Lead Generation For a Small Business - August Roundup

Patrick McFadden • September 1, 2022

Let's kick off the month of August focused on lead generation for your small business.

You know what I say, “leads are the lifeblood of every business. Clients are actually the lifeblood, however, without leads there are no clients.”

When it comes to lead generation, too many small business owners focus most of their attention on single event lead generation promotions.

The most effective lead generation occurs through the careful blending of multiple avenues and channels.

Often a prospect must encounter your brand or message dozens of times before they decide to move forward or make a purchase.

It is the momentum and cumulative impact of presenting your message in each of these arenas that eventually allows you to cut through the clutter and become the provider of choice to a market.

Each area is equally important to your overall success and each area must receive the attention needed to let your market know you are serious about earning their business.

Which means lead generation is essentially a game of channels more than tactics.

Translation: you need to find the right mix of channels that allow you to profitably attract a high enough number of leads over and over again in order to feed your growth objectives.

You don’t simply assemble a few tactics; you master a few ideal prospect channels.

A channel for lead generation purposes is simply a broad way to gain access to your prospective audience – so referrals is a channel, sales is a channel, SEO is a channel, and speaking is a channel – and there are countless ways to master every channel.

These posts aim to help you, your team, and your marketing service providers better understand how to build a lead generation process that serves a strategic and business objective in route to growth.


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The Ultimate Guide to Small Business Lead Generation


What Are You Doing Offline That Will Amplify Online?

Can we have this real conversation? So many owners and CEOs invest their resources of time, energy, attention, and money into every idea or tactic of the week. Trying lead generation services, signing up for Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook, TikTok, clubhouse, and any other social account being mentioned, purchasing followers, buying LinkedIn automation, I mean you name it I've probably seen it.


You Don't Need Fans, You Need Clients

Most owners and CEOs of small businesses are still fascinated with generating fans, followers, and likes but at the end of the day, the real focus should be on generating clients. Specifically finding the right clients for your business.⠀


6 Essential Website Elements Every Small Business Needs to Have

Many small business owners believe that a website's job is for lead generation. Just create website pages, write the recommended minimum of 300 words per page, add a call-to-action button to the top and bottom of every page then sit back and the phone will start ringing. Yet the primary job of a website isn’t to only generate leads. In fact, 92% of consumers visit a brand's website for the first time for reasons other than buying.


Build On The Success You're Already Having

The statement you just read sounds like common sense: "build on the success you're already having." The problem is that most owners and CEOs of small businesses don't know what's working, and even when they do, they may not think of it as marketing.


Be Loyal To The Market, Not The Tools

Whoever gets closer to the customers wins in business. If your people don’t know exactly which customers to target and what fuels their buying decisions, small business growth will always feel painfully slow. Customers constantly shift their behavior and attention and that is why your loyalty must be to them not tools.


Focusing On The Sale Is Costing You Leads

Recently I was in talks with a prospective client for developing their marketing strategy plan and during this conversation, the topic of guiding the #customerjourney and understanding customer touchpoints become the discussion.


This Might Be The Best Way to Fix Your Lead Generation

I’ve spoken with hundreds of owners and CEOs of small businesses over the years and the #1 pain point for many is lead generation. Not that they can’t generate leads, it’s just a constant battle to keep the flow going. That’s why I created an approach called “channel mastery” that will help you achieve more with the marketing resources you have and generate a better flow of leads.


The Most Overlooked B2B Marketing Strategy Ever

I work with a lot of small businesses that implement b2b marketing and for many of them, the most effective marketing strategy involves in person education through speaking and presenting. 🗣️🎤👩‍🏫🎫🖥️🎟️👨‍🏫 I know that the idea of speaking and presenting is not exactly a new strategy, everyone acknowledges this, but finding ways to apply it in the realm of a specific marketing process seems a little harder to pin down.


There Is No One Way To Generate a Lead

There's no 🚫🚫🚫 one way to generate a lead - in fact - you need to employ several ways - paid ads, SEO, speaking, PR, referrals, sales, strategic partnerships, networking.


