Luxury Brands Lead Generation Tactics/Best Practices With Successful Case Studies

Table of Contents

Some of the best lead generation tactics for 2021 include, using Facebook ads, negative keywords, targeting audiences based on user income level and merging in-store and online experiences. A deeper dive into these findings has been outlined in this high level overview report, along with successful case studies that you can learn from to take your business to the next level.

Popular Tools For Lead Generation

i) Social Media

Consumers of luxury goods and services are becoming more active online, especially through the use of mobile and tablet devices. At the same time, as the digital age progresses, traditional forms of advertising such as print marketing and large format adverts are becoming more prohibitive and expensive, while offering significantly reduced return on investment. Luxury brands are adapting to these changes, and finding new ways to engage their target audience through digital channels. Social media has become a critical component of contemporary digital interaction.
Visual content is a powerful way to gain the attention of and engage target audiences. Aesthetically pleasing and eye-catching powerful visuals can help luxury, high fashion brands (for example) present their clothes to their target market in a way that promotes ‘aspiration’ emotions.Through the use of compelling visual material, target audiences will feel compelled to connect with, support, and spend money on a business.
Several social media visual platforms are perfect for luxury brand content distribution for lead generation, with Pinterest and Instagram being two of the best examples.
Pinterest is a photo-sharing and social networking site. Some of the most “pinned” companies on Pinterest include high-end luxury labels like Chanel. According to figures provided by Pinterest in 2018, 57% of millennials in the United States use the site, and more than a quarter of users had a household income of $150,000 or more. These numbers are growing, and Pinterest is quickly becoming a go-to platform for luxury companies looking to connect with high-end, millennial customers.

Pinterest offers a feature called ‘pins’ that may be improved for lead generating reasons. Brands can design an interesting Pinterest board that entices their target audience to discover and follow them. Following that, by creating Pinterest posts that ‘grab the eye’ while emphasizing the brand’s exclusivity and luxury aesthetic, including URLs in each pin, and directing potential customers to a lead generation-optimized landing page, luxury brands can leverage Pinterest to drive targeted and direct customer engagement and an enhanced customer experience.
Another visual channel that works well for luxury companies is Instagram. The platform has experienced rapid development in recent years, with over 1 billion monthly active users and over 500 million daily active users. Instagram is not only a platform for sharing pictures; it is also an incredibly effective tool for lead generation. Luxury companies the world over utilize Instagram to connect with their target audience by generating images that elicit “aspirational” feelings in the viewer. While these visually stunning posts will entice visitors, Instagram also provides a mechanism for converting those views into qualified leads.

Instagram offers lead generation advertisements that are intended particularly for the purpose of acquiring leads via the site. They are intended to aid businesses with gathering prospective clients’ contact information. Additionally, Instagram allows businesses to put a powerful call to action button to their profiles. This guarantees that audiences may quickly obtain contact information for businesses or suppliers. Additionally, Instagram influencers are rapidly being viewed as the new “celebrities,” and if an influencer has a strong love for a brand, companies can increasingly collaborate with them on promotional efforts. Influencer marketing, particularly for premium companies, may be more powerful than a broad media campaign.

ii) Facebook Ads

Facebook is a goldmine of personal information, and Facebook Ads is one of the most efficient types of internet advertising, owing to the extensive segmentation and targeting options available. Advertising may be targeted to hundreds of distinct demographic groups, and Facebook enables the targeting of extremely niche audiences.
Facebook advertising is a cost-efficient method of reaching a highly focused audience, and for those operating in premium neighborhoods targeting high-net-worth buyers and sellers, Facebook advertisements may be an excellent tool for attracting and converting new listings. Advertisements are distributed via Facebook’s audience network, and the technology displays advertisements to targeted leads on Facebook as well as on hundreds of popular applications and websites (Instagram, Spotify, WhatsApp, and more).
Advertisers may use the audience network’s targeting capabilities to narrow down ideal leads based on their geography, interests, age, money, homeowner status, and lifestyle. For instance, it is possible to target advertisements especially at singles/couples/etc. who fall within a given age bracket and have previously engaged with certain high-end goods (liked, checked into stores, posted content etc.). Additionally, audiences can be targeted based on their work title and lifestyle preferences, such as the type of music they listen to.

