Generating marketing leads can sometimes feel like chasing tennis balls. And if you're part of a small marketing team, you'll want to to avoid running in different directions to chase down those leads, and instead identify the best ways to reach your target audience.

Here are 5 tips that will help your marketing team run in the same direction, and connect with customers more effectively to score big results for your brand:

1. Take advantage of Google Analytics

Website optimization is a priority for every marketer. That’s why it’s important to make Google Analytics a starting place. When using Google Analytics, don't miss these few (free) reports that top the list for fixing traffic problems:

• Identify test opportunities with a path report. A path report shows the route your visitors take on your website before they convert, including which path yields the highest conversion rate. Is it “Homepage > product page > trial” or “Homepage > pricing > trial”? Pay attention to how each path performs and use tests to experiment how to boost conversion rates.

• Learn how each marketing channel drives conversions with a basic channel report. Are your social ads driving revenue? How is SEM performing against SEO? You can adjust your investments and budgets based on the returns of your best performing channels.

• Identify bottlenecks with a funnel report. A funnel report can show you where conversions are dropping off. Is most of your traffic going from "Homepage > Lead Form" but then exiting the site altogether? Maybe your Lead Form has too many fields or the content isn't relevant to your visits. Use these insights to make small changes to help your customers connect.

• See how segments perform overtime with a cohort report. This report looks at how segments behave over time and which converts at the highest rate. For instance, a cohort report might reveal that users are more likely to convert if they have been retargeted within 15 minutes of leaving a site. This report can help inform the best way to stay in touch with your leads.

2. Set up event tracking

Add tracking to each key event you want to measure with Google Analytics, or another analytics tool. But start simple. Think about the actions that lead to a conversion, such as video views, 800-number calls, or a trial button.

Most people don’t know this, but if you're a Google Analytics user, you can set up a free consultation with a specialist to help set up all your event tracking. This step can get a little technical but it’s absolutely a step you cannot skip. Why? It’s proven to be an effective way to use data to make meaningful optimizations down the road, helping to prove your website’s value in driving leads and revenue from an event.

3. Sync sales and marketing data using a marketing automation platform

What’s the main goal for marketers? Simply put, you need to know your customer. All that data is in your CRM. Having access to it gives the marketing team the information needed to create relevant and engaging campaigns. With the systems tied together, you can put the customer’s needs first, providing marketing messages that are relevant and help nurture leads.

It's vital for any company that all customer data and tracking gets to sales! Research shows that when companies align sales and marketing data, they typically see an increase in leads who convert. What does that look like in real life? By automating data collection and sharing, sales reps are more informed and better equiped to present solutions that make sense. How many times have you received a sales call about a product you have zero interest in? Problem solved.

4. Use nurture email campaigns to drive conversions

We’ve all been there before: we write the perfect email and then, crickets because your customer has deleted it. How can you avoid that in the future? Use a combination of technology and technique:

• Build email campaigns triggered off behavioral and intent actions. Are most people dropping off from a page on your website? Did someone get stuck in a trial? What triggered their first-time purchase?

• Talk to Sales and Product about identifying high-converting actions

• Finally, build your nurture email to drive the converting actions that you've identified

The anatomy of a good email is not just good copy. You need to couple copy with data, including: search history, trial experience, personal and company information. This will ensure your emails are more personalized. Would you rather get an abandoned cart email offering you a discount or would you rather get a generic promotional email with product recommendations that you don’t care about? Relevancy will improve your open rates, click rate, and ultimately, conversions.

5. Make SEO your best friend

Believe it or not, using the right words is the key difference between gaining or losing organic daily traffic.

The internal way you might speak about a product is most likely not the same as the words and phrases millions of people use to search for business topics every day. Prospects might be searching for “customer service tools” vs. the industry term “help desk solution.” By using keyword research, you’ll be able to understand all the varieties that your prospects are using to get to your website (or your competitors).

The best part? Determining the right SEO search terms doesn’t have to be costly. Diagnostic tools like Moz and SEMrush are free. Use these tips see big changes in your traffic:

• Increase your domain authority (Google’s grading system on how well your site ranks). Jot down what your domain authority is before making SEO optimization and use it as your baseline. Check your domain authority again in 3-6 months. The score should have gone up and you should see your optimizations come to fruition. Benchmark this score against your competitors too.

• Boost your domain authority with on-page optimization. This includes a number of housekeeping items like adding keywords in title tags and meta descriptions, creating an intuitive site structure, having an easy navigation bar, and asking other sites to link back to yours whenever it's relevant.

• Test your site. Google honors sites that are mobile optimized and load quickly. Use this tool for to test how your site performs: https://testmysite.thinkwithgoogle.com/intl/en-us

• Make your content readable. That means using "intuitive navigation," such as a footer that categorizes your content.

Make sure your small marketing team is using these optimizations to boost rankings, help you drive leads, and most of all, connect with your customers in a much more effective way. Remember, you don't have to be a big team to achieve big results! 

Click here learn more about how Salesforce Pardot can help you can increase leads, receive more email engagement, and track ROI.

Salesforce can help you find more customers, win their business, and keep them happy so you can grow your business faster than ever. Learn more about our small business CRM solutions or follow us on Twitter @SalesforceSMB and on LinkedIn at Salesforce for Small Business. Join the conversation with #SalesforceEssentials.