Defining trade leads?

A trade lead can be defined as buy or sell leads of products or services for export and import purposes. Decades back, before the Internet revolution, World Trade Centers, Chambers of Commerce, Export Promotion Bureau and few Government agencies, were authorized to gather and circulate trade inquiries by mail to subscribers. Subscription costs, however, was pretty high. Even trade journals, for that matter, had exclusive sections on trade inquiries. However, this turned out to be a long-drawn process and an outdated one too.

However, things took a drastic turn with the emergence of internet. The expansion of trade activities, e-commerce and the world-wide use of Internet have led to the surfacing of numerous bulletin boards, and trade leads sites. Country specific trade lead portals have become a common meeting ground for both importers and exporters aiming to conduct business in those countries. For example, Made-from-india.com ( Business to Business Marketplace ) is an India based B2B portal that generates genuine trade leads from India.

Importance of posting trade leads

When you visit a trade leads portal like made-from-india.com, you can do two things. You can find suppliers or buyers for products, by checking the latest trade leads. Or you can post your own trade leads. More often than not, posting of trade leads can be done for free.

While browsing the trade leads portal, find out whether the products or services you are planning to sell or buy have been already posted on the site or not. And in case you find the traders dealing in your products, then before getting in touch with them, do some background check. Like, study the profile of the company, check out their websites and even do some Google search. Since Google lays heavy emphasis on forums and web logs you will get a comprehensive picture on your potential business partners and their solutions. .

If you are a buyer, then you can post your trade leads too

Why should you post your own ads?

1. Generally suppliers keep looking for buyers for their products, but fail to post their own ads.

2. Your ads automatically get posted on other trade portals because of the partnership programs. This will give you bigger exposure than what you expect.

3. The major plus factor being if your posting gets indexed by search engines, this will facilitate in highlighting your requirements to a larger target audience.

How to make your trade leads informative

Follow the steps given below to craft an interesting trade lead. The trade lead should be so good that it will attract potential buyers or suppliers, automatically.

Pithy, precise subject lines

Your subject line shouldn’t go beyond eight to ten words. Don’t pad it up. Don’t use marks like “!!!” to grab the eyeballs. If you are posting a sell lead, emphasize on the value aspect, if you are posting a buy lead, elucidate on your requirements.

Body of the trade leads

Since, you are free to incorporate more information here, see that you are as clear as you can be. If you provide vague information, you won’t be able to get as many inquiries.

Product Description

• Specify the advantages of the product you are dealing in. If there are any freebies attached, make it public.

Specify the terms of sale, shipping terms, packing and location of the product.

If you are posting a buy lead:

• State in clear terms your requirement

• Provide a link to a picture of a related product

• Quantity required, delivery time, shipping destination and other important information should be incorporated.