B2B Marketing: Technology & Call to Actions
00:00:00:22 Welcome to sales exchange where we talk marketing for CEOs who want to maximize their income without sacrificing profits. This is the final episode of marketing fix for CEOs. Follow on from the last video we were talking about some of the basics of direct marketing. So this should be an interesting one so stick around over the years I've
00:00:37:12 come to understand. Not everyone wants to spend hours and hours learning new skills especially when they're already running a company. But I do know that unless a marketing department can hold its own and be able to structure its activities we, as managing directors, will steam in and tell them to do as they're told. Even though we might not be the best people to give those instructions at
00:01:03:20 this moment in time, that moment in time whenever it was, this final video is not about teaching anyone to suck eggs. You know about this then that's that's great, you're in a minority but that's great. But for those who are not quite sure how this all hangs together, let's start with call-to-actions and if you've been following this series the last however long, I've talked about the basics and getting noticed and I
00:01:32:04 mentioned the call to actions, now let's assume all your call to actions worked. And if they didn't by the way, you'd need to keep testing to make sure that your messages increase their success rate. So the person looking at your social media post or advert, needs to know where they are going to be taken when they click on your call to action button. Exactly where they're taken
00:02:03:10 is called post click marketing and this is where landing pages and mini websites come into play. Naturally they're supposed to, you know when they click they're supposed to go to a web page but just make sure you don't send them to another social media page or somebody else's website.
00:02:24:18 And don't, just don't send them to your home page or any other standard page on your website unless it's got all of the attributes that will enable you to connect and engage with that browser, ideally make up a separate landing page that speaks directly to them. By way of a short video or something, something in writing, but make sure it matches the imaging and messages where they've come from.
00:02:53:16 It's is a bit like a fox following a scent. If there's no continuity, it becomes a dead end and then there's a disconnect and they'll lose the scent and they'll click away. For example, if they came from say LinkedIn, use the same image that was used on LinkedIn, use linked him logo, mention LinkedIn in the the body of the text. It's at this point you're able to sell the benefits of what you have to offer and you want to encourage them to give you their name and
00:03:26:16 email address and maybe one other detail, but don't go overboard. The only point of this is that you're asking them for permission to communicate with them in the future. So just getting the basics will definitely be enough. The next time you communicate with them you can ask them for more detail to help you with your ABM strategy or whatever.
00:03:51:05 But basically you need to know who to contact and why. The other alternative is to create mini websites for each of your products or services, especially if you want to approach a specific vertical market
00:04:09:21 It will take a bit longer. But what the whole point of this is narrowing down objections and communicating a very specific message to a given audience. A mini website can be as simple as complex as you want it to be. Starting with things like 'self segmenting home' where people that have been taken to that page can click on the buttons to say yes I'm a CEO or yes I'm technical or yes I'm support and they're taken to a page that
00:04:39:23 speaks directly to their position and persona. Yeah you get the idea. So you've probably heard the expression 'What's In It For Me' throughout all of this you're reinforcing the thought process 'what's in it for me' because the end of the day you've got something of value to give them in exchange for their details like an e-book or a white paper or free offer and so on but it's got to be something worthwhile having once they've
00:05:10:16 bought into you. Now, they're in to your marketing funnel, yes! Now you can execute your marketing plan to communicate with them. Yeah, eventually meet them. Invite them to events to demonstrations and eventually sell to them I want to teach you to suck eggs, but the best way of orchestrating all of this is by using marketing automation platforms or MAPS or whether you use
00:05:45:08 something like Get Response or MailChimp or Marketo. It doesn't matter. These platforms can deliver amazing results through, I kind of describe it as refined analytics and lead scoring stats and complex integration with other platforms like with CRM or mobile push marketing and so on, but marketing automation platforms I think are an absolute essential component
00:06:12:01 that helps maintain continuous engagement with your suspects and prospects and customers way, way beyond any kind of manual effort that you could achieve.
00:06:23:02 The great thing about this technology, I think is the manufacturer's pricing, especially because their platforms are typically based upon the number of records you want to use. So if you're trying to sell to everyone and their dog around the country it'll cost you a fortune, but carefully segmenting your target audience and using persona strategies mini websites and so on you'll be able to target the exact people you want to, and then of course there are the cookies, the
00:06:52:06 cookies to communicate what's actually going on. I mentioned earlier about lead scoring is just a touch on that with the automation platforms. They know who's been on your website what they've looked at and for how long. So when someone downloads a document and gives you their email address, the automation platform can then look back and attribute the history of that
00:07:21:23 browser and give you a clear picture of their behavior. So when all the data is combined you can decide at what point additional information can be sent or when phone calls are made to specific prospects at specific times by specific members of staff. I mean, as far as I'm concerned it doesn't get any better than that. It's all these features work towards creating, i know it's ABM, but it's
00:07:50:15 kind of the ultimate account based marketing platform. That means you, your company, gets to speak to the right people, at the right time, who collectively have the authority to buy your product. Well, that's it, that rounds up this Marketing Fix Series just for CEOs and our own call to action is you can visit our website, download a series of free brochures and of course we'll be asking you for your email address, but not everything, because, as a last thought, if you've created some
00:08:27:02 great content, it is always worthwhile testing to see how much interest is generated by NOT asking for an email address.
00:08:37:07 I mean let's face it, you would have already put your name and telephone number and email and contact details and a raft of different kind of personalized contact details on that content. So anybody reading the literature or content or whatever it, is will know how to get hold of you anyway. So it's important about split testing those two things, anyway... It's just a thought and also finally, if you'd like to talk about your business and your plans for the future and you'd like some advice or direction or some input, you know who to call. That's me I'm Nigel Maine, so thanks for joining me and I'll see you in the