DoorLoop

Also, measure everything. Dig into the analytics for each strategy, tactic or channel and track performance during and after implementation. Identify areas for improvement and use A/B testing to make specific enhancements instead of doing a complete overhaul.

Pro Tip: Track all the projects you publish and share online with Visme Analytics. Whether it’s a form embedded on your landing page, an interactive ebook or a video, you can analyze views, engagement and more to understand how your content is performing. B2B lead nurturing - Visme analytics

 

Nurture your existing customers

Selling to happy customers is often easier than converting new leads. These people have first-hand experience with your product or service—and they’re loving it. Find opportunities to upsell or cross sell and create targeted campaigns to increase their lifetime value (LTV.)

For example, you could craft an email campaign for clients currently on your cheapest plan that highlights the benefits of upgrading to a premium package. You can also offer loyalty rewards and special discounts to existing customers to convince them to upgrade.

Finally, regularly ask existing clients for feedback, and not just for the sake of it. Incorporate their feedback to improve your products and services—your customers will thank you for it.

 

Align your sales and marketing teams

Lead nurturing is not just a job for the sales team. Building relationships with clients does not happen in isolation—you need all departments to work together, especially your sales and marketing teams.

For example, salespeople can offer valuable insights into the customer journey, such as specific pain points and goals at various stages. Marketing can use this information to create ICPs as well as tailor blog content, ads and nurturing emails to make them more relevant.

Similarly, marketing can provide sales teams with strong, branded collateral and sales enablement content reps can use in conversations and follow-ups.

The key is to align both teams so everyone is working towards the same goals. One of the best ways to do that is to have a powerful CRM that enables shared intelligence and transparency of the sales pipeline across the board.

Pro Tip: Create all types of branded content collaboratively with Visme. Upload your logo, colors and fonts to your Brand Kit and reuse them across projects. Or use the Brand Wizard to automatically pull assets from your website and create customized templates for your business.

 

B2B Lead Nurturing FAQs

Q. What Are the Benefits of Lead Nurturing?

Lead nurturing benefits your business in various ways like higher conversion rates, accelerated sales cycles, larger deal sizes, improved customer lifetime value and increased ROI.

Q. What Is Lead Qualification?

Lead qualification is the process of determining if a prospect matches the characteristics of your ideal customer profile (ICP). This indicates they have a real need for your offering, a budget to purchase it and the authority to make buying decisions. Qualified leads need further nurturing and sales follow-up actions, depending on what category they fall into.

Q. What Is Lead Scoring?

Lead scoring involves assigning points to prospects based on the level of sales readiness and interest they demonstrate through various actions like email opens, content downloads, site page visits and event signups. Higher scored leads are prioritized for immediate sales outreach, while lower scored leads get more nurturing to warm them up.

Q. What Are Lead Nurturing Campaigns?

Lead nurturing campaigns are carefully designed, often automated initiatives that brands use to reach and build relationships with prospects. Nurturing campaigns are executed across a variety of channels and touchpoints, including email, social media, blog, events and ads. They aim to provide value and push leads to conversion.

What Is the Best B2B Lead Nurturing Software?

The best B2B lead nurturing software includes CRMs and email marketing automation tools like HubSpot, Salesforce, Pipedrive, Zoho, Mailchimp and ActiveCampaign. You can also use content creation software like Visme to develop engaging and interactive lead nurturing content.

 

Nurture Your Leads & More with Visme

And there you have the complete playbook to crush B2B lead nurturing and rack up those conversions. We covered top strategies and best practices like identifying ICPs, organizing leads and creating omnichannel campaigns tailored to the buyer journey stage.

The key is to provide valuable, relevant experiences via email, social, content, ads and other touchpoints. Build relationships through constantly delighting people, not just hard selling.

Ready to level up your lead nurturing campaigns? Visme is the perfect partner.

Tap into stunning B2B lead nurturing templates. Design engaging, high-converting lead forms. Create dynamic content for both sales and marketing. Share projects online, track results and do much moreall from a single platform.

Mahnoor Sheikh
Written by Mahnoor Sheikh

Mahnoor is a freelance writer and content strategist for B2B SaaS brands (and a toddler mom). She loves to talk about marketing, sales, branding and visual design. When she’s not working, she’s chilling at home (or the beach), cooking gourmet dinners for her family or traveling the world. She’s currently based in Antalya. Connect with her on LinkedIn or check out her website.

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