Cold calling is hard! Technology makes screening too easy and calls are rarely returned. Many look to email campaigns for the solution, but fall short because generic, spray & pray, emails are not targeted to recipients. The sales process is a series of stages, and as prospects move through each stage their interests and motivations change. Nurture marketing is a way to engage with prospects by providing relevant content until they are ready for sales. Nurture campaigns are designed to bring leads and customers to the next stage of the sales cycle, and one step closer to becoming a loyal customer/advocate. Here are some campaigns to help you build your Nurture Marketing Strategy.
Awareness
You have a terrific product or service that solves a problem. Customers love it but prospects don’t think they have an issue. Create an awareness campaign to send a stream of messages to let them know they may have a problem. It could be frequent price increases, lack of spend control, or maybe how their community is being negatively affected by non-local competitors. Messages can be conveyed via email, social media, website, and sales calls (sales engagement is critical). Every interaction should include a call to action (CTA) such as “Learn More” or “Download a Free Ebook or Guide”. Contacts who respond positively are ready for the next stage.
Consideration
Prospects entering the consideration stage now think they have an issue, and ready to evaluate solutions. This is where you get to convey the benefits of your product or service, or how you solve the problem more efficiently and effectively than your competitors. Try to include success stories in your messaging that will resonate (people love stories). Calls to action should focus on a demo, presentation, or trial order.
Decision
Your prospect has seen a demo/presentation and responded positively. Sales is closely involved, ready to make a proposal, and you want to help them seal the deal. This is where many opportunities lose steam. Messages should reinforce your value proposition while expediting the decision making process. CTAs could include extra discounts for signing before a deadline. Make sure to personalize emails to come from the salesperson to build the relationship.
Customer Success
Congratulations you have a new customer! This is a critical time to keep them engaged on their journey to become loyal advocates. Start off with welcome, onboarding, and training to avoid first order issues. Reinforce your value proposition by offering how-to, best practices, and account reviews. Reward customers for loyalty and referrals. Surveys are a great way to solicit feedback to find out how you are doing to proactively respond to issues. Feature customer/advocates in case studies to create content for awareness and consideration campaigns.
Sales & Marketing Alignment
Sales involvement is a key contributor to campaign success, and they need to fully embrace the process and messaging. Involve sales in campaign creation and meet regularly to review results. Create ground rules by clearly defining roles and expectations. What type of engagement determines when a lead is ready for sales? What are expectations for response times and task completion? Alignment makes for a more consistent and enjoyable customer experience.
See How Sugar Market Makes Nurture Marketing Easy
Marketing Automation
Nurturing campaigns are a great way to stay close to prospects and customers, but can be extremely labor intensive without the proper tools. Marketing automation solutions such as Sugar Market help marketers manage campaigns by making it easy to build and schedule content. Automated listeners track sales, email, website, event, and social media activity, to make sure contacts are subscribed to relevant campaigns based on their engagement. CRM integration gives sales a view into marketing activity to help them have more productive conversations. Advanced analytics measure campaign return on investment for every email, post, form, or landing page. Marketing automation software is a must have tool for a rapidly growing number of marketing organizations, playing a critical role in the digital transformation journey.
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