What Channels Are Your Customers On?

I've been reviewing some direct marketing vehicles from a couple of companies recently... in both cases these companies have been using print pieces to reach out to their targets. The pieces are nicely designed and reasonably effective.

I've always maintained that any and all marketing channels (including print DM, it's not necessarily a dinosaur) can and should be used to interact with your prospects and customers. I've done highly-qualified, high impact dimensional and print pieces that have delivered response rates in excess of 70%! A multi-channel campaign ensures that you are using all available communication highways to your target.

But what channels do they prefer to be messaged to and communicate back to you? Have you asked them? Think of the channels now available to marketers - digital, print/dimensional, mobile, telemarketing, personal, broadcast. Remember you want to engage a prospect or customer on their terms, not what's best for you. It's entirely possible that a percentage of your target audience may not have as readily adopted online communication so perhaps email campaigns are not as effective. Or print pieces rarely if ever make it to their desk as they go through numerous gatekeepers. Or they are impossible to reach via the telephone. Or they don't attend trade shows.

What's important to recognize is the answer to the question -- what are the most effective channels in which to communicate w/my prospects and customers? -- is sitting on your desk. Pick up your telephone and call your loyal customers and simply ask them. You probably (hopefully) have a number of customers who love your product and service and want to see your company continue to succeed and grow. They would love to be a part of that success. And they would most certainly share their likes and preferences about how they like to be communicated with, the types of marketing vehicles and channels that they prefer. How often do they wish to be contacted? What type of offers appeal to them? Do they take the time to read white papers? Are they Internet savvy and do all their research online? Do they ever see print pieces? What types of media (on and offline) do they read? Why did they buy from you originally? What types of marketing don't they like?

You can take just a handful of customers and reach out to them via the telephone, or online survey or print survey. Design 8-10-12 primary questions that will provide you with the answers that will help you to better understand how to engage with your customers, how to give them what they want.

From the types of offers you build, to the channels you use to communicate to the design of your products, your customers and prospects are an untapped goldmine of information and data that should be shaping your entire marketing strategy. Remember, these are the people who chose your company over all others. Whatever you did with them worked (or didn't work). Go ahead. Pick up the phone.

Buyers Finding Sellers

In my recent white paper 'The 7 Secrets for Generating Quality Leads in a Recession' I talk about establishing an inbound marketing orientation -- the process by which prospects find your products and services rather you trying to find them. It doesn't have to necessarily supplant your current outbound marketing strategies (at least not yet :^), but it should at least run in parallel.

In a recent survey MarketingSherpa found out that 8 out of 10 deals were struck with prospects initially seeking out and finding the vendors they considered and the vendor they ultimately chose. The voluminous amount of information and data now available online has led to this sea change in the buying process (and the marketing process). The web is the first (and sometimes only) place prospects/buyers go to educate themselves to make informed buying decisions.

And it doesn't mean they necessarily go to a vendor web site, at least not in the beginning stages. The ubiquity of research sites, user reviews, blogs, online communities, social networks, et al allow these buyers to first stay abreast of new ideas, technologies and innovations, see similar challenges to problems they also have and then read up on how like ppl/companies solved their problems. All this before their first knock on a vendor's door (or website) and a demo of how their solution satisfies the buyer's needs.

The issue for forward-thinking marketers then is, how do we get ourselves included in those initial awareness/interest phases of the buying process? To help inform the prospect's understanding of the best solutions that may be available to him? And to make the connection between smart, helpful ideas and products/services that are built upon those ideas?

And the answer of course is to establish your company or brand as a business problem expert and as a credible and trusted source of useful knowledge, expertise and information. Marketers have always known that content is king, but these days, unbiased, educational, business-expertise, 'what-makes-you-an-expert?' content is where it's at. If you haven't yet, identifying and regularly communicating your core value in the form of your company thought leaders publishing those thoughts should be of paramount importance as you set up an outbound marketing strategy. The online channels to publish this intellectual property are defined -- blogs, share sites, social nets, company websites, podcasts, etc. Now your focus needs to be on consistently generating the ideas, education and answers that address and solve critical business issues and establish you as a trusted partner.

