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What are best practices for converting someone consuming your third party content into a prospect?
I get this question all the time which is essentially: "Ok, so I create all this awesome third party, vendor agnostic content, but how do I convert these readers/ or visitors into prospects or leads?"
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2 Answers
The formula for selling is:
1. Find a pain
2. Get agreement that there is pain
3. Agree to do something about the pain
4. Agree to a generic solution to take away the pain
5. Agree to a customized (my) solution to take away the pain
Vendor agnostic white papers are great at POTENTIALLY finding a pain. The problem is that most marketing departments call this a lead. When it gets to the sales force they start with #5 instead of beginning with #2.
This formula is simple, and it works - as long as you actually take the prospect through every step.
I use the word "POTENTIALLY" above because lots of folks download content just because they are consumers of content - and not because they have any pain. Obviously, sending content consumers out to sales as leads is a total waste of time. That is why suspects need to be converted into prospects BEFORE they go to sales.
Hmmm. This answer really calls for a fable-rich metaphor:
You know the story of Hansel and Gretel? This is the one where Hansel leaves a trail of breadcrumbs for he and his sister to follow back out of the scary woods.
Well, businesses should think of content as this trail of breadcrumbs. You want your prospects to follow this path by consuming each breadcrumb, which leads to the next which leads to the next. But, the breadcrumbs aren't all the same. Some are spicy, some are sweet. Some are big and some are small. They're all slightly different. So, after your prospect has consumed a number of breadcrumbs, you start to learn about his likes and dislikes. You can tell if he's a fast eater or a slow eater. And, you can start to discern whether or not this prospect may like an entire meal that you have cooked back at the house (your ultimate goal - otherwise known as A SALE!!).
Now, the goal with all of these breadcrumbs you leave around is to qualify as well as disqualify potential dinner guests. Who should you spend you're limited time on trying to convince to come over for the full meal?
If you have crafted your content (the breadcrumbs) correctly, you should increase your closing ratio with prospects by simply better understanding his desires, goals, wishes, and characteristics.
Too many companies new to content marketing or marketing automation, just serve up all the breadcrumbs at once or swoop in for the kill after the first breadcrumb - otherwise known as the fog-the-mirror prospecting technique.
Good content marketers understand that each bit of content consumed tells an important part of the story, and use this to increase conversions.
Of course, later on Gretel ends up getting locked in a cage by a witch, but that part didn't really fit my clever metaphor...
Cheers
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