SEO has the biggest impact on lead generation

SEO has been again appeared as the most important way to generate leads. The survey was conducted by Webmarketing123, a California-based online marketing agency.

The company surveyed more than 500 U.S. online marketers in August and September.

The results show that while lead generation and sales are the top two most important objectives of digital marketing, SEO makes the biggest impact on lead generation across the board.

Summary from the Report Generating Leads has been selected as the most important objective behind digital marketing programs – by 46.4% of the total B2B companies participated. Whereas For B2C companies, 39.9% opted for generating sales as the most important objective) Website traffic has been selected unbiased as the leading measuring tool for success in digital marketing program. 57% of B2B marketers and 41% of B2C marketers credit SEO as their primary source for generating leads to their business; followed by PPC and Social Media respectively. No one surprised when Facebook emerged as the Number 1 choice for the social media across all the participants. But amazingly the number goes to 73% when it comes to lead generation using Facebook by B2C marketers. As expected, B2B marketers invest one-third of their digital budgets on SEO activities, while B2C marketers invest mostly in PPC. The most important of all, the report reveals an interesting trend that marketers in both the categories are planning to increase their budget in 2012 with Social Media.

Other facts to know

- More companies likely to outsource PPC than SEO

- 84.8% keep social media marketing in-house

- Website traffic is the primary way they measure the success of online marketing efforts.

Source - http://go.webmarketing123.com/seland-state-of-digital-marketing-report.html