Business Development vs. Marketing

When I went to a small business conference in Hampton VA I spent some time talking to a business development professional for the State of Virginia who asked, "what's the difference between business development and marketing?" Here's my point of view: business development and marketing are both responsible for growing sales, but they each have different job responsibilities in how they achieve that goal.

How to Hire a Lead Generation Company Without Being Burned

Recently I had the opportunity to chat with a franchise owner and one of the things they mentioned was their frustration with a national lead generation company provided by the franchisor. Now I don't have anything against lead generation companies but one of the issues I've seen from experience is that they produce low quality leads which brings you activity but as this franchise owner pointed out not a lot of accomplishment in terms of turning leads into clients.

Why You're At The Mercy Of Home Service Directories

I speak to tons of #businessowners who own and operate a home services business about the right way to approach directory advertising because usually they're at the mercy of a middle man. And that middle man is the closest to the customer. And in almost any business the one who is the closest to the customer wins.


The Real Reason Social Media Isn't Lead Generation For Your Business

The reason social media isn't working is because of how you view its role in the big marketing picture. A lot of what’s written about social media amounts to a list of things you should do—get on Instagram, blog, create a LinkedIn page—and not enough on WHY you might consider doing it.


How to Do More Business With Existing Clients

It's a truism that "one of the easiest ways to grow your business is to do more business with your existing clients" but often the key element to executing this marketing strategy is never talked about. What is it? Trust.


The Missing Link to Getting Repeat Business

What I'm about to reveal in this post is something I think still, for a lot of businesses is a missing link. One of the best ways to #growyourbusiness is to do more with existing clients. The missing link 🔗 to getting repeat business is not more promotions, a perfect website page, or even great discounts, it's to 100% make sure that your clients are getting the most value possible from working with you.


Lead Generation Examples

Marketing Agency Lead Generation Example

IT Consulting Firm Lead Generation Example


Contact Your Marketing Consultant at Indispensable Marketing

If you’re a small service based business that needs help with lead generation for your business or your business’s online presence on Google and other search engines, at Indispensable Marketing we can help. We offer marketing strategy consulting, marketing audits, monthly marketing packages, consultations, exploratory calls or monthly local SEO servicesContact us for more information.


