There are many lead sources on the internet. Many leads are generated by giving away something valuable in exchange for contact information. Many entrepreneurs and lead venders will use this technique to attempt to gain leads in mass. The obvious benefit of using this technique are the increased number of opt-ins when ones list. The downside to this however, is you lose some an amount of ‘targeting.’

Everyone knows that in order to build business you need a list of highly targeted prospects to market to. But on top of being targeted the prospect must also be actively ‘looking for what it is your offering. If your selling a product or service to a person who has no need for what it is your offering, but has shown interest to a free vacation promotion you may be running, it doesn’t really how targeted that lead may be.

Part of your online promotional efforts should be offering incentives that not only offer your prospects value, but also target them as a potential consumer for your particular product or service. Some business owners will use ebooks that passively promote their product or service while at the same time giving useful information. This is a particularly good idea, simply because the free product that is being offered also targets the list.

Digital offerings that target prospects is definitely the best way to do. The reasons are obvious:

1. Instant deliverability. 2. Fear of loss if the prospect passes on your offer 3. More incentive for giving you contact information versus a joining a simple newsletter.

The problem is everyone has a newsletter these days, and online marketers need to be able to offer a bit more then this benefit to convince todays consumers to opt into their mailing lists. The free offering you are utilizing must give the potential prospect value while at the same time letting you know that are actively in the buying market for your particular offering.

Buying incentive generated leads is almost entirely not worth it. Usually companies that generate these are extremely incentive heavy, meaning they don’t really care if the lead is highly targeted or not so long as the lead types in their contact information so they can in turn sell that contact. The only type of incentive lead that is worth is a lead in which you have generated and therefore know the overall quality.

By offering incentives you can easily boost the speed in which you generate an opt-in list. However, by utilizing incentives the wrong way in your online promotions you can also hurt yourself. Therefore care needs to be taken when considering this avenue of online promotion, and make certain that you are doing it the right way.