Build a lead engine that never stalls.

Trust is earned, and it’s why we B2B veterinary marketers always say “content is king”. But content had achieved royalty status for its ability to do more than earn trust, but also to fill every stage of the sales pipeline with leads.

In this blog, we’ll dive into ways to turn your content strategy into an inbound lead generation engine that’s firing on all cylinders. We’ll take an approach that works from the top of the funnel to the bottom, providing tactics to drive awareness, attract interest, and identify sales-ready leads.

Before we dive in, let’s get on the same page about what we mean when we say lead generation. This blog is all about converting new leads into your database. Therefore, all the content ideas we suggest in this blog are intended to be gated content, meaning the veterinary professional fills out a form to gain access to your content, thereby adding them to your database and sales pipeline. The forms don’t have to be long, but they do have to be there, otherwise, you’re giving high-value content away with no ability to contact and nurture those engaging with it.

This blog will not dive into post-conversion nurturing strategies. For a playbook on how to use marketing automation to nurture your leads through their buying journey, check out our blog, Mastering Email Sequences: A Guide for B2B Veterinary Marketers.

Top of Funnel: Easy, High-Level Education

Top-of-funnel leads are the easiest and least expensive leads to attract. Typically, the cost per lead for top-of-funnel leads ranges from $3 to $25, depending on the campaign content and channel strategy. The further down the funnel we progress, the more expensive the leads are. Ensure that you factor your target cost per lead into your marketing plans, based on the stage of the funnel where your lead generation content is targeted.

The goal content at this stage of the buyer’s journey is to make prospects aware that they have a problem and that you have a solution to solve it. Typically, content is concise and high-level, with your product or service presented as part of a comprehensive solution. Content that is educational and concise, rather than self-serving and in-depth, shines at the top of the funnel.

If you’ve already got a library of evergreen long-format content, great news! You can likely re-package the content you already have into shorter, bite-sized snippets that are appropriate for the top of the funnel. Keep this content hyper-focused on a single pain point and a quick solution to give the audience a transactional win that they can remember.

Must-Have Top of Funnel Content

• Checklists
  These short-form content pieces are quick to make, functional for veterinary teams to consume, and great for low-cost lead generation. Based on your product or service, consider whether any point-of-care tools beyond checklists could improve the efficiency of your target customer and keep your brand top of mind.
  
  
• Quizzes or Self-Assessments
  Double dip with quizzes: you’ll generate leads and you’ll get market intelligence from their answers that you can use to inform future campaigns, or that you can repackage into an infographic or short guide. Quizzes can also help sales identify leads that are ideal customers based on their responses. Make it easy for sales to prioritize these leads by including a question at the end that asks the participant whether they would like product information or a demonstration. Offer an incentive, such as a drawing for a gift card, to increase the volume of leads.
  
  
• Giveaways
  These can be challenging to plan, but highly productive when executed properly. Giveaways are commonly used at conferences to attract booth traffic (and badge scans). Many brands also utilize them outside of live events to keep the top of the funnel filled with fresh veterinary professionals. The key to an effective giveaway is to connect the giveaway item to the brand so that it facilitates a conversation about an industry pain point.

Channel Strategy

Of course, email remains a staple of B2B veterinary communication, but paid social is the unsung hero for top-of-funnel lead generation for modern marketers. Well-crafted social media ads can drive top-of-funnel leads for an incredibly low cost per lead (CPL). Social media offers an excellent opportunity to leverage video to push to a gated piece of content. If you’ve got video on the topic of your lead generation piece, then add it to the creative line-up for your paid social campaign. Experiment with both video and static images to optimize your ad outcomes.

Native advertising is also very effective at driving competitive CPL. Contact Clinician’s Brief today to learn about our native content options.

In-house emails and third-party emails to targeted customer profiles also shine at the top of the funnel. Clinician’s Brief can deploy email to very narrow audiences based on the people most likely to be interested in your top-of-funnel content.

Also, don’t forget to add this content to your blog, organic social, and on any other owned channels to keep the organic leads flowing long after you’ve finished actively promoting your top-of-funnel content.

Middle of Funnel: More Targeted Education to Address Pain Points

To target people with more purchase intent, we’ll need a slightly higher budget. Middle of funnel leads commonly cost $15-$30; again, the CPL is variable based on content and channel strategy. Very niche content with a small target audience will have a higher CPL than content that appeals to a broad audience.

If you are trying to reach a “needle in a haystack” kind of niche audience, contact the Clinician’s Brief team. With an immense amount of demographic and behavioral data, they can help you reach even the smallest ideal customer group.