FREE Lead Gen for Small Business

Just finished updating my monthly post for my consulting business on Craigslist and thought I'd do a quick post. You already know that Craigslist is a mostly free, online classified space for buying/selling just about everything under the sun. Remember too that there is also a Services section where small (and not so small) businesses can advertise their products and services.

Each month I post this for LMG Consulting:
http://sfbay.craigslist.org/sfc/biz/1145135957.html

It's free, easy and drives respondents to my website (and new white paper landing page). I've received a number of emails and calls from prospects, and right now am working on a project proposal I received thru CL. It also directs another link into your website which helps w/your search engine rankings. Not bad for about 5 mins work each month.

'Eat the Elephant One Bite at a Time'

I spoke recently with a prospective client about if/how his company should go about implementing a lead management (lead gen) system. He's unsure where to start as it all seems quite daunting -- how to begin the process, the expense, the resources required and the fear of the unknown are all giving him pause.

I mentioned to him that he should 'eat the elephant one bite at a time'. For a company that has never attempted to deploy some sort of system, I frequently tell them to start small and work your way up. Rather than immediately looking at tools and automation (which I do agree provide the right foundation for a true lead gen model), I suggested to him that he first simplify and brainstorm the ifs and whys of implementing a lead gen strategy. What does the company hope to gain from a strategy (i.e. objectives)? What is the value of such a system? Are the sales and marketing teams aligned as to what each should expect from lead gen? Does sales have the resources/bandwidth to handle lead flows or will new lead follow-up be sporadic and uneven? Does marketing know what a sales-ready lead is, and ensure their hand-offs achieve an agreed threshold? Can sales and marketing communicate and work together if a demand gen policy is in place, working to constantly update and improve the system?

Once these questions have been answered, a basic framework can be created that spells out quantifiable objectives, basic processes and how to collect and measure the lead flows captured, the types of tactics/programs they think would resonate and a means to input results back into the system to improve performance. If the resource isn't already in house, at this stage it may make sense to invest in an outside expert to help you with this framework and ensure you're on the right track. It's not necessary to right out of the gate leap to vetting lead management systems and making huge $$ investments in tools before you have an idea if your company is ready to maximize their value. Find out first if your company is ready to adopt a lead culture and way of thinking.

Download My Latest White Paper! 7 Secrets for Generating Leads in a Recession

I'm very excited to announce the availability of my latest white paper 'The 7 Secrets for Generating Quality Leads in a Recession', now available on my web site here (you can also click the image).

In it I write about my experience in working with some of the world's largest and most successful B2B companies to out-perform, out-market and and out-hustle their competition in the daily battle for new prospects, leads and customers. The paper describes how you can quickly establish a social media marketing strategy (for next to nothing) to drive demand, how to make your offers laser-focused by building them through the AIDA funnel, how to use inbound marketing to help prospects find you and the basic steps in a successful lead management process.

I think it's a great, quick read that provides some useful tips... hope you agree!

Marketing Automation Made Easy(er)

Had a chance to meet this week with Howard Sewell, Founder and President of Connect Direct, a demand generation agency with offices in Northern California and Seattle (Howard also writes a terrific blog called Direct Connections). Howard's agency has been providing outstanding demand gen and direct marketing services for tech companies since 1990.

We talked about a number of things, including the adoption of marketing automation tools like Marketo that help companies to better execute, manage, track and measure their lead flows. We both agreed that companies like Marketo have come a long way in creating tools that are considerably easier to deploy campaigns on and allow you to focus on getting campaigns out the door rather than spend all your time trying to figure out how a tool works.

If you have previously looked at these types of tools and threw up your hands in your frustration, the time might be right now to take another look and see what they can offer to you.

White Paper Coming Monday!

I'm putting the finishing touches on my latest white paper on generating quality leads in a recession and will have it posted on Monday. In it I talk about how some of the world's most successful B2B companies out-market their competition for prospects and leads during tough economic times. I also discuss some of the latest ideas and innovations in lead generation including social media marketing, targeted offer development and inbound marketing. Keep an eye out for it Monday!