iii) Google for Luxury Brand Sales Lead Generation

Luxury brands are well-known, and successful marketing strategies should always involve having a strong and visible presence on search engines, specifically google. Google controls 92 percent of the search engine industry and had 62.2 billion visits between January and April 2020 alone, with the platform accounting for 46 percent of all product searches. Google is linked with the internet, making it an effective tool for generating sales leads for luxury companies.
Google can be used as a tool for luxury brands to generate sales leads via pay-per-click (PPC) advertising. This offers a way to direct visitors searching for a specific brand, product or service to a website or landing page. Marketers bid on the placement of an advertisement in a search engine’s specified sponsored link section, which is subsequently displayed when a relevant search is conducted or relevant search keywords are used. PPC advertisements are generated with Google Adwords, a marketing and advertising technology built only for and by Google for use inside its own portfolio of advertising choices.

iv) Bing

While Bing does not have the same level of traffic as Google, a recently published list of the top five strategies for advertising luxury brands suggested advertising on Bing as having several benefits.
The main reason for this is that Bing’s user base contains a significantly different demographic to that of google. Google’s wide market appeal makes targeting different segments on the platform rather complex. In addition to this, more people search Bing from their PCs, particularly from work computers, and therefore it follows that these users make up more of a white collar professional demographic, for which Bing has a strong reach into. Overall, Bing’s audience is slightly more mature (average age 45 vs. average age 38 in the United States), more educated (50 percent have a college degree, and 17% have an advanced degree), and more affluent (one-third have a household income over $100,000, and the average Bing searcher spends 35% more online than the average Google searcher. Additionally, they are more likely to be married and have children at home.

In addition to this, Bing also allows marketers to reach around approximately 59 million people who aren’t reached on google, and in general terms Bing’s advertising services are cheaper (per click). These factors all make Bing a very useful and effective tool for luxury brands and those promoting luxury goods to generate leads.

v) Email

Despite recent and frequent speculations that email as a marketing tool is declining within the digital space, recent reports and studies suggest otherwise. Indeed, the Direct Marketing association recently concluded that email marketing provides a 122% ROI, significantly higher than paid search (25%) and social media (28%). The highly targeted nature of email lists and relatively low costs are some other benefits of email marketing for luxury brands.
For luxury brands and sellers of luxury goods, The fact that their goods and services do not appeal to a wide audience is a significant challenge. There is therefore a need to focus on a target group who have the means to afford the extravagance and status they and their products provide. Email marketing is one of the most successful methods for luxury businesses to acquire new consumers and drive repeat purchases from existing ones in these circumstances.

vi) Website and Online Presence

Luxury businesses must invest in intuitive and well-designed websites from a user experience standpoint. One of the most effective strategies for increasing traffic and engagement is to offer highly visual and aspirational content that appeals to an innate desire to demonstrate riches and status. This is critical since one of the major reasons people purchase luxury items is to demonstrate their status, and companies can capitalize on this by developing and distributing content that, when shared or spread by word of mouth, demonstrates the characteristics that individuals wish others see in them.
Creating a sense of exclusivity online is of significant benefit to those promoting luxury goods and services. Exclusivity is a critical component of luxury branding because it sustains customer demand via scarcity and uniqueness. Luxury items risk losing their appeal if they become too common, especially to those who wish to own something that others can’t get or don’t have access to. Websites can be used as tools to provide wider distribution of content that evokes the desire to buy luxury products and exclusivity can be created online through such tools as private member groups, concierge services, or digitally-delivered loyalty benefits that are specifically tailored for and reserved for previous customers and those who show interest.

