Last time we looked at some of the greatest challenges (and their solutions) content marketers face in today's competitive online world.
Continuing with the podcasting trend, join us for Part 2, as Chris Muccio interviews marketing expert Lorraine Ball on some of the benefits content marketing has to offer, that you might have never thought of.
Introduction
Welcome to Social Fusion's Digital Growth podcast with your host Chris Muccio. Be sure to head over to www.socialfusion.com to subscribe to our weekly podcast series. Today our guest expert is Lorraine Ball. If you've ever wished to hear someone peel back the layers and explain the benefits of content marketing in a very practical sense. Sit right back and listen to Lorraine. You could learn more about her at www.roundpeg.biz. Today Chris and Lorraine are going to discuss powerful benefits you can generate with content marketing.
Lorraine Ball [00:00:40]
One of the things that I think is really important is this idea that an informed customer is actually a better customer. The more your customers know about who you are and what you do, and what that experience is gonna be like before they walk in the door, the easier it is to sell them when they get there.
Chris Muccio [00:01:02]
Agreed they're not expecting you to. You don't have to commit to cold close them, or spend the time just pitching them. You already created the relationship; you've already created trust, now what you need to do is just sit back and literally just take the sale, accept the order because you built that relationship through your content. It's tremendous the type of benefits that content marketing offers. I mean sure you shared a couple just now through the success stories. There's a lot of there. Can you pick another few benefits that you could share with our audience, and you shared quite a few already. I think, certainly depending on how you use the content it can help you identify what someone is interested in if you have multiple products.
Lorraine Ball [00:01:54]
One of the things that I've seen across industries is you get someone sitting across the table from you and you don't know where to begin. And you spend too much time in the sales hall talking about something they don't even want to hear, right?. If you have them in your content cycle, you already know they've downloaded these three items, you kind of know what they're interested in. So you can go into that first sales conversation much more prepared and much more focused. So I think that's part of it. Number two…
Lorraine Ball [00:02:34]
You have sort of guided them down a path, people are going to look online and they're going to look at a whole lot of different information.
Lorraine Ball [00:02:46]
If you've got information that you really want them to see in a certain order, having that content on your website, having you know a series of things that you send them maybe over several weeks once they download the first thing allows you to sort of control their learning curve. So they're learning what they need to know to sort of move them down a path where they get to a point where you're not selling you, you know you're giving them information, you're making them an informed consumer. But the natural conclusion is that the best possible choice at the end of this path is you. Other benefits; different industries I think use it differently, one of the things that I used to have early in my career was a lot of people would invite me to come and give presentations, which is all wonderful but I would drive all over the city, have five people in the room, and not sell anything. By having more of this content that I can share it online with those people who are really not ready to buy. Maybe they don't have the budget yet. You know, whatever that issue is that's holding them back. I can push them towards one of my content pieces that help them sort of move to that next level where they are now prepared to have that conversation and write that check because at the end of the day although they give away a lot of stuff I'm a capitalist and I am doing this because I want to make a sale.
4 Tips Lorraine Ball and Chris Muccio share:
- An informed customer is a better customer. The more your customers know about who you are and what you do, and what that experience is gonna be like before they walk in the door, the easier it is to sell them when they get there. This is all achievable through content.
- When you create valuable content, you don't have to commit to cold close them, or spend the time just pitching them. You already created the relationship; you've already created trust, now what you need to do is just sit back and literally just take the sale
- Through content, you know what your potential prospects have downloaded, you're able to understand what they're interested in. This allows you to be much more prepared and much more focused.
- Content marketing can push potential sales clients down your funnel using articles, images, videos, and even presentations to help alleviate whatever reason your customer is holding back to make a purchase
And there you have it. Did you find this first installment interesting? Let us know!
For more digital marketing insight be sure to check out the links below:
- 10 Common Content Marketing Mistakes & How to Solve Them
- Step-by-Step Guide to Content Syndication
- Efficiency Tips for the Content Marketing World
- Revitalize Your Marketing Strategy With This 5 Step Content Audit
