11 Effective Ways to Promote Your Lead Magnet

Updated 8/22/2020

I want to give you some effective ways to promote your lead magnets. For years, I had a lead magnet on my website development site, and I thought that having an opt-in on a couple of pages was enough. I had a few people sign up to my email list and download the guide I offered, but not very many. 

What I’ve learned is that as a whole, we (us Internet users) see so many optin boxes, we just look past a boring box. As it turns out, we have to actively promote our lead magnets to convince people to sign up.

And that makes sense really if we view our lead magnets as tiny products. I don’t believe that opt-in incentives are “freebies” at all. They’re not free – they cost one email address. So, we have to treat them as products, including promoting them like products if we want people to buy.

1 Build a Lead Magnet Landing Page

Just like you would build a sales page for a new product, you need to build a page for your lead magnet. I’ve seen very simple opt-in pages that convert well, and I’ve seen long-form sales pages for lead magnets that successfully “sell” the tiny product. 

You’ll have to test out what will work best for you. As a busy parent though, I don’t recommend spending weeks building a full-blown sales page for your lead magnet. Start with an attractive, simple page that has: a list of benefits, image or description of the lead magnet, an opt-in form, and instructions or text to set visitor expectations about what they’ll receive. If you get people landing on the page but not converting, then spend time working on your landing page, possibly turning it into a sales page.

Once you build out your landing page, you need to link to that landing page from your website. Yes, even if you have opt-in forms directly on your site, you still want a few links. One place I see effective links is on the site’s main menu. It can be a stand-alone link, or a link underneath a products tab.

Do include a link to your lead magnet landing page on your products page, as your entry-level product. If you have a tools and resources page, include a link there too. On other pages, you can use on-page opt-in forms.

2 Include Lead Magnet Opt-ins Throughout Your Website

To thoroughly promote your lead magnet, make sure you have many opt-in forms on your website. People are so good at over-looking opt-in forms, and you never know what pages they’re going to visit! Make sure you give them plenty of opportunity to sign up.

Here’s a list of good places for opt-in forms:  on the home page on or under the hero image, near the bottom of the home page, individual blog pages – at the end &/or within the post itself, on your sidebar, on your footer, on your about page, on your 404 page, on other informational pages.

When you’re thinking about the format of opt-in to use, be sure to weigh the goodwill of your audience with the effectiveness of the opt-in placement. Pop-up forms and downward sliding welcome mat opt-in forms are very effective, but can also be pretty annoying. I’ve wanted to read a very interesting looking article before, but couldn’t because of the multiple opt-ins that kept interrupting my page view. I don’t think that’s effective if you’re building an audience for the long-term.

3 Write a blog post about your lead magnet

Promote your lead magnet with a blog post. Write about the benefits of the lead magnet and how it makes your readers’ work easier or faster. You can even write out a sales page in blog form as long as you give out some good information that would be worth reading, even without the lead magnet download. Include some opt-in forms throughout this post, even if you don’t do that for most posts. Readers will be more tempted because if they’re reading the blog post, they’re definitely interested in the subject of your lead magnet!

4 Share on social media

Be sure to make your social media followers aware of your lead magnet and its benefits. And not just once. Social media moves so quickly that you will have to post more than once to get your lead magnet noticed. You can automate some of this with a scheduler of choice.

Send your social media traffic to the landing page you’ve built. If you want to track conversions for each social channel, you can build a separate landing page and funnel pages for each channel. This can get your lead magnet seen, but can also tell you which social media audiences are most likely to purchase from you.

5 Guest post about your lead magnet

A guest post on a blog with a similar type of audience can expose you to new people who could be very interested in what you’re working on. You can write about your lead magnet, like you would on your own blog. Or, you can write a related article and link to your lead magnet landing page within the article. 

Just make sure that the link is approved by the owner of the blog you’re writing for, or they may reject your article.

6 Bio Paragraphs

If you find a blog you’d like to write for, but the owner won’t accept links inside the article, you can still get a lot out of writing guest posts. In the bio paragraph that you submit for guest posts, interviews, podcasts, and other appearances, you can include the link to your lead magnet landing page. This is a great way for new readers to find out more about you. If after reading about you, you give them something valuable for just an email address, you’re creating goodwill.

Save for later! Pin this post to your Lead Magnet Board.

7 Email signature

Another great place for a lead magnet promotion is in your email signatures. Again, link to the landing page. You’ll reach folks like other suppliers and prospects who may not otherwise see your lead magnet link on your website.

8 Your email list

Begging! Remind your email list about the lead magnet, and ask them to share your link to the landing page. A bonus here is that you might have people on your email list who haven’t downloaded your lead magnet. They either signed up through another method that didn’t offer the lead magnet, or they just forgot. By making them aware, you’re providing value to this group.

9 Online groups

In your online groups, forums, Facebook groups, meetups, Slack groups, etc, you have some opportunities to promote your lead magnet. Many groups frown on posting promotions, but then offer a day or time that it’s allowed. Be sure to take advantage of those times! Even if you’re never allowed to post, these groups have bios and signatures where you can add promotional links.

10 Paid advertising online

So far, all these ideas have been free. But you can advertise your lead magnet online through Google, social media, and online advertising networks. The key would be to make sure you’re targeting a specific, narrow market.

11 Thank you and delivery pages – invite recent signups to share

Within your lead magnet delivery funnel, you have a few opportunities to ask your brand-new subscribers to share your link. You can have them share on social media or email colleagues directly. 

Go Promote!

Now that know a few promotion methods, look through and find the easiest to implement. Email signature, maybe? And go do it! As you have time, add in other promotion methods. Over the long term, the more you do, the more time you’ll save. When you have leads coming in to you on a regular basis, you won’t have to scramble for that next job. Promoting you lead magnet can help make that happen.

Featured Photo by Anete Lūsiņa on Unsplash