Planning and Creating Systems
In order to start effectively integrating your sales and marketing, you have to start with a plan (one of Spearhead Sales and Marketing’s specialties!). Using the buyer’s journey stages (Awareness, Consideration, and Decision) will help you define what information, tools, and systems would serve you best to increase sales.
Planning
As you move down the sales funnel, your planning pieces become clearer. You must take into consideration:
- Metrics – Visits, leads, proposals, customers/orders, repeat customers/orders, referrals
- Challenges – People (hours + skills), technology, money
- Timing – Why now? A window of opportunity?
- Implication/consequences – What happens if you hit your goals? What happens if you don’t?
Content, Content, Content
When thinking of content creation [content marketing page link], there are many questions (What kind? How much? Who creates it? etc.). But just remember that the content is about your customer. What do they need? Why do they need it? Will it help them? How?
Creating good, relevant content will help with your lead generation program. You must create content that appears where your customer is, so they can see it and it sparks an interest in them to solve their problem(s).
Traffic/conversion
According to Hubspot, companies that have 30 or more landing pages convert 7x more leads than companies that have less than 10 landing pages? More content = more conversions. It’s really that simple. Of course, it takes time, money, and management buy-in to achieve this level of content creation, but the numbers don’t lie.
Type of content
Always stick to the buyer’s journey stages when creating your content. In the Awareness stage, your content should present a problem that your buyer has experienced or can relate to, so your content should offer information or entertainment, seek to gain attention, or ask: “How to know when it’s time to…”
In the Consideration stage, the content should offer a solution. This is where you’re seeking to convert the buyer by offering helping or a “how-to” guide, providing a form to fill out or writing content that demonstrates: “What to expect when…”
Lastly, in the Decision stage of the buyer’s journey, is when you present your “why us?” statement to the buyer. Your salespeople should be guiding the buyer to become a customer. It’s also an opportunity to offer validation of your product/service and any case studies, test results, etc. to prove your case.
Automation = Results
Using sales and marketing automation tools also helps you focus on an oft-forgotten step in the sales funnel: Delight
Serve your customers so well that they provide repeat and referral business. You can implement automated appreciation, upselling, cross-selling, and social monitoring programs that keep your customers engaged with you after the initial sale.
Marketing automation technology will make all of these steps easier so you can spend time actually serving your customers. Tools such as Hubspot, ONTRAPORT and SEMRush are at the heart of Spearhead’s marketing and sales practices. They streamline our work and give our clients a leg up on their competition – not to mention conversion rates are as high as 50%!
Contact us today to experience how Spearhead Sales and Marketing brings maximum, sustainable impact to businesses that are dedicated to optimized sales and growth. We focus on tailored programs in both the traditional and digital spaces that maximize relationship building, lead generation, innovative marketing technology tools, sales partnerships, digital services, and strategic planning and development to build your customer base and close sales. Spearhead will be your agency of record for record-breaking performance!