UK Lead Generation Podcast

James Dooley:
If you are an AV hire company looking for a consistent flow of enquiries all year round, this video is for you. Myself and James have worked with a lot of AV hire companies throughout the UK, and we know exactly which marketing strategies work and which ones you should avoid so you don’t burn money. In this video, we’re breaking everything down. James, take us to step number one. Step number one to grow is a Google Business Profile. If you already have one, reach out to your existing clients to get as many five-star reviews as possible. Google Business Profile is a great way to generate more leads. You should also get citations, post regularly and upload photos. This is the first thing I’d do to generate more local leads.

Kasra Dash:
Step number two, to support your Google Business Profile, is to create service pages for each of your offerings as SEO-optimised pages on your website. This helps your website rank better and increases the chances of your Google Business Profile showing for those keywords, bringing in more calls.

James Dooley:
For more local leads, another option is PPC lead generation — pay-per-click on Google or Bing targeting bottom-of-funnel keywords. The challenge is you need someone good at PPC because of click fraud and the need for a solid negative keyword list to avoid job seekers or irrelevant searches. PPC can work, but when done wrong, you’ll waste a lot of money.

Kasra Dash:
You’ve also got Meta ads such as Facebook and Instagram. Users might see your ad while scrolling. You can run lead form ads, which keep people on Facebook, but the quality can drop unless you add more qualifying questions. You can also run conversion ads where users go to your website and fill in the form there. There are a couple of setups you can use depending on your goal.

James Dooley:
Another way to grow local leads is organic social media — posting on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Pinterest, Instagram. Lots of platforms. Reddit and Quora are big now too, especially if you answer questions people are actively searching for. Organic social media is a great lead source.

Kasra Dash:
Organic social is all about volume. You want to upload consistently, maybe daily or weekly. For example, five videos a week. Consistency matters, especially for YouTube and Twitter algorithms.

James Dooley:
And what do you think about AI agents automating content creation and posting, using tools like N8N? AI is everywhere now for lead generation. Would you work with an AI consultant to set that up?

Kasra Dash:
You can definitely set up AI agents to crop videos and auto-publish to YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and other platforms. Another big focus is AI search. People still search on Google, but many now use ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude and Groq. If your brand isn’t visible there, you’ll struggle to get leads from those search engines.

James Dooley:
If you want more local business leads, you should also team up with trades-people websites — Checkatrade, Bark, Builder Builder, TrustATrader, Rated People. These can generate a lot of leads. Track KPIs to understand ROI — not just cost per lead, but cost per acquisition and overall return. These platforms can work very well. And since I mentioned FatRank a few times, Kasra, what do you think about lead generation companies versus trades-people platforms?

Kasra Dash:
With lead generation companies, you need to do your due diligence. Make sure they’ve actually generated leads in your niche. Have a strategy call with them to discuss your budget and lead volume. Check whether the leads are exclusive or shared. Shared leads — like Bark or Checkatrade — become a race to the bottom on pricing. These are common pain points for business owners. These are the questions you need to ask before partnering with a lead gen company.

James Dooley:
If anyone wants more local leads, go to FatRank.com. We offer a commission-based lead generation service. You only pay a finder’s fee on completed, paid jobs. No upfront cost. No cost per lead. Only once the job is done. Go to FatRank.com to see if you qualify. Kasra, what are your thoughts on inbound versus outbound?

Kasra Dash:
I always prefer inbound. The conversion rate — meaning leads turning into paying customers — is much higher. The last stat I saw was 16.1% conversion for inbound compared to 1.4% for outbound.

James Dooley:
That’s huge — around 10 to 12 times more conversions. Outbound channels like cold calling, cold email or LinkedIn outreach need massive volume and bigger team resources. Some people think it’s free, but it still costs money — email tools, sales reps, etc. I agree inbound is much better. What about real-time leads? People always ask if they’re important.

Kasra Dash:
They’re very important. Our internal stats show real-time leads convert 63% higher. We found that responding within a minute dramatically increases conversions. We used to think five minutes was good, but under a minute is the sweet spot. When an enquiry comes in, calling or emailing straight away gets better results. I’m not saying every company must do it, but it’s a major performance factor we check when we partner with businesses at FatRank.