Best Practices For Lead Generation

i) Using Facebook Ads to Solve Challenges Luxury Real Estate Agents Face

The cost of reaching affluent audiences is often higher, due to increased competition and reduced numbers of individuals who qualify. For these reasons, generic lead generation formats don’t typically perform well. A common practice to mitigate against this is to have a clear, compelling value proposition, demonstrating specifically ‘why’ potential customers should click on an ad.
Online marketing experts Luxvt recently published an article detailing strategies for how luxury real estate agents can leverage Facebook ads with the specific goal of capturing luxury seller leads. With the primary difficulty being that the more expensive the listing, the more difficult and costly it is to generate a lead, Luxvt has developed a set of proven and established techniques that assist optimize outcomes while minimizing expense.
The so-called ‘winning tactic’ is a ‘Just Sold!’ promotional message, which lets potential sellers know of the value of recently sold similar properties, and then engages potential sellers in dialect about the value of their property. For instance, a promotional advertisement with the phrase “I recently sold your neighbor’s house for $1.6 Million – what is YOUR property worth now?” is a particularly effective strategy since it avoids the use of endless, anonymous home valuation offers and personalizes the information. Additionally, it serves as a brand builder by reiterating reputations for completing sales and finishing agreements.
In terms of creative content, it has been proven that a simple single image along with a form or landing page works best. In the example above, all that is necessary is a basic image AD overlayed with the aforementioned text and a photograph of the sold property. Facebook does feature a built-in lead capture form, but customized landing pages with multi-step forms have also proved very successful in recruiting sellers into the marketing funnel.

ii) Negative Keywords Strategy

Negative keywords prevent ads from showing to people that are less valuable or less interested in the offer, even though their queries may be related to the keywords in the campaign. Negative keywords are critical components of a well-rounded keyword strategy since they enhance profitability, return on investment, and provide marketers greater control over the flow of visitors into the marketing funnel.
Terms among the queries which do not fit with the business model, or negative keywords suggested in the course of planning are excluded from viewing the ads. For example, in the case of luxury brands or goods, audiences using words like “cheap” and “free” in their search queries will be excluded.
There are several available software options for automating and streamlining the process of defining and using negative keywords. Once process allows luxury brands to define a set of keywords in an external file, upload these in bulk, and apply them to multiple campaigns.

iii) Targeting Audiences Based On User Income Level

Income based Geo targeting. Allows the specific targeting of audiences based on their income. The underlying data is derived from publicly accessible data from the United States Internal Revenue Service (IRS), allowing advertisers to target certain geographical locations based on the average household income of that area.
Social media marketing experts identify different criteria to find audiences with high income on Facebook. Methods include targeting the latest smartphone users (Facebook can identify from which device and manufacturer a user enters into a social network, and therefore facilitates the ability to target users of particular, or more exclusive brands of device, which may indicate affluence), regular travelers (Facebook tracks GPS-location and IPS-address data, as well as ‘check-ins’ where users update their status with the location of an event or destination. Frequency and types of destinations can both be used as indicators of affluence), professionals (such as small business owners, or those working within particular industries), residents of affluent housing communities, engaged shoppers (those who have shown previous interest in luxury items), previous buyers, and luxury fans (users who have liked, posted about or engaged with luxury brands).

iv) Merging In-Store and Online Experiences

As technology and the digital age advance, this opens up opportunities for the different online vs offline customer experiences to become more integrated. Luxury brands are finding new ways to link and engage with customers via both channels.
Burberry is an excellent example of a premium company that has embraced this technique and successfully integrated the in-store and online shopping experiences. By often promoting their brands online and luring luxury consumers into their stores, they exploit digital interaction potential by encouraging customers to snap pictures, post content, watch live broadcasts, and use in-store technology.

Luxury lifestyle brand Shinola is also pursuing a similar strategy, using technology to connect online with offline channels and creating a ‘singular’ customer experience. The goal is to help ensure that potential customers ‘never have to start over,’ by establishing processes that allow customers who visit a physical store to browse again at a later date, either online or offline, and the website or in-store staff will ‘already know who they are’ and what products they are interested in.

