Companies that have struggled with the transition from offline tactics to online lead demand programs are particularly at risk for not surviving in the new world.
Marketing CoPilot has compiled the 5 most important tools B2B companies need to survive in these times of significant change.
The pitfalls of a weak value proposition are more evident than ever. Customers spend seconds browsing your website. The problem you solve for customers and the way in which you solve it needs to be immediately understood.
Messaging in a time of abundance is different than marketing in a time of crisis. We need to be much more specific and impactful in how we’re going to help. People want clarity. Clarity builds trust.
Right now, what you’re offering may not be very appealing. You need to dig deep and figure out, “How can I help my customers improve their business?”
Everyone is feeling their way in the digital-first world. Now is not the time to "sell". Now is the time to build trust.
Companies need to adapt their messaging to suit the prevailing mood of the customer. Some of the most important tips for these uncertain times:
Every buyer is starting to ask tough questions around how purchases will affect them. Budgets are tight, and buyers need to have rock-solid faith in your ability to deliver. Today, trust is the most important currency you have.
What you DON’T want to do is create anxiety in the mind of your buyer. If buyers have unanswered questions after visiting your website, they might not even contact your sales department. It’s important for your web presence to be clear, concise, and helpful.
If you’re not answering these questions it’s going to be a rough ride. People need to know that you’re going to do what you promise.
There’s a lot of trust being broken. I don’t trust you because I don’t trust myself to make a decision right now. People feel like one wrong decision could make or break their business.
This might be the time to slow down the cadence of your social media marketing and focus on quality over quantity.
Your pacing and the way you present your message will contribute to whether you’ll be seen as trustworthy. You can’t be silent, but posts need to reflect the mood of the moment. People are unsurprisingly spending more time on social channels, so high content quality is key.
Once you have the top 5 reasons someone buys from you, rank them using the following criteria:
Instead of compiling a long laundry list of promises that is exactly the same as what your competitors are saying, get rid of the clutter. “Saves you time, saves you money,” isn’t interesting to the buyer because they hear it from everyone. Maybe there are statements you’re making that aren’t actually very appealing to your customers. No matter what you’re selling, now is an opportunity to take a close, hard look at what you’re doing to pivot and pivot quickly.
Can you find a value vector that will propel you to growth and transformation? Is there something you need to stop doing because it’s not right for this time? Is there something you’re really good at but don’t talk about very much? Maybe there’s a way your business can help customers in a unique and relevant way. This is the time to really dig deep into your value proposition and figure out how to transition.
Companies that have weak content and weak messaging on their web presence will have a hard time creating digital transformation of the sales and marketing functions.
Statistics show people will go with the company that provided them with the best information. With everyone working from home, content matters more than ever.
Would your sales and marketing program still work if you had to stop all offline marketing for the next 18 months? Would you still be able to generate leads for your business without any face-to-face contact?
This is the problem we’ll all trying to solve and why content is so important.
Regardless of the type of business, you can still reach out and connect with your customers with special offers and helpful how-tos.
Often, there’s a disconnect between what you think is important and what your customer thinks is important. Good content builds trust because it’s that perfect intersection between the two where you’ll find your content strategy.
Before the digital revolution, the sales rep played an important role in the buying process as they were the primary source of product information. Now, buyers self-serve by researching products and services on the web. You have to think about the emotional triggers of your buyer and the keywords that they’re using when they think about their problem.
The buyer persona is not just demographics. You really need to get inside the head of your ideal customer to understand what they’re going through. You need to know very specifically what they’re looking for in these 5 areas:
Use our workbook: http://resources.marketingcopilot.com/buyer-persona-workbook
This is a thought-provoking process that can unearth gold. Getting specific about your buyer’s priorities, decision-making process, barriers to purchase, and criteria can help you craft content that speaks directly to them.
Ultimately, you want your content to be capable of stopping someone in their tracks and compelling them to take the next step in their buying process with your organization.
A manufacturer searching for a new delivery service because people can’t come to the plant.
Sample models around pricing and cost help people figure out how this fits into their overall cost of service. At this point you’re not trying to sell them a solution, but build a model that works into their cost perspective of what they need to do.
Do a search pretending to be a buyer. When you walk through the process from their perspective you can start to see how they process information.
