How to Increase Sales and Build Relationships in a Tough Economy Webinar Recap
How to Market During a Pandemic Effectively
Last week we hosted a webinar with the wonderful Zoya, our partner at Hubspot and master of inbound marketing called “How to Increase Sales and Build Relationships in a Tough Economy.” It was chalked full of amazing information about sustainably growing an audience, understanding
To begin, it was important to look at data and understand where we are at in terms of the economy, ad spend, and how we are relating to our customers:
- 69% of brands expect they will decrease their ad spend in 2020
- 41% intent to make use of the momentum or increase their presence online
- 74% are posting less on social media
Where we’ve seen an increase in spending:
-
News, hobbies, technology, education, health & fitness.
Where we’ve seen a decrease in spending:
-
Food & Drink, arts & entertainment, science, sports, travel, gov & politics.
Consider How Building Relationships Have Changed:
Before COVID?
- Networking events, in your offices, conferences, tradeshows, on-site visits, travel?
And now?
- Social media, blogging, email campaigns, marketing & sales automation, video conferences… online!
As Zoya then pointed out, you might realize that everyone is online right now. Your customers are online right now… Which begs the question, where are you?
At this point, we know where we are at, we see what the state of things are and now you must decide, what are you going to do about it? From here, lets cover a few of my favorite quotes from the webinar and what that means for you.
Takeaway 1:
Being more 'inbound' means transforming your marketing strategies into educating strategies and turning your sales process into a valuable service.”
Especially during this time, buyers don’t want to be pushed, demo’d or prospected. They want to be educated, supported, and guided through their buying process. Inbound marketing allows you to build trust with your ideal users by providing helpful content and deliver it at the right time for maximum engagement.
So how do you provide value? You must first ask yourself…
- Who is your customer?
- What do they care about?
- How and/or why do they want to work with you?
Takeaway 2:
You want to add value before you can extract value.
This often brings up the question, how do I know I’m bringing value? That’s where we recommend buyer personas. Zoya shared a ton of information about buyer personas and even shared an example here. You can learn more about personas in our previous blog, but the important thing is, using a persona allows you to understand where your potential customers are looking, how, and what they’re looking for. From there, you can understand what type of content they’re looking for and you can be the one to provide it.
Takeaway 3:
A key component of an inbound sales strategy is connecting with the buyers before they enter the decision stage.
With the growth in popularity of the internet, a lot of people are doing the research before making the decision to buy. They’re looking at social media, reviews, and helpful blogs. So why would you miss out on putting yourself in front of your potential customers earlier on? We recommend time and time again connecting with your audience and one of the best ways to do so is through blogging. Don’t believe us? Check out these stats.
Companies that blog receive 55% more web traffic than companies that do not.
Businesses that blog receives 67% more leads than companies that do not.
This is because you’re providing value earlier on in the cycle and building trust with your end-user.
Takeaway 4:
Focus on providing an experience of helping your prospect make progress in a journey they’ve already begun.
Up to this point, we spoke a lot about inbound marketing. But thinking in terms of inbound can also be in terms of inbound selling.
Inbound selling takes a step back to fully understand the problem that your user is facing. Rather than marketing your business or product generally, knowing their problem can help you better position yourself to share exactly the solution that will help fix your clients problem.
Remember that your buyers are probably drowning in information overload, so helping your prospect along with only the information pertinent to them will help them along in that journey and position you as a trusted advisor for them.
And finally…
Takeaway 5:
Let your prospects set their terms of engagement.
Remember, everyone is different, and especially now people are reacting differently. Some people want to hop on a call right away, while others may be earlier on in their buying process. Your lead capturing should allow for them to choose their level of engagement, that means:
- Don’t force people to call you if they’re not ready
- Leverage a middle ground like live chat
- Use a variety of calls to action
- Use forms and landing pages to gate content and capture more qualified leads as they begin to engage with you and are showing more relevant purchasing signals
- Enable them to help themselves with a base of knowledge through emails, videos, etc.
Now you might ask… how am I supposed to do all this? Where do I start?
The first place to start is thinking about your consumer. Consider your buyer personas and what they’re looking for right now. That’ll be a huge guiding factor in knowing what steps to take next. Maybe it's blogging, maybe it's updating your website content, or maybe it's starting a social media account for your business. Not sure how to start creating your own buyer personas? You can have an agency do them (like us!) or you can try it out yourself with our free template that we're sharing below!
Free Buyer Persona Template
Fill out the form below and you'll automatically download our free template for creating your very own buyer personas.