Case Studies Of Successful Lead Generation Tactics/Strategies/Practices

i) Luxury Real Estate

Cynthia Froid’s two-person team sold $49 million worth of premium urban lofts and condominiums in the downtown Minneapolis region in 2019. This enormous success was credited to a comprehensive marketing strategy which covered repeat-and-referral clients which make up 70% of the business, but also considered ways to attract new customers. To attract new business, the company leased a storefront location in the historic Mill District, which receives a high volume of foot traffic from neighboring offices, restaurants, stores, museums, and residences. The storefront works in gaining the attention of potential customers 24 hours a day, providing the information which makes it very easy for potential customers to find, interact and do business with Cynthia Froid. As an indication of the added value the prime location brings, sales of up to $2.5 million have previously been generated through people walking into and visiting the storefront. Additionally, Cynthia Froid is very deliberate about cultivating the area surrounding their offices, concentrating on 30 adjacent buildings and engaging tenants via direct mail. To maintain relevance with their target audience and referral base, Cynthia Froid sends monthly personalized mailings to each building with statistics on sales, the average number of days on the market, and comparisons to prior periods. Cynthia Froid sends a Saturday email with data to a handpicked list of around 1,500 individuals who have signed in to receive the messages. This email is extremely useful and serves two purposes: it provides local value to their most engaged audience and acts as a reminder to sellers. The sequence is consistent each week, with a segment on ‘coming soon’ listings, price reductions, current listings, pending sales, and a neighborhood feature showcasing a local company or neighborhood event. Additionally, the storefront appears beside Cynthia Froid’s contact information, and informs clients that listings must be signed by Wednesday (for example) in order to be included in our famous Saturday newsletter.
Spinelli Residential Group’s CRM approach involves database management which distinguishes between the top 20% and the remaining customer base. The top 20% includes not just the price of the homes they purchased, but length of time spent in the homes and referral information. The team maintains touch with this database using a drip campaign. For both audiences, the communications technology remains identical; only the messaging varies. Spinelli invested a great deal of time and attention in developing connections in a personal and consultative manner, focusing on the relationship’s depth rather than its size. Through customized contacts and talks with her luxury customers, she wins a “seat at the table” alongside their financial planner, attorney, stock broker, and other partners to create a strategy that supports their ambitions and goals.
Kapital Brothers conduct approximately 60%-70% of their real estate business in the luxury space. During the COVID-19 epidemic, the corporation sustained immediate losses of around $10 million due to lost contracts and lender failures. They were however able to quickly realign daily practices and working in partnership with KW MAPS Coaches to revise the strategy from transactional to relational oversaw a surprisingly simple and natural shift in lead generation. Using a core database of 3,000 contacts and eschewing real estate communication, the business simply asked individuals how they were doing and connected with consumers and potential customers in a more relaxed manner. No priority was given to certain customer groups, and they contacted each other daily. Three “new and improved” lead sources emerged: wealth managers, attorneys, and former and present clients. The new ties aided the firm in mitigating the pandemic’s impact, and they began having actual talks about how their clients were doing. They were able to get more listings as a result of this feedback, and began communicating the impact of COVID-19 on their businesses with wealth managers and other executives across different sectors. This resulted in the strengthening of current relationships and the formation of new ones. Behind the scenes, trust built, and the business went on to market $8 million in real estate with clients with whom they had spoken just once or twice in the previous three months.

ii) Facebook Ads For Luxury Real Estate – Lead Generation, Developing Custom Audiences, and Selling Lifestyle Instead of Property

2020 saw many industries presented with business hurdles and new challenges not previously seen in modern times. Real estate experienced the full force of this, with lock downs curtailing the usually productive spring season, and few open houses and active buyers. Facebook Ad campaigns at the peak of the pandemic were at first deemed ill-timed, but a significant problem was convincing tepid buyers that homes were available, deals were being made, and conditions were ideal to purchase. After extensive market research in Toronto, the answer was decided to be a targeted Facebook Ad campaign with a simple bullet point list highlighting the several benefits of owning a property in the present climate. The list contained only three key points: details about historically low interest rates, decreased buyer competition, and indications that the market may quickly recover, all of which contributed to the very real notion that the second quarter of 2020 was the time to buy a new home before the market recovered from the downturn. The campaign had a potential reach of 45,000 Facebook users, mainly young high income tech, business and finance professionals. The result saw significantly increased impressions and clicks, and resulted in 114 Facebook leads, a cost per lead of $9.21.

