Firms allocate big chunks of their marketing budget to lead generation activities yet still fall short of their lead conversion targets. That’s because many fail to provide the right type of web content for when prospective customers come to short-list firms. It’s a relatively simple problem to fix.
For many firms today, the top priority continues to be lead generation. Businesses of all sizes still resort to outbound telemarketing: calling existing customers and old prospects to identify firms that have immanent sales potential. This approach works, but it can be expensive.
Increasingly, firms are having success with social media platforms like Linkedin. Others are generating a good volume of leads from their web site. Their investment in SEO is generating plenty of traffic and many firms are converting this into high quality business.
But getting on the front page of search results is limited to those have all the SEO tactics and back-links in place as well as a strong social media presence. For most firms, it’s pre-emptive outbound activities that will continue to be important for lead generation. But it’s important to remember that this is just the first step in the process. Almost certainly, once you have reached out to your customer or prospect, they will visit your website before they place an order.
Web content is fundamental to your lead conversion
As part of their “due diligence” process, prospective buyers will explore your web site to look for information that justifies placing their business with you. They’re not just looking for details about how well your business is funded or how long you’ve been trading. They are also looking for evidence that your business is competent at helping them solve their problem. In short, you need to provide web content that meets the information needs of potential buyers at each stage of what can be a complex buying process.
A typical buying sequence might look like this:
You need to be aware of the sequence as it applies to your industry and ensure that the content on your website fulfils the needs of each type of visitor when they come looking for information.
The Content Marketing Institute published some valuable research in 2012 outlining what content formats work best for B2B firms. You can see from the following chart the extent to which web-enabled content plays such a prominent role:
You need to fully understand the buying sequence for your industry and target audience. This means being very clear about your target audience profile or, to use the latest buzzword, buyer “persona”.
For example, IDG identified the specific content formats preferred by IT decision makers. They found that for the Problem / Need stage, IT decision makers looked for case studies and blogs that talked about problems similar to their own. They are essentially looking to see how other firms solved the problem they were experiencing themselves.
In the Requirements Definition stage, these IT decision makers looked for “How to…” content as well as whitepapers, articles and blogs to help them understand the range of possible solutions. Read more about the content preferred by IT decision makers here.
So, no matter what initial lead generation tactics you deploy, you’re unlikely to see many of these leads convert into orders unless you can satisfy the information needs of your prospective customers with suitable web content first. Your content needs to be well written to persuade potential customers that your firm should be on the short-list: an overt sales pitch is more likely to hinder your success. It is professionally written content, carefully targeted, that will bring you the most success.
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Freelance marketing content writing for overstretched marketing professionals
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