Lead Lists: Is It Worth Buying? Cost-Benefit Analysis and More

In a scenario where 68% of companies are struggling with lead generation, it does make sense to consider lead lists, but that doesn’t mean this practice isn’t risky – or even effective.

This strategy, although it may seem easy, can bring some problems to your company, often hindering more than helping.

Therefore, it’s time to explore this subject, finally uncover whether it’s worth buying lead lists or not and what its real cost-benefit is.

But before we delve into this strategy, let’s talk a little about lead generation, I assure you it will further enhance your understanding.

Let’s go!

We’ve talked a lot about lead generation before…

It’s impossible to talk about lead lists without addressing sales lead generation and all the concepts that encompass it.

So, let’s explore here what those famous leads are, what the definition of lead generation is, and its lists.

Let’s go!

What is a lead?

In the marketing and sales area, a lead is a potential consumer who has already provided personal and contact information to a company.

A user becomes a lead every time they access a blog, website, landing page, or another communication channel, fill out a contact form, providing data such as name, email, and phone number. From this point, your sales team is activated and already receives information about this newly converted lead.

But it doesn’t stop there, within the subject, we have qualified leads, which are nothing more than users with all the characteristics of a potential customer of the company, who already show interest and are a match for your business.

What is lead generation?

If leads are potential customers, we can define lead generation as the strategy developed by companies to capture these contacts.

Lead generation can be done in various ways, including:

• Inbound marketing;
• Active prospecting;
• Ads – paid traffic;
• Conversational Marketing;
• Events;
• Partnerships;
• SEO – organic traffic, such as with a blog.

What is a lead list?

I mentioned some ways to capture leads above, right? But then let’s understand what a lead list is.

Lead lists are spreadsheets with thousands of contacts of real users, which can have been captured either by other companies or organically by yours.

In this format, the information on the lists is established according to the company’s needs, determined by qualification questions, such as:

• Geographical qualification – e.g., Where do you live?
• Personal qualification – e.g., What is your job title?
• Commercial qualification – e.g., Which of our products do you know?
• Time and money – e.g., How urgent is your hiring need?
• Decision-makers – e.g., What are your key success metrics?

Okay, so far it seems like a good method, right?

However, if the lead list is bought, this can lead to random user contacts, who often don’t even know their data was collected.

But what is Lead Buying then?

Lead buying is a quick, easy, and cheap method to acquire contacts of potential customers and then forward them to sales approaches.

You must be wondering how this relates to lead lists, right?

Well, lead lists aren’t just floating around on the internet; there are companies that sell them. In other words, by using this strategy, you’ll be buying your leads instead of organically capturing them.

Although this offer may be tempting, you should pay attention to what you’re really investing in and what its advantages and disadvantages are.

First of all, think:

Are you sure you know what you’re buying?

Imagine the following scenario: a paid advertisement appears to you with the headline “Lead list with over 1,000 contacts for prospecting.” It seems tempting, doesn’t it?

But how can there be such a simple and cheap solution for such a competitive scenario, as we saw at the beginning of the article?

That’s where you should be suspicious and ask yourself:

• What is the quality of these leads?
• What contact information will be available?
• What will be required after acquiring the list?
• How many of them will result in sales?

Remember the popular saying: “There’s no such thing as a free lunch.”

To avoid problems, you need to first define what your ideal lead is, think about their characteristics, demographics, and what qualifications will be necessary.

In summary, the lead should fit into your Ideal Customer Profile (ICP); I can assure you that very few of the right leads will come in this highly anticipated gold list.

Advantages and Disadvantages of Buying a Lead List

Now that we know a little more about lead lists and the entire process involved, let’s discuss the positives and negatives.

Advantages

• Saves work and time – you won’t need to chase leads or attract more traffic to your website, blog, or LP; the lead list will provide the data in your hands.

• Low cost – in most cases, lead lists are inexpensive. However, pay attention to factors that compose the total price for you, such as lead cost, conversion rate to sales, average ticket, and operational cost, etc.

Disadvantages

• Not qualified leads – leads from lists are random; it’s highly likely they won’t even come close to needing what your business offers.

• Leads are not exclusive – lead lists are available on the market for anyone interested, so you won’t be the only one contacting the users on that spreadsheet.

• Your email becomes spam – remember that first contact email? It will turn into spam because the lead has no idea how you got their contact.

• Many emails don’t even exist – the emails on these lead lists can be fake, invented just to grab your attention.

• Serious companies don’t deal with this – there are no reputable companies that use lead lists because they know the return is low and there can be losses.

What’s the best way to get leads on the internet, then?

We’ve mentioned some strategies here for lead generation, from organic methods to paid traffic.

But there are other strategies that can increase your lead generation. You’ll need the help of a tool, lead generators, as we mentioned earlier.

Among some of them, we can mention:

• Chatbots, like Leadster and Intercom;
• WhatsApp Button like Leadster and RD Station;
• Landing Page builders, like Unbounce and Instapage;
• Pop-up creators, like OptinMonster and Potp.in;
• Ad platforms, like Facebook Ads and Google Ads;
• Active Prospecting tools, like LinkedIn Sales Navigator and Ramper.

However, let’s delve further into a quick, easy, and very effective strategy that can triple your website’s lead generation.

Let’s get to it!

How to Create a Lead List Legally and Authentically in 5 Simple Steps

It’s quite simple, actually, just rely on Leadster!

The conversational marketing platform offers you a marketing and sales chatbot that, through personalized approaches, will grab users’ attention and start a conversation actively, collecting data legally.

To do this, you can simply implement a free chatbot with Leadster. Here’s the step-by-step:

• Start your free demo – access Leadster’s website and click “SEE DEMO”. Then quickly create your account;

• Set up your account – define your goal, your company’s segment, choose your virtual assistant’s characteristics, create a personalized call, and preview the demo on your site;

• Finish your first flow – go to “Manage Flows”. Define on which pages the chatbot will be displayed, build your question flow, set lead qualification criteria, distribute leads to the right channels, and integrate other platforms;

• Activate Leadster on your site – activate your chat via plugin on already configured platforms (like WordPress) or via code;

The rest is up to Leadster! Let’s get started? You can create your first chatbot today, free of charge and no credit card required.

Thanks for reading and until next time!