Research!

After all, content is king, right?

Companies that want to reach their full potential now need to understand the importance of maintaining a permanent presence in the lives of clients.

Every interaction with customers and prospects, however small, provides further opportunities for you to provide more value, get to know them, and vice versa.

According to Adestra:

Marketers say that the biggest benefits of automation are saving time (74%), increased customer engagement (68%), more timely communications (58%) and increased opportunities including up-selling (58%).

And to quote SocialMediaToday:

It is a basic marketing principle that it takes several "touches" before someone will internalise and/or act upon your call to action.

SO if you can establish trust over time, you will win.

1. Stage One: Awareness — Your client is becoming aware of a problem and begins research to understand the problem.
2. Stage Two: Consideration — Your client is fully aware of the problem and begins exploring all options available.
3. Stage Three: Decision — Your client has explored all problem solving options and then selects a provider to help.

So it's reasonable to say, if they only see your marketing message once in Stage One, it’s not likely they’ll remember you in the future as your message may not completely resonate with them at that time.

Now if you’ve been in the marketing world for awhile, you’ve may have heard of the Marketing Rule of 7.

It states that a prospect needs to “hear” the advertiser’s message at least 7 times before they’ll take action to buy that product or service.

(Google suggests it could be as high as 11!)

And according to Marketo:

Companies that excel at lead nurturing generate 50% more sales ready leads at a 33% lower cost and 96% of visitors who come to your website aren’t ready to buy.

So every interaction with your clients, however small, provides further opportunities for you to get to know them, and vice versa.

And every time they visit your website, encounter you on social media, or chat with a bot or a person, a memorable moment is created.

These touches can take many forms:

1. Seeing a series of “aspirational” social media ads.
2. Visiting a few articles tailored to their needs.
3. Watching a small video clip solving a really nagging problem.

The point is: getting in front of potential clients is relatively straightforward, but if you want to bring the sales ...

Repetition matters!

Napoleon’s wisdom also said it best:

Between a battle lost and a battle won, the distance is immense and there stand empires.

The more a potential customer is exposed to your brand, the more likely they are to buy from you when they decide to make a purchase.

A personal relationship is more than a series of encounters or incidents, and the brand experience should be no different.

And you can with a method called Omnipresence.

An Omnipresence campaign is a technique that brings back potential clients who haven’t converted after their very first interaction with your company.

And in a nutshell, here’s how it works …

So ask yourself:

1. What does your client need to believe before he or she will purchase your product or service?
2. What problems are keeping them up at night?
3. What frequently asked questions do they have?

Each piece you create should solve one of your prospects most burning problems or lead them to discover new opportunities.

Better yet, using the below app, you can generate content ideas and find untapped interests your competition doesn’t know exist ..

1. Enter a topic you'd like to craft your content around.
2. Receive tons of information and ideas regarding this topic.
3. Find what will work best for you: headlines, questions, related topics.
4. Create powerful content that resonates with your audience.

But to drive the point home, let’s put this another way, the established way. Let’s say you’re going to redo your old website.

Because, in my humble opinion:

Most website designers don’t get sales funnels.

Sure, they might — might — read your content and they might — might — have a good idea on how to tart up your About Us/Me page.

Which is nice, but largely pointless as your brand story needs to bleed into EVERYTHING you say or do and shape every way you say or do anything.

They might know how to design for readers first, art lovers second, especially when it comes to mobile readability.

And I’m not going to argue with that as the barest minimum starting point.

But you also need to hire a digital sales strategist who buys into your story as a seamless sales pitch.

Someone who can provide the tools and techniques to tell your magical sales story in a coherent way.

Becuase here’s the deal:

How many actually went on to buy what you were actually selling?

Of course if that part fails, a seasoned web designer will point to:

“I know, but the site I designed has loads of amazing graphics, animation, color photos. Give it time.”

Time for what, exactly?

Are they also saying your marketing funnel sucks?

Of course, you could hire a heavyweight web design agency.

An agency that uses great design and a firm grasp of the value of publishing great 10x content.

So this agency ensures your content has the best shot at the title.

Sound like heaven wrapped up in the shape of an award winning solution?

Kind of.

Because as invaluable as all these skills are — and believe me you get what you pay for — the site they create might look nice, read well — we’ll take it as given that your content rocks — but all of this will still fail if everything isn’t designed to funnel the audience into making a sale.

You see, telling a great story isn’t the same as selling a great story.

If the story — and the funnel — coalesce to solve a problem and ensure there is a strategic, personal, compelling flow to multiple engagements, your story and your sales funnel are one.

And the difference is huge ..

Do that, you’ll still bag and tag the 2%, but you’ll also begin to wean the 98% into action much, much faster than ever before.

Who knows, you can then maybe start helping the kids with their homework this weekend.

Anyhoo ..

That's it for this post.

Lot's more to come.

But first, think about this ..

Is your website built to generate customers, or is it just the result of a bunch of random tactics thrown together?

Could you improve the copy?

The call to action? The design?