By Patrick McFadden May 2, 2025
Everyone is scaling outputs. Almost no one is scaling judgment.
By Patrick McFadden May 2, 2025
Ask anyone in tech where AI is headed, and they’ll tell you: “The next leap is reasoning.” “AI needs judgment.” “We need assistants that think, not just answer.” They’re right. But while everyone’s talking about it, almost no one is actually shipping it. So we did. We built Thinking OS™ —a system that doesn’t just help AI answer questions… It helps AI think like a strategist. It helps AI decide like an operator. It helps teams and platforms scale judgment, n ot just generate output. The Theory Isn’t New. The Implementation Is. The idea of layering strategic thinking and judgment into AI isn’t new in theory. The problem is, no one’s been able to implement it effectively at scale. Let’s look at the current landscape. 1. Big Tech Has the Muscle—But Not the Mind OpenAI / ChatGPT ✅ Strength: Best-in-class language generation ❌ Limitation: No built-in judgment or reasoning. You must provide the structure. Otherwise, it follows instructions, not strategy. Google DeepMind / Gemini ✅ Known for advanced decision-making (e.g., AlphaGo) ❌ But only in structured environments like games—not messy, real-world business scenarios. Anthropic (Claude), Meta (LLaMA), Microsoft Copilot ✅ Great at answering questions and following commands ❌ But they’re assistants, not advisors. They won’t reprioritize. They won’t challenge your assumptions. They don’t ask: “Is this the right move?” These tools are powerful—but they don’t think for outcomes the way a strategist or operator would. 2. Who’s Actually Building the Thinking Layer™? This is where it gets interesting—and thin. Startups and Indie Builders Some small teams are quietly: Creating custom GPTs that mimic how experts reason Layering in business context, priorities, and tradeoffs Embedding decision logic so AI can guide, not just execute But these efforts are: Highly manual Difficult to scale Fragmented and experimental Enterprise Experiments A few companies (Salesforce, HubSpot, and others) are exploring more “judgment-aware” AI copilots. These systems can: Flag inconsistencies Recommend next actions Occasionally surface priorities based on internal logic But most of it is still: In early R&D Custom-coded Unproven beyond narrow use cases That’s Why Thinking OS™ Is Different Instead of waiting for a lab to crack it, we built a modular thinking system that installs like infrastructure. Thinking OS™: Captures how real experts reason Embeds judgment into layers AI can use Deploys into tools like ChatGPT or enterprise systems Helps teams think together, consistently, at scale It’s not another assistant. It’s the missing layer that turns outputs into outcomes. So… Is This a New Innovation? Yes—in practice. Everyone says AI needs judgment. But judgment isn’t an idea. It’s a system. It requires: Persistent memory Contextual awareness Tradeoff evaluation Value-based decisions Strategy that evolves with goals Thinking OS™ delivers that. And unlike the R&D experiments in Big Tech, it’s built for: Operators Consultants Platform founders Growth-stage teams that need to scale decision quality, not just content creation If Someone Told You They’ve Built a Thinking + Judgment Layer™… They’ve built something only a handful of people in the world are even attempting. Because this isn’t just AI that speaks fluently. It’s AI that reasons, reflects , and chooses. And in a world that’s drowning in tools, judgment becomes the differentiator. That’s the OS We Built Thinking OS™ is not a prompt pack. It’s not a dashboard. It’s not a glorified chatbot. It’s a decision architecture you can license, embed, or deploy— To help your team, your platform, or your clients think better at scale. We’ve moved past content. We’re building cognition. Let’s talk.
By Patrick McFadden May 2, 2025
In every era of innovation, there’s a silent bottleneck—something obvious in hindsight, but elusive until the moment it clicks. In today’s AI-driven world, that bottleneck is clear: AI has speed. It has scale. But it doesn’t have judgment . It doesn’t really think . What’s Actually Missing From AI? When experts talk about the “thinking and judgment layer” as the next leap for AI, they’re calling out a hard truth: Modern AI systems are powerful pattern machines. But they’re missing the human layer—the one that reasons, weighs tradeoffs, and makes strategic decisions in context. Let’s break that down: 1. The Thinking Layer = Reasoning with Purpose This layer doesn’t just process inputs— it structures logic. It’s the ability to: Ask the right questions before acting Break down complexity into solvable parts Adjust direction mid-course when reality changes Think beyond “what was asked” to uncover “what really matters” Today’s AI responds. But it rarely reflects. Unless told exactly what to do, it won’t work through problems the way a strategist or operator would. 2. The Judgment Layer = Decision-Making in the Gray Judgment is the ability to: Prioritize what matters most Choose between imperfect options Make decisions when there’s no clear answer Apply values, experience, and vision—not just data It’s why a founder might not pursue a lucrative deal. Why a marketer might ignore the click-through rate. Why a strategist knows when the timing isn’t right. AI doesn’t do this well. Not yet. Because judgment requires more than data—it requires discernment . Why This Is the Bottleneck Holding Back AI AI can write. It can summarize. It can automate. But it still can’t: Diagnose the real problem behind the question Evaluate tradeoffs like a founder or operator would Recommend a path based on context, constraints, and conviction AI today is still reactive. It follows instructions. But it doesn’t lead. It doesn’t guide. It doesn’t own the outcome. And for those building serious systems—whether you’re running a company, launching a platform, or leading a team—this is the wall you eventually hit. That’s Why We Built Thinking OS™ We stopped waiting for AI to learn judgment on its own. Instead, we created a system that embeds it—by design. Thinking OS™ is an installable decision layer that captures how top founders, strategists, and operators think… …and makes that thinking repeatable , scalable , and usable inside teams, tools, and platforms. It’s not a framework. It’s not a chatbot. It’s not another playbook. It’s the layer that knows how to: Think through complex decisions Apply judgment when rules don’t help Guide others —human or AI—toward strategic outcomes This Is the Missing Infrastructure Thinking OS™ isn’t just about better answers. It’s about better thinking—made operational. And that’s what’s been missing in AI, consulting, leadership development, and platform design. If you’re trying to scale expertise, install judgment, or move from tactical to strategic… You don’t need a faster AI. You need a thinking layer that knows what to do—and why. We built it. Let’s talk.
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