Facebook targeting restrictions hit the luxury real estate market particularly hard. Selective, high-end buyers most often know exactly what they want and are willing to wait for it. They also appreciate advertising and content that is directly pointed towards their wants and needs. The challenge when dealing in hyper-specific properties which appeal to wealthy individuals looking to purchase a second home, is attempting to market to and engage this hyper-specific group, and working within the confines of restrictive advertising policies. A solution was devised by way of a two-pronged approach. Phase one necessitated identifying the right audience, without the usual assistance from Facebook’s demographic database. Instead of targeting ads towards the client’s desired demographic, a specific piece of content was advertised. A blog post with tips on buying in the specific location triggered certain interests among readers. It provided confidence that those who click the link were most likely the high-quality leads the client was after. Drawing individuals into a marketing funnel through the blog posts aided in identifying and narrowing the qualified leads. In phase two of the campaign, the affluent audience the client was seeking (those who clicked the blog post) were re-targeted with lead generations that detailed a property for sale. In addition, the demographic information provided by those who clicked the blog link in phase one allowed the client to craft a broader lookalike audience. With that data in hand, the target audience grew, increasing the number of potential leads without using additional resources. Over the five-week campaign, 15 Facebook leads were generated at a cost per lead of $15.66. Beyond those leads, the client was able to verify the core demographics of their target audience and expand the scope of the custom audience the original blog post created.

Facebook’s targeting limits have been particularly detrimental to the premium real estate sector. Selective, high-end customers frequently have a clear idea of what they want and are prepared to wait for it. Additionally, they value advertising and material that is targeted precisely to their desires and needs. When dealing with hyper-specific homes that appeal to rich individuals wanting to acquire a second home, the issue is marketing to and engaging this highly targeted demographic while adhering to restricted advertising regulations. A two-pronged method was designed. Phase one required finding the appropriate audience without relying on Facebook’s demographic statistics. Rather than advertising to the client’s intended demographic, a single piece of content was promoted. A blog article with shopping advice for a specific region piqued readers’ curiosity. It instilled trust in the client that individuals who clicked the link were most likely the high-quality leads he sought. By funneling consumers into a marketing funnel via blog articles, we were able to identify and restrict the qualifying prospects. In phase two of the campaign, the client’s desired wealthy demographic (those who clicked on the blog article) was re-targeted with lead generation campaigns highlighting a home for sale. Additionally, the demographic data gathered from individuals who clicked on the blog link in phase one enabled the client to create a more diverse lookalike audience. With that data in hand, the target audience expanded, resulting in an increase in prospective leads without the need for extra resources. Over the course of the five-week campaign, 15 Facebook leads were created at a cost of $15.66 per lead. Apart from those leads, the client was able to validate the target audience’s key demographics and broaden the reach of the bespoke audience generated by the initial blog post. Source for Kauai Listing Facebook’s advertising limitations were designed to stymie another real estate advertising effort, this time in the wealthy Cameldale Estates neighborhood in Paradise Valley, Arizona. When marketing a specific piece of real estate on Facebook, the option to target an audience’s interests was removed. The limitation substantially restricts their ability to promote a property’s qualities on their platform, posing a considerable barrier, particularly in high-end luxury real estate. The approach includes a campaign divided into two phases; the first phase focused on educating the client’s desired, wealthy demographic about the excellent level of life available at Cameldale Estates. This strategy enabled the campaign to leverage Facebook’s enormous demographic database without breaking the social network’s new advertising guidelines. Due to the campaign’s focus on the neighborhood as a whole rather than on any one property, the potential audience was fairly large. It had a 100,000-person reach and targeted residents of affluent neighborhoods and high-income ZIP codes, as well as those with interests in luxury real estate, as well as the professions and job titles of high-net-worth individuals and those who owned several houses. The individual was funneled through the marketing funnel after clicking the ad in step one. Here, that particular demographic was targeted with advertisements that not only promoted Cameldale Estate’s premium lifestyle, but also gave information about the community’s available homes. Finally, by emphasizing the community’s lifestyle elements in phase one advertising, the campaign was able to separate serious, high-value purchasers from indifferent spectators without breaking any fair housing rules or Facebook regulations.