Must-Have Middle of Funnel Content

• eBooks
  These eBooks differ from the top-of-funnel checklists in that they are more in-depth and delve further into product benefits. Again, these should still prioritize education over sales, but they take a deeper dive into the topics covered at the top of the funnel. eBooks offer an excellent opportunity to repurpose long-format webinars, expanding the reach of your highest-quality content. Often, marketers choose to make eBooks evergreen so they can be used repeatedly. Having a month where you are short on MQLs? Turn on a social media ad for an evergreen eBook and save the day!
  
  
• Self-serve ROI calculators
  ROI is the one thing every veterinarian wants to know, but they often don’t want to meet with a sales rep to learn about it. Depending on your product or service, consider implementing a self-serve ROI calculator. The final stage of the calculation involves providing their contact information to receive the ROI report via email. This enables you to add the prospect to your funnel and provides your sales representative with an insider's view of their hospital volume, helping to facilitate follow-up.
  
  
• Benchmarking or Industry Reports
  These can also sometimes work at the top of the funnel, depending on the report's content. These reports are typically based on research either conducted in-house or by a third party, or on proprietary data that your company has access to due to product utilization. These reports are often appealing to both prospects and customers.
  
  
• Live Event Promotions
  In the case of live events, giveaways or contests are a great way to drive booth traffic, and middle-of-funnel promotions are a great way to deepen interest. For example, booth visitors may earn additional prizes by participating in a booth presentation or taking a quiz.

Channel Strategy

Often, leads can enter the middle of the funnel without ever engaging with top-of-funnel lead generation content. Therefore, the same channels that are effective for top-of-funnel marketing can also work in the middle funnel: email, targeted advertising, paid social media, live events, and owned channels.

One key difference with middle-of-funnel content is that it should also be used to nurture and engage people who are already in your database at the top of the funnel. This content is crucial in increasing their knowledge and progressing them closer to being a sales-ready lead.

Bottom of Funnel: Deep-Dive Content for High Purchase Intent

Bottom-of-funnel leads are the highest-value leads, and, of course, the most expensive. Depending on your product or service, these leads may cost between $50 and $400. Inexpensive products with a short decision-making process are less costly, while capital equipment for complex products can cost several hundred dollars.

Ideally, these leads are being converted from your middle-of-funnel leads in your database to help control costs. Contact the Clinician’s Brief team to find out about their Handraiser Lead Generation program that can drive a mix of middle and bottom-of-funnel leads for a guaranteed CPL. Programs like this can help control lead cost and quality.

Must-Have Middle of Funnel Content

• Webinars
  Long-format webinars offer a treasure trove of content that can be repurposed to serve both top-of-funnel and middle-of-funnel needs. But they can also drive quality bottom-of-funnel interest. Prospects willing to part with an hour of their time are much more qualified than those who engage with a self-assessment quiz. They can also serve as on-demand evergreen content that can be used for long-term lead nurturing. Help your sales team prioritize the best leads by asking if the prospect would like product information or a demonstration on the registration form, and by including the webinar exit survey.
  
  
• Case Studies
  Both sales representatives and marketing teams can use these to generate leads. Consider also including relevant case studies in your evergreen ebooks and your email marketing strategy to translate your product into real-world results. These can also be translated into “convince the boss” pieces that members of the veterinary team can download to share with their managers, helping to make the case for adding your product or service to their lineup.
  
  
• Live Education
  This could be in the form of conference presentations, dinner meetings, hands-on labs, or other live educational events. These high-touch events provide prospects with the opportunity to meet face-to-face with your team and product, ultimately driving sales conversions.

Channel Strategy

Many of these bottom-of-funnel conversions will be driven by nurturing your own top and middle-of-funnel leads, typically via email. If you are hosting a live event, direct mail and outbound calling can also be effective ways to connect with people already in your sales funnel.

However, in some cases, leads skip the top and middle stages of the funnel and enter your database at the bottom of the funnel. A friend may have referred them, or they may have done their own research and begun with their first conversion at the bottom of the funnel content. For example, targeted third-party campaigns, such as webinars hosted by Clinician’s Brief, are a prime example of how a lead can skip the other stages of the buying journey.

Paid social can also be an effective channel to drive webinar registrations, and geotargeted ads can help fill seats for live educational events.

Build a Lead Engine That Never Stalls

Great content doesn’t just live at the top of the funnel—it fuels every stage of your marketing engine all the way to generating sales-qualified leads. From quick-hit checklists that capture attention to webinars that close the loop, each piece of content plays a crucial role in attracting, educating, and converting your next customer.

Brands that don’t take breaks from lead generation achieve sustainable growth and don’t put all hope on one breakout campaign. Instead, they’re building a lead generation system that connects every download, webinar registration, and event interaction as part of a complete buyer’s journey.

If your goal is to reach more engaged veterinary professionals with lead-generating content that performs, partner with Clinician’s Brief to put your message in front of the right audience at every stage of the funnel. Contact us today to discuss our comprehensive family of lead generation programs, including lead guarantees.