In this environment, you really need to look at your content with a fresh set of eyes and figure out the content you’re presenting to the outside world—does it help? All content today must, must, must…
A keyword strategy is an important part to support your content plan. Knowing the words that your consumers use when they are on Google researching their problems allows you to reach them in a timely and relevant way. Having a strong keyword strategy also allows you to align your website content with Google searches and improve your SEO.
Make sure you’re following through on your promises. Good content should make sales much easier. What are you offering? It should consist of ungated content, helpful information, authoritative sources, and relevant details.
A content theme will propel you to growth and transformation.
The secret lies in buyer personas.
What is engagement? A connection with someone about something. Some people think they are engaging their buyers with an email newsletter, a post on LinkedIn, or a cold call, but these are communication channels, not engagement. The activity needs to be able to encourage a next step.
A customer cannot be created without engagement. People who want to take their demand generation from offline to online need to stop and think about tactics that create true engagement.
Dump the clutter and confusion. Volume isn’t a good thing. There’s always buyer anxiety, but since COVID-19, buyer anxiety is the highest it’s been in your lifetime. What can you do right now to reduce buyer anxiety?
If social media made us lazy, then marketing automation made us repetitive. It’s taken away personalization and levels of engagement.
Your website is your #1 sales support tool. You have to have a good one right now.
The most over-used phrase on the web today: “Learn More”. The one-two engagement punch is as follows:
What do you offer?
Strong Value proposition
Repeat the CTA
Tell me what would happer if i do not do this
Tell me what success looks like
Spell out a 3-step plan to engage with the product or service.
You have to achieve this immediately —regardless of what you sell. Buyer anxiety is removed when clarity, credibility, and curiosity are created. This is how engagement happens.
You need to create a story that people can engage with. Don’t let the absenceface-to-face selling be the reason your lead generation stops.
How do we make conversion happen? In the old B2B world:
Since COVID-19, the line between your buyer and you is complicated and confusing. Educating in a time of abundance is different than marketing in a time of crisis. How do we make conversion happen?
Conversion is not a sales qualified lead (SQL). There are many different types of conversions in digital marketing, each of them representing a step towards becoming a qualified lead.
These steps, and many more, are required to create a marketing qualified lead. This is what builds trust and interest before we try to sell. How many conversion points do you offer on your website today? If the answer is only “Contact Us”, chances are you need to build a better buyer journey
You need sales and marketing alignment for conversion to work. How do you measure alignment?
Average lead to opportunity ratio: between 8-13%
Opportunity to sales conversation ratio: between 3-8%
Let’s do the math… traffic sources for a website produce 5,000 monthly visits with a lead to opportunity ratio of 10% and an opportunity to sales conversation of 5%.
Activity that drives traffic:
Optimistic Conversion Ratio
How many leads do you need a year? What’s your definition of a lead? What’s the close ratio of those leads? You need to reverse engineer these numbers
Tracking Metrics that Matter
These should be tracked on a weekly basis. It will tell you a lot about your conversion rate.
These should be tracked on a weekly basis. It will tell you a lot about your conversion rate.
Mapping out your conversion strategy is key. If you’re not converting and seeing prospects click through, you may need to go back to the beginning and rethink your value proposition.
Primary
problem
being solved
by Persona
Channels
Key
Conversion
Points
Key Metrics
How has your marketing program changed over the last year?
What are B2B marketers doing?
You should not stop marketing. It’s more important than ever to be communicating.
Are you growing or gauging your marketing spend? Marketing and innovation produce results; all the rest are costs. Investing in marketing can drive your business forward.
Example
Are these tools costing us money or making us money?
Digital lead generation is the future. Get onboard now.
Some companies aren’t going to make it. Some companies are going to struggle. But if you consider these 5 important steps you’ll have the right marketing tools to survive and thrive.
In the age of 24/7 internet, there are thousands of ways for businesses to talk to, sell to, and connect with their customers. But, just as the old adage says, less is more.
In You Can’t Be Everywhere, Wiese offers her well-tested insight on how to become a savvier marketer. Through personal stories and no-nonsense advice, Wiese shows how any company can conquer the digital space and craft extraordinary strategies and customer connections. Available on Amazon or marketingcopilot.com