iii) Luxury Wine Brands Focus on Authenticity and Prestige

Luxury brands have spent significant amounts of time ‘cultivating the perfect mix’ of authenticity and prestige to remain both relevant and successful in increasingly competitive times. Generally, it is believed that luxury wineries are a good example of brands being able to exhibit these two characteristics, and that can provide lessons which other high-end brands must seek to fulfill, at least to some extent. A case study of Château d’Yquem demonstrates how winemakers have established a benchmark for authenticity, while a case study of Veuve Clicquot demonstrates how champagne companies have established a comparable bar for status.
It has been highlighted that contemporary causes such as increased insecurity, increasingly open societies, a perceived increase in corporate manipulation and deception, and the professionalization of the luxury sector all contribute to the decline in authenticity. Additionally, the growing significance of authenticity to consumers in industrialized countries, along with a desire to avoid excessive commercialization, as well as a search for meaning and experiences that feel more real, are all important problems for marketing academics. As a result, ensuring authenticity is a significant problem for premium companies. Luxury winemakers are able to leverage this desire for pure authenticity, as indeed their very existence is usually determined by long established wine estates, buildings, barrels, tools, practices and methods which have been in use for extended periods of time. This helps with a feeling of pure authenticity which appeals to high-end and high value customers. Indeed, when confronted with new rivals and a changing market, established wineries sometimes lay a greater focus on their centuries-old traditions, longevity, and established reputation in order to differentiate themselves from competitors. Château d’Yquem is one of the most renowned vineyards in the world and is a model for a premium wine brand.
The term “prestige” refers to the “widespread respect and adoration felt for someone or something as a result of their perceived accomplishments or excellence.” Prestige is inextricably linked to status, which is a term that relates to one’s “social standing” or relative place within the social order. Numerous factors impact how individuals perceive status, including their career, money, wealth, education, and lifestyle. Throughout history, humans have been motivated to pursue status since talent and information transmission among social groupings aided survival. Admiration and regard for a prominent personality boost one’s desire to please that individual. As a result, renowned persons benefit from a slew of societal benefits. Naturally, this notion of prestige can be applied to products, and some scholars have demonstrated that products can be split into three distinct types of value: use value, exchange value and prestige value. The prestige value “expresses a product’s potential to enhance a person’s prestige.” Prestige is critical for luxury companies, as the core of luxury is better quality and social status. Prestige appears to pay dividends, as research indicates a favorable correlation between a premium brand’s perceived prestige and its gross profit margin. Champagne brands serve as excellent prestige standards due to their legacy in generating status. Mot & Chandon and Veuve Clicquot are excellent examples of how a brand may develop a sense of prestige by conveying higher quality and accomplishments, therefore suggesting that it belongs to a superior class. Champagne companies such as Veuve Clicquot employ a variety of strategies for establishing their renown. They consistently represent the high class lifestyle and elegance in their brand messages. Packaging is a significant communication tool, and in this case, it adds significant value. For instance, Veuve Clicquot’s yellow badge-shaped labels are instantly recognizable. The firm has developed a symbol for its hue and connected it with high-class components throughout time. Co-branding with someone or something with status is another way to boost prestige. For instance, Veuve Clicquot collaborated with Riva to develop the 86’Domino yacht. They invited Riva owners, celebrities, and select media to the yacht’s introduction, which took place amid a whirlwind of parties, dinners, and sailing excursions. A comparable tactic entails affiliation with prominent organizations like Comité Colbert, the French luxury group to which Veuve Clicquot belongs. Finally, delivering exclusive experiences lends reputation to the business. Veuve Clicquot delivers brand experience in a variety of ways, including sponsorship of bars in upscale department stores (for example, Harrods in London or KaDeWe in Berlin), hotels, and cruise ships. Additionally, Veuve Clicquot produces and supports socially elite international events on a monthly basis, including the annual Veuve Clicquot Manhattan Polo Classic, one of New York’s most exclusive events. Although only a select few customers may partake in these events firsthand, a brand’s participation fosters a sense of grandeur that generates adoration and respect. Prestige is particularly significant in social settings, making it a significant consideration when customers purchase for gifts. Champagne businesses cultivate status by creating symbolic items that serve as class identifiers. As a result, buyers may create a favorable impression on others by bringing a bottle of Veuve Clicquot to a